Dead dogs in the Dolomites

The first redpoint ascent of a project that has meant a lot to you is always a special moment. Particularly if two old foxes of the Dolomites: Manolo and Riccardo Scarian are involved. For several reasons. First of all because the two friends aren’t exactly “inexperienced”. And then because we are speaking about big capabilities, high quality rock and strong desire to climb. In the summer of 2003 we saw the first concrete results, when the two climbers established Cani Morti, a 200-meter route on the North Face of Campanile Basso di Lastei, in the Pale di San Martino.The route has been strictly equipped from the ground up, following an ethic that requests the use of bolts only, avoiding any other kind of protection. That means climbing into the unknown, pushing the limits, skyhooks to hang on and to put in the bolts and then be ready again for a new battle. Because it was really a kind of war. A conflict with your own limits, a confrontation with your psychophysical capabilities. Manolo and Riccardo have won this challenge, day after day, without hurrying too much. Establishing the route they confirmed the validity of the initial intuition, first analyzing the wall with the binoculars and then climbing it, finding a free climbing route. But the game ended worthily only about a year later, when the same line was redpointed. They managed to do it together, on the same day, and during the same attempt. Which better seal of a story of climbing and friendship? Our friend Vinicio Stefanello tells us about it, collecting the impressions of the two protagonists.
Oscar Durbiano

First redpoint of “Cani Morti” by Manolo and Scarian
On August 26, 2004 Maurizio “Manolo” Zanolla and Riccardo “Sky” Scarian have (both) realized the first free ascent of “Cani Morti”, a route they equipped in the summer 2003 on the North Face of Campanile Basso di Lastei, Pale di San Martino. Scarian says: “ This route has been equipped from the ground up, with a strict and clean ethic, without reconnaissance from above, without the help of nuts and friends or something else, and without fixed ropes for the redpoint”. Manolo explains: “The choice of using only bolts and excluding any other means of protection seemed us the most honest possible. The bolts now and then would have protected us, but also pointed out indelibly our weakness”.
What Manolo and Sky have tried to do was an attempt to find their own limits through a significant “style”: a personal choice, first of all, therefore that goes further than the considerable difficulty of the route (8b+ maximum difficulty and 8a mandatory) and the really low number of the used bolts (climbers pay attention!)
Vinicio Stefanello/Planet Mountain

PROTECTION AND WEAKNESS
Interview to Manolo

Cani Morti: what are we speaking about?
The summit of Campanile Piccolo di Lastei is about 2700 meters high. Its north face isn’t longer than 300 meters, this isn’t a big Dolomites face, but it isn’t also a sunny crag, easy to reach in a few minutes. Let’s say: Cani Morti is a wonderful route, on this mountain with an unbelievably elegant shape, in an alpine location that is clearly something very particular. First of all Cani Morti represents the desire to experience a story on a mountain that means something to me. An attempt to understand what it means to make a new ascent from the ground up, ethically correct, without reconnaissance, trying to move near your limits using bolts and power drill to put them in, without fixed ropes and of course without the certainty of success. Cani Morti has been also an ironic attempt to say something concrete and new. Therefore nothing better than this small and fascinating face to begin with.

How did you get the idea?
The particular shape of these towers has always attracted me, but the compactness of the rock, that was an attraction, at the same time repelled pitons and foolish ambitions. I have never tried to climb a wall with aid at any cost and all my efforts concentrated on free climbing it. It is understandable that I renounced, if it was so impossible to protect the extreme difficulties. The bolts could be a compromise. …but that subtle line through the wall seemed more a dream than a possibility. Also if that line was fascinating, the idea to try it “on sight” with normal protections from the ground up seemed straight away exaggerated for my possibilities. To tell the truth, looking from the talus, it seemed exaggerated also to think about climbing there. Well, we could only try. And the choice was to do it in the cleanest way possible.

Style more important than the technique?
I believe that there is a big difference between establishing a new route with a lot of normal pitons and other progression means (like friends, nuts, skyhooks, etc) or to fight and try to free climb and reach the unknown on your fingertips, also if protected by a bolt. The choice to use only bolts and to exclude any other means of protection seemed the most honest possible: the few bolts would have protected us but also indelibly signaled our weakness… All the rest would have been absolutely free climbed.

Bolts equal safety, how many versions has this statement?
I don’t believe that bolts mean absolute safety. Safety comes first of all from the preparation and experience, and from the capacity to renounce and to understand unavoidable limits that also unavoidably move. The mountains still offer us the great possibility to experience something extraordinary; to transform them in a safe place wouldn’t only mean to lose them, but also to cancel an important and deep part of our culture.

How did you apply all this on Cani Morti?
Certainly this route (despite the extreme mandatory difficulty, 8a) doesn’t claim to be the hardest and most dangerous in the Dolomites, evidently it can’t even be it, as it is protected by bolts. But objectively, I wouldn’t be sincere if I compared it with a crag route in high elevations. Thinking about it now, when you get pumped, and you are holding yourself only with your bare hands, you can make a very long fall, and in a couple of sections of Cani Morti it is definitely very dangerous to do it. I found very engaging to climb such difficulties, also from the mental point of view, particularly in a first ascent. I believe, as I already said, that it is possible to make it much better: this has been our “first experience”. We have had to learn fast also if the kind of rock and the sequence of the difficulties was favorable.

What did this route request from you?
After having equipped the route everything was ready, two 60-meters ropes and 6 quickdraws were enough, but strangely this lightweight equipment didn’t give me so much tranquility. This route was engaging also because it had remained in my dreams (or in my nightmares) the entire winter and the personal commitment to free climb it, after the endless physical misadventures, became always heavier, particularly when I thought about that damned far away, last hold of the first pitch. Also excluding my age as a reason, unfortunately I am not able to move on such difficulties with disenchanted self-assurance, not even with the bolts, particularly when pure power is requested. And up there, for me, all my power was necessary, and another factor were the weather conditions, totally different from the ones of last year. But the ambition and the tension were double: both of us had to free the route! And that hasn’t certainly been easy.

A project for two climbers, what does that mean?
May be it means to share and participate in an incredibly strong way, until your emotional spheres overlap. I believe that these are deep experiences, strongly bound to the intensity and sometimes to the danger of the action and that only in the mountains I have had the occasion to experience.

Your projects after Cani Morti?
When, during the first ascent, the last two pitches revealed to be much easier than expected, I was kind of deceived, but when I started to work to free climb the route, honestly I told me that for this time it could be enough. What there will be in the future for me, I don’t know… my ID suggests beer.
Vinicio Stefanello/Planet Mountain

TWO FRIENDS ONE CHALLENGE
Considerations of Riccardo Scarian
It was the end of December 2003: thinking about the just finished year I tried to analyze what I had done or I hadn’t done, and if it had been a good year for my climbing. That means: am I satisfied or not, and where and why haven’t I reached the results I wanted? After making this analysis, my mind went already to the future; I thought about what I wanted to do, the objectives I wanted to reach. I like too many aspects of this wonderful vertical dance, and therefore, often, I am obliged to make some choice. My first objective had been the Gladiator, (8c+ in Fonzaso, BL), a project from the year before: luckily in two weeks, in the cold January 2004 I managed to free climb it; and then I could concentrate on something else: this year I wanted to concentrate a little more on one of my big loves, bouldering; I wanted to get a good result in the World Cup in Fiera di Primiero, where I live. With this spirit I decided to go to Fontainebleau, the Mecca of bouldering, a wonderful world for boulderers. I came back home very loaded and in the first Coppa Italia competition I got an encouraging second place that gave me hope. My energies were now concentrated on the World Cup of Fiera di Primiero. Everything was right, good shape, strong determination. But just a day before the competition a bad surprise: I got sick, and two months of hard training were for nothing. I spent a month cursing but there was nothing to do and I couldn’t find an explanation, this is life and you can’t hang too much on a plan. So I started straight away to work to recover my power, already looking for the next crimpers. In my thoughts there was a wall in the Dolomites, with a special line, a not yet finished project: Cani Morti, equipped with Manolo in 2003 and not yet freed. Of course it isn’t easy to transfer in a short period from bouldering to climbing a Dolomite wall; the movements are may be the same, but the physical and especially mental efforts are totally different. I am lucky, to be rather flexible in this aspect, and I can adapt easily to the different situations. I am under the wall, I observe the elegant line, and I think back to some moments during the first ascent. One of them was a fight, almost one day long, to solve that mandatory 8a. Just a number on the paper, but it hides intense moments and deep emotions, made of tries, falls, barely missed holds, sequences to discover and to understand, that two friends have decided to challenge. A beautiful story that has nothing heroic or mythical in it, but for me it had a deep meaning, to discovere which is your limit and how much can you push it, and ask, can we go further? Sure! “Impossible is nothing”, as a famous advertising explains. I want to point out that this route has been equipped from the ground up, with a strict and clean ethic, without reconnaissance from above, without the help of nuts, friends or something else, and without fixed ropes for the redpoint. While equipping the route and redpointing it I was struck by the mental and physical energy that you need when you climb with this ethic, that means when the protection isn’t just below your knee. I mean, we are more “mountaineers” when the bolt is 5 meters under your feet, than when there is a line of bolts every half meter, may be reinforced rappelling from above. On August 23, 2004 Manolo and I have made the first redpoint, both of us leading the route.

CAMPANILE BASSO DI LASTEI, PALE DI SAN MARTINO
Via Cani Morti
First ascent: Riccardo Scarian and Maurizio "Manolo" Zanolla, in the summer 2003, climbing from the ground up, using only a few bolts. First free ascent: Riccardo Scarian and Maurizio "Manolo" Zanolla, on August 23, 2004. Difficulty: max 8b+, mandatory 8a
1° pitch: 23 meters long, 7 meters overhanging, (4 bolts); the difficulty is 8b/8b+, in this pitch mandatory 8a. 2° pitch: around 8a/8a+, 4 bolts on 33 meters, 4-5 meters overhanging, wonderful endurance pitch on awesome rock. 3° pitch: difficulty 8a, 6 protections on 35 meters, it is also overhanging and is very beautiful. 4° pitch: 7b, 55 meters (3 bolts) 5° and last pitch: diff. 6c+, 50 meters (2 bolts). Descent: Easy rappels along the route, equipped belays. Attention: while rappelling, on the first three pitches, it is necessary to clip the draws, to be sure to reach the wall! Gear: two ropes and 6 quickdraws. Approach: From Falcade to the village Molina, from the camping place take the trail to Mulaz Hut until the cabin Focobon (bivouac possibility). From there reach the San Lucan Col, then traverse the north slope along ledges and easy rocks, until under the edge of the Campanile.