Nominations for the Alpinist of the Year 2020 are:
For first ascents (team nominations):
Ben Dare – South Face Pyramid Peak – ‘Frost Flower’ grade 6-, VI, (1200 m), solo, July 2020
Ruari Macfarlane and George Loomes – ‘Shooting Tahr’ grade 5+, IV (500m), South Face Mt Aspiring, July 2020
Ruari Macfarlane, Maddy Whittaker, Jaz Morris – ‘Antics’ grade 5, III (500m), South Face Mt Joffre, July 2020
Gavin Lang and Ruari Macfarlane – first Torres-Tasman traverse in winter, June 2020
Petrouchka Steiner-Grierson, Bia Boucinhas, Owen Lee, Chris Tipper – ‘Nota14lol’ grade 5, II (300m), Mt Humdinger, June 2020
Gavin Lang and Sooji Clarkson – new route on South Face Mt Aspiring
Ruari Macfarlane – solo new route on south face Vampire
Gavin Lang and Ruari Macfarlane – new route on Malte Brun
For first ascents (individual nominations):
Gavin Lang – for the efforts above
Ruari Macfarlane – for the efforts above
Ben Dare – for ‘Frost Flower’ on Pyramid
For significant repeats:
Alastair McDowell and Ben Mangan – Curver Neo Classic, South Face Mt Hicks, July 2020
Rose Pearson and Alastair McDowell – Aoraki GT in sub-24 hours, Mt Aspiring NW Ridge in sub-12 hours, summer 2020
Reg Measures and Rose Pearson – ‘Pilgrim’ Shiela Face Aoraki / Mt Cook first repeat, September 2019
Other notable climbs considered but not nominated:
Merry Schimanski, Daniel Joll, and others – ‘Mile High Club’ 700m, 20p, 24 C2, Milford Sound Airport Wall, and another ground-up new route at Copper Point. Copper Point has also seen a string of good new routes developed by Bruce Dowick, Jon Seddon, Steve Fortune and Llewellyn Murdoch.