Kazakhstan mountain climbers win gold High Altitude Mountaineering World Championship

    Three renowned Kazakhstan mountain climbers have won the gold in the Mountaineering World Championship in the High Altitude competition class, Vesti.kz reports. Vassily Pivtsov (team leader), Ildar Gabassov and Alexander Sofrygin scored 7 points for their ascent of Khan Tengri peak (6 995 meters) along the center of the North Face, a 6B difficulty route.
    They made the ascent on August 12-20. It was the first successful climb of the mountain’s North Face since 2005.
    A direct line on the wall has never been climbed by a westerner, a mountain climber outside the former Soviet Union. The route posed a serious challenge even for the seasoned climbers from mountainous Kazakhstan like Pivtsov, Gabassov and Sofrygin. Especially since conditions were definitely not favorable this season, www.tengrinews.kz states.