British climber Kenton Cool summits Everest for record 20th time
The veteran mountaineer extends his own mark for the most Everest ascents by a non-Sherpa, adding another milestone to a career that includes the first “Everest Triple Crown” and a historic Olympic mission.
British mountaineer Kenton Cool has climbed Mount Everest for the 20th time, further extending his own record for the most successful ascents by a non-Sherpa climber, officials said Friday.
Cool reached the summit at around 4 am local time, according to Khimlal Gautam, coordinator of the Department of Tourism’s field office at Everest base camp.
The all-time record for most Everest summits is held by Kami Rita Sherpa, who scaled the peak for the 32nd time earlier this season.
Cool is the first person in history to complete the ‘Everest Triple Crown’ — the peaks of Everest, Nuptse and Lhotse — in one continuous push from base camp. He remains the only non-Sherpa to have summited Everest 19 times, a figure he has now increased to 20, and was the first non-Asian to climb Everest twice in one week.
In 2012, Cool was selected to fulfil ‘The Olympic Games Pledge’, a century-old promise made by Great Britain to Baron Pierre de Coubertin to place a 1924 Olympic gold medal on the Everest summit. That mission was completed four weeks before the London 2012 opening ceremony.
He is also the only Briton to have ever skied down two 8,000-metre mountains and has been nominated for the Piolet D’Or — often called the climbing Oscars — for a route on Annapurna III.
