Simon Messner, Martin Sieberer discover L Pilaster Desmincià on Sass Rigais in Dolomites

This climb begins not now, in 2020, but fifty years ago when Reinhold Messner traced a thin line onto a black and white photograph of the west face of Sass Rigais. It is here, in the remarkable Geislerspitzen massif, that years earlier the young Messner had first started climbing, but despite all his impressive ascents across the Dolomites in the ensuing years, for one reason or another the route line remained nothing more than a intuition.

This idea was finally transformed into reality by his son, Simon Messner, who teamed up with Martin Sieberer on 29 July to check out the lefthand side of the NW Face of Sass Rigais in order to climb an obvious pillar they now called L Pilaster Desmincià, the forgotten pillar. Although the rock is rather loose on the lower and upper section, the central part of the route contains rock that is "pure joy." The crux pitch contains one VII- section, while the rest of the climb is considerably easier. Wires, cams up to #3 and 2 or 3 pegs are required for a repeat, as are slings, although most threads have been left insitu.

"The route is an alpine undertaking but still easier than expected. We left one peg insitu on the crux, removed one of our pegs and found one on the lower section. This was the only sign of passage, we presume it belongs to an aborted attempt" Simon told planetmountain.com. "Nonetheless I am happy. It is a new route on a piece of rock that was almost forgotten about. For me it holds above all an emotional value."

L Pilaster Desmincià is Simon Messner’s fourth route on the north-west face of Sass Rigais. In 2016 with Philipp Prünster he established three routes on the buttress called Kirchdach, located immediately to the right of the pillar.

TOPO: L Pilaster Desmincià, Geislerspitzen, Dolomites

Link: www.simon-messner.com, FB Simon Messner