Heiko Queitsch greenpoint climbing in the Frankenjura

“The first person to start greenpointing was Wolfgang Güllich in the 1980’s…” This, in short, is how the Grünpunkt climbing movement began in Germany's Frankenjura, that art of climbing sport routes which ignores the bolts and instead relys on natural protection in the form of nuts and camming devices

The route climbed by Güllich was Welzenbach Gedächnisweg, a great 7c+ repeated greenpoint by Heiko Queitsch who, as we reported last year, had also greenpointed some superb classics such as Fight Gravity (7b, Kurt Albert) and Chasin the Trane (7c, John Bachar).

In the meantime Queitsch has continued in much the same vein, sending other Albert routes which marked important moments in the development of sport climbing in Germany, such as Magnet (first ascended in 1982 and at the time widely considered one of the hardest climbs in the world) and Power of Love.

Recently Queitsch has made the first ascent of Dragon Mouth F7c/+ and he states that interest is growing in this greenpoint movement - the first ascent of Archon 8b by Patrick Matros is a case in point - and with many more projects in the bag, this should prove an interesting summer.