Fraudulent Speed Record on Aconcagua?

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A few weeks back I posted this blog entry on Jorge Egocheaga’s record speed ascent on Aconcagua. The orginal article was posted at MountEverest.net, which is a part of the Explorers Web Network.

Apparently, since the orginal article was released, there have been some questions in regards to the authenticity of the record. The following letter has been sent to ExWeb, Climbing.com, and Everest News, and was posted in the comments section of my original post:

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Hello ExplorersWeb,

Regarding Jorge’s claimed record of Aconcagua, in your article you write:

“He covered the distance between Valle de Horcones summit and back in 14 hours, 5 minutes and 54 seconds – almost one hour faster than previous.”

Actually, the previous record claim by Holmes was 20hrs 35min from Horcones to the summit and back. So Jorge is claiming he beat Holmes by 6hrs 30mins, not “almost one hour”.

Also, Holmes reached the summit in 13hrs he claimed, and Jorge in 7hrs:52mins, so Jorge says he beat Holmes to the summit by 5 hours 8 minutes.

Once source for this, Climbing Magazine: http://www.climbing.com/news/hotflashes/aconcaguaspeed06/

You comment re Jorge is shy and modest about his records and doesn’t promote himself. He lets others do it for him and agressively so. And he knows they will, this is why he quickly reports his record-claims to them immediately – and then they go to the press immediately to promote him. If Jorge wasn’t interested in self-promotion he wouldn’t advertise his record claims wouldn’t tell anyone — or, would tell his friends to absolutely not tell any press. An agressive self-promoter strategically giving the impression he isn’t so. Exactly like Chad K. and many others in this specialized field. Incredible and crafty, and much like Chad Kellogg who is perhaps the most astounding multi-fraud committer in world history for speed records, most notably and increduously for Denali in 2003 and also Rainier (twice, 1998 and 2004).

You try to make it look like there is verification for his record — you write —
“It’s a small BC – no way to keep it secret”
However, this means nothing about whether the key points of his climb were in fact a secret, namely (1) his start, (2) the summit, (3) his finish. All are totally unwitnessed, no photos, no timers. Has Jorge submitted any start, summit, or finish photos, especially summit photos? No press covering this to date has published any. Can you request from him who witnessed him start at Horcones way below BC, who saw him at the summit, if he has any summit photos, and who saw him finish, and to provide all of these people’s names and contact information.

At least Holmes has a summit photo and summit witnesses http://www.mounteverest.net/news.php?id=1561. Although many considered Holmes’s report to beat Benegas’s round-trip record by 2hrs:25mins was very suspicous in light of Benegas’s proven distinguished athletic performances in competitive endurance sports. This is not the case in any sense with Holmes or Jorge. Benegas reported 23hrs roundtrip (can’t find any reports of his summit split time).

So Jorge is also reporting he beat Benegas round-trip by 8hrs:55mins.

It is thought that Jorge’s record claim is highly fradulent.

These 7 summit record claims, from the horrific Sherpa (the most recent record claimer Pemba Dorji being jailed for months due to his direct involvement in a horrible kidnapping/ransom scam), Chad Kellogg, Sean Burch’s proven fradulent Kilimanjaro climb (http://www.teamkilimanjaro.co.uk/seanburch.html), and it appears Christan Stangl has been engaging in fraud on several major peaks including submitting summit photos of only his head with no mountain surface or background shown, also the absence of summit photos on many major peaks like Everest where it is very standard and expected for such historic events, and how Stangl was challenged to enter the Elbrus race after claiming an Elbrus record (he entered and promoted his entry, then bowed out at the last minute despite his entry being publicized on many major international websites).

The sport is a mockery. Seems it does a substantial number of climbers (whether speed climbers or not) are just very dishonest people who very often embellish, lie, deceive, conjure, etcetra.
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As you can see, there are some serious questions as to the authenticity of the claims on the speed record. The fact that there are no summit pictures, or witnesses, sure does make it seem rather fishy. I’m not sure who the orginal author of this letter is, but if anyone has more information or anything else to share, I’m sure the climbing community would like to get to the bottom of this controversy.

I’ll post more as it becomes available.

Kraig Becker

11 thoughts on “Fraudulent Speed Record on Aconcagua?”

  1. I’ve been looking into all of this since this article. The Chad Kellogg fraud cases are ASTOUNDING actually. It took a while to sift through all of the clearly biased celebration (lots of press, Explorersweb.com, even Climbing.com and many Washington papers). I’ll gather the reports on Chad Kellogg and post them here.
    The first proof against him is from his own summit-register-inscription. A famous Portland speed climber (officiated speed climber) actually got the summit-register page from the National Archives, September 1998, and there was Kellogg’s signature and time-inscription “4:20” referring to 4hrs 20mins. He then descended the peak down 9 miles to the bottom and literally ran to the press and his king-pin Mike Gauthier (Rainier National Park lead ranger), and told them his time was 3 HOURS 26 MINUTES! And that his round-trip time (up and down) was 5hrs 6mins 54secs.

    No one ever got the summit register page until 2004, after which many detailed well written disputes on the internet were done, causing outrage among the community associated with Kellogg (large community of mainly Internet personas, anonymous usernames that talk to each other’s anonymous names, but, also some high ranking people like Mike Gauthier (author and Rainier Ranger). They all underwent embarrasingly pathetic obsessive posting on cascadeclimbers summitpost mt-whitney.info, supertopo.com, mountainzone.com, etc). Incredible. The webmasters couldn’t tollerate anything said about Kellogg and instead went on the attack against his accuser. Embarrasing themselves and showing their true colors.

    Anyway I have most of the reports now including the summit register page. Can I post pictures here and past reports.

    Kellogg’s Denali claim has the most astounding proof against it as noted here a few times I see.

    Team Kilimanjaro does reject Kellogg’s Denali, and, Rainier claims.
    Bill Wright author of “Speed Climbing” is the first and last person so far to write on his site that he believes Kellogg’s 1998 Rainier claim “is bogus, I don’t consider it the record.” Really amazing coming from Wright http://www.wwwright.com (look in Rainier speed record section).

    More in a bit.

  2. I can send you all the reports as well rather than post them in the comment area. In this way you’ll have original email copies (such as from Kellogg’s reported Denali timers, showing they timed nothing despite that he told ExplorersWeb that they did, the emails from Lisa Roderick and Mark Westman (the Denali Rangers at the time) show 1 they are good friends of Kellogg’s, 2 he never asked them to time him, 3 calling via CB radio from the summit he told Mark that Lisa timed him at the start and that his time was 14hr22min; he never asked Mark to document the time of day, Mark simply proceed to convey this time-claim 14:22 to the press and others who asked, Chad told the press that it was in Mark and Lisa’s hands, Lisa said she couldn’t remember when Chad started, that Chad never asked her to time him. An unbelievable story, yet never covered except by USA Mountain Speed Climbing in 2004. More unbelievable is Kellogg has provided hugely from this, sponsors, repeated press (they continue many times a year to report this Denali “record”). Gary Scott the 1985 Denali record holder rejects Kellogg’s report to beat his (Scott’s) record. (Scott has a website, I’ll find it in a bit, he’s in Colorado).

  3. Feel free to post any links you have. I would be interested in taking a look at what you’ve found.

  4. I’ll email you the photo copies, email copies, statements from Team Kilimajaro, Summit Journal, Gary Scott (80’s Denali record holder), Denali National Park’s chief ranger Roger Robinson, etc. Plus all of the discussion.

    Of recent note is the furry of record-claims by Christian Stangl in the last year. Astounding cases against him, including for his North Face Everest speed record claim (with no O2), witness or timers at any point, for his Mt. Elbrus record-claim, no witness or timers, his summit photo is only of his face (shows no summit or any background surface features (similar to Chad Kellogg’s Khan Tengri self-photo, up close of only the face and no surface, Kellogg claimed to climb it solo to the summit (no witnesses, all climbers were down for the season, no fixed lines were set according to Asia Tour, many think he went up a ways and took a photo with only his face and lied in order to add this to he resume.

    I’ll gather all these photos and everything else and email them to your profile email address (gmail). Might take a little while.

  5. Hello Guys
    About Holmes"S record 20 Hrs 20 minutes im sure is not Fraudulent because more then one expeditions saw him on the top also you can si the photos in everestnews.net also hi did from gate summit gate ., about Jorge hi did with support nobody saw him on the top , and hi did from Puente Durazno ,NOT FROM GATE

  6. There is a documentary about this record available at YouTube:
    Aconcagua, más que un record (I) – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3ZL4lwWcIEQ

    Aconcagua, más que un record (II) – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JCdQ6pGWS8Y

    Aconcagua, más que un record (III) – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QIYZ8RRADL4

    Aconcagua, más que un record (IV) – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fAnir95H_FE

    Of course, a video can be edited, but still you have images of (1) the start, (2) summit, and (3) finish in Horcones.

    You also have the other official record by Carlos Sá in 14 hours and 52 minutes (http://carreraspormontana.com/noticias/carlos-sa-registra-un-nuevo-record-oficial-de-ascenso-y-descenso-al-aconcagua). So I think Holmes record was simply destroyed unless Carlos Sá was also a fraud.

    Jorge Egocheaga is also known for this new in K2 – http://www.explorersweb.com/everest_k2/news.php?id=18604

    when he recognized to stopped 12 meters from the K2's highest point when he could have taken a picture and say that he made summit. Should he not recognize this fact he would be in the list of the 14 8.000-ers. I believe he has a controversial history for not going into the record fights, but I think he is as honest as to admit when he gets or not an achievement.

    Jorge Egocheaga is a well-known himalayist. I don't know any other merit from Holmes Pantoja.

  7. iRunFar.com
    13 min · Modifié ·

    Kilian Jornet has reset the Cerro Aconcagua round-trip speed record with a time of 12 hours and 49 minutes.

    He began at the Horcones entrance to the national park, where speed records have traditionally begun, which is located at roughly 2,750 meters (9,022 feet) above sea level, ascending to the 6,962-meter (22,841-foot) summit. The roundtrip distance is over 50 miles (80 kilometers).

    Kilian broke both the informal/incompletely documented record of Jorge Egocheaga who claimed he did the route in 13 hours, 46 minutes, and 19 seconds in 2006 and the record of Carlos Sá whose effort from 2013 was documented at 15 hours and 42 minutes.

    (via Summits of my life)

    Photo: Summits of My Life

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