Roger’s Pass Horseshoe FKT

The NW Ridge of Sir Donald with Terminal N to the right - photo by Matthew Tufts

Alone on the ridge, all day, not a soul to be seen, no one to see me. That’s what it’s all about. An important and powerful experience shared between the mountains and myself. A reflection of how I’ve been treating myself - how I’ve been training. That’s what movement in the mountains is. The mountains provide a reflection of the strength conjured in the years, months and days leading up to an objective. They can’t be fooled.

That’s sport isn’t it? Well, maybe not.

Correction - that’s likely mountain sports. The distinction comes with exposure and its consequences.

During my Roger’s Pass Horseshoe effort, I didn’t see a single person. Nor did a single person likely see me. A little human with red shirt and black 3/4 tights weaving through the rock along ridge lines. Following a movement with a flow for the purpose of finding the reflection-how have I been treating myself, how have I been training?

It’s not just about the physical training, but the mental in an objective like this. You have to hang your butt over the edge more than a few times, so doubt? Nope. A continuous movement throughout the day for the purpose of finding what my body and mind could accomplish.

The sunrise atop Avalanche, looking out towards Eagle, Uto and Sir Donald

I had a beautiful day on the Roger’s Pass Horseshoe. Albeit, it started out very smoky. That’s becoming the normality of summer - particularly in Canada. As I crested the summit of Avalanche (peak #1 of 14), I had developed a bit of a smoker’s cough. The thought “fumar mata” (smoking kills) and the anti-tobacco advertisements in Spain went through my mind. I kid - but it’s good to have some lightness and laughter on a solo effort such as this. Especially when you’re inhaling smoke on an effort such as this.

Why do it on this day with the smoke you may ask: well the 30º C temps were melting the snow quickly and I wanted to have as much coverage during my solo crossing of the Illecillewaet and Asulkan glaciers. Especially for the sporty slide down the 50 classic ski descent, 7 Steps, in my approach shoes (specifically the tx2 evo).

Looking back at Rampart, Dome, and the Jupiter Group from Afton, with Swanzy to the right and the Dawson Group in the backdrop to the left (from a different day out)

Okay, let me back up and provide a brief overview of the Roger’s Pass Horseshoe. It’s a route that is actually a loop, which traverses two prominent ridgelines above the Asulkan and Illecillewaet Valleys in the Selkirks of British Columbia. There are 14 summits along the route all consisting of beautiful black quartzite that provide stellar climbing and ridge running. The first ridge traverses 6 summits from North to South (Avalanche, Eagle, Uto, Sir Donald, Terminal N, Terminal S). To reach the latter ridge, known as the Asulkan Traverse, you cross the Illecillewaet Neve to reach Young’s Peak, and descend/traverse the Asulkan Glacier to reach Asulkan Pass. From here, hop back onto the ridge to traverse the latter 7 summits from South to North: Leda, Pollux, Castor, Dome, Rampart, Afton and Abbott. The route is roughly 49km with 5,200m of vertical gain – that’s what my Coros Vertix 2 calculated.

The Avalanche, Eagle, Uto, Sir Donald, Terminals ridge line (from a different day out watching the sunrise)

Now back to my report on the day I had out.

Of course, the smoke was a bad thing and not ideal, but some of these FKTs have so many little variables you have to line up that there never will be a ‘perfect’ time. Are you recovered? No. Is the smoke clear? Not at all. How’s the snow coverage? Rather good. And the weather. It’s not raining, so perfect. For me that meant it was send time.

Even with the smoker’s cough developing atop Avalanche, I continued on in a steady manner finding a magnificent flow in the dream state blurred sunrise over Eagle, Uto, and Sir Donald. Rather quickly I found myself halfway up the NW ridge of Sir Donald with the smoke layer beneath me. I was six hours in at this point with a blue sky above and a breeze coming in blowing the smoke away for the latter part of the effort.

The down climb of the SW ridge on Uto requires quite a bit of focus, but traversing Sir Donald over to the Terminals is definitely the part of the day that required the most focus. The NW ridge gives and gives, truly it is too fun. For those curious about the Horseshoe, I do recommend climbing the Sir Donald NW ridge with a significant amount of respect. It’s a large ridge. I found myself pushing a bit harder than I would have liked because I was enjoying myself too much. So, I stopped at the 3/4 point and just sat there for 7 minutes to let my HR cool down and take the only still moment of the day. It was beautiful, but no time for hesitation - onwards.

Descending Sir Donald was interesting to say the least – I’ve heard some other stories here ha. Namely the tails from Taylor Sullivan’s FKT on the route from last year. I won’t get into the details of his dealings here. But boy, isn’t this the magical part of some of these long mountain running/alpine rock FKT routes: a kerfuffle likely will arise, and how you deal will make it or break it. The fast and light style plays with the edge in what sometimes is an uncomfortable way.

Anyways, there are three rappels you must do to get off Sir Donald. The first is an abseil to the ‘hanging waterfall station.’ I made it here easily with my 60-meter pur line, started pulling the rope and it caught. Shit. Let the kerfuffle begin. I was hanging there with rather minimal gear – doing the fast and light style – in my running shorts, harness, atc and two slings. Attached to the anchor with not much more other than a pack filled with Maurtens and rice/sweet potato burritos (an inreach too of course). I started absolutely yanking on that rope. My life line. About 40 meters of the 60 had come through, and after 10 minutes of full gas yanking from different angles had passed. It was time to problem solve. I needed to cut the rope, so I looked at a sharp fin of quartzite in front of my face, gave the pur line a few good passes on the knife-like rock and about 10 seconds later…pop. My 60-meter rope was now a 40. The second rappel was fine with that length. The third involved some additional down climbing that felt like 5.10-. It’s hard to grade something like this onsite while moving quickly.

Nice to have the rappels over with a crippled rope.

There was still snow on the traverse to the Terminals, so I engaged my crampons and made the balancy firm snow crossing across the exposed slope to the low 5th rather loose dihedral above the typical traverse to gain the ridge of North Terminal. Often times these routes become the ‘choose your own adventure’ sort. I wouldn’t recommend following a GPX track.

The traverse from North to South Terminal and down to the Illecillewaet involves more magnificent quartzite hop scotching, a bit of chimney descending and there you are – standing on the Ille Neve looking at the Dawson Massif. I carried full stride across the glacier, hopping over the small cracks and ensuring to keep my forward momentum. This was the only part of the day where I could actually run except for the entrance and exit trails so it was rather enjoyable. Not to mention panoramic views of Fox, the Dawson Massif, and Charity and Virtue in the distance - the views of the Selkirks never fail to inspire.

These are those moments that are truly quite fun, but also slightly irresponsible. We laugh about them because they remind us of the times when we were a kid and got away with things we shouldn’t have done (I say we because this applies to my partners I’ve shared the uncontrollable laughter with, and all those who’ve experienced it too). And boy, is it a certain type of giggle.

Traversing Youngs, descending the West Face, and crossing the final part of the Asulkan was less giggly. There were two particular moments where forward momentum was a must. I wouldn’t recommend making a habit of doing it solo. Then again, the glacier will probably be gone in a decade, so there will be different cruxes to deal with.

The crux downclimb off Rampart (from a different day out) shot by Matthew Tufts

Now the Asulkan Traverse to bring it home. The first 3/4 of the traverse was wonderful. Smoke was billowing to the west above the Purity/Justice zone. The ambience of Bonney’s North Face never fails to disappoint on the Asulkan traverse. On this day in particular, it was like peering into the underworld. The dark wine-red sky engulfed the mood and created a hellish gradient down to the black quartzite north face finishing with an impending cracked Bonney Glacier. It’s spectacular how the feeling within the mountains change with the setting of weather. Humbling to say the least. So, I continued on, weaving my way through the Black Ridge, with tired legs and body, but a focus that comes about only with pushing your body to its limits. Albeit, the 5.4 cruxes on the traverse felt more difficult than I would have liked. At least my stomach was happily still ingesting Maurten’s.

It went dark by the time I arrived at the summit of Afton. I turned on my headlamp, and upon reaching the summit of Abbott, I could see the well-lit Trans-Canada Highway with cars passing. There are many unique moments from this day, but how wonderful that likely the only time anyone knew I was up there, albeit they had no idea what I was doing, was when there was a little light falling down the ridge above. “Imma star” Mike does a childish jump into the air extending all limbs. Man, I shoulda thought about that during the effort. But instead I was just sprinting and enjoying the heck out of the downhill running.

I was gunning it at this point with all the technical difficulties behind. There was a light drizzle of rain now – how wonderful to have the smells of the Hemlock and Cedars amplified by a bit of fresh moisture – for the absolute sprint down the 1,000meter descent of Abbott and the first sign of civilization all day on the Roger’s Pass Trans-Canada highway below.

My time for the route was 18:46:41.

Eric Carter and Leif Godberson did the first continuous push of the Horseshoe in 2021 in 1d: 1h: 21m: 5s

Taylor Sullivan did the first solo linkup in 2023 20:56:23

I’m excited to see who lowers the bar next!

The Gear That I Used

La Sportiva Tx2 Evo Approach Shoe

Petzl Altitude Harness

2 slings

2 locking carabiners

1 ATC

1 60-meter Pur line

Camp Skimo Pure Crampon with Edelrid Soft Bindings (a Mark Smiley genius gift)

Nutrition

4 sushi rice/sweet potato burritos with pistachios and honey

5 hornby bars

1,000 carbs worth of Maurten (mixed between gel 160 and drink mix particularly caffeinated 320)

Liquid IV for hydration (didn’t drink much water-actually only had two 500ml bottles for the entire first ridge from start to the end of terminals).

5 packs of Skratch Gummies Caffeinated Cherry