The 7 Summits
A Mountaineering challenge to climb to the highest mountain on each of the 7 traditional continents.
The main 2 lists are: Bass and Messner lists
If you want to climb mountains but the 7 summits isn’t the right challenge for you - visit Mountaineers to learn about other mountains and challenges.
From a geology viewpoint, there are only 6 continents on the Earth: Africa, Antarctica, Australia, Eurasia, South America and North America.
Europe is considered a peninsula of the Eurasia continental platform and is not a true physical continent.
However, from a political perspective, Europe is considered a continent thus Elbrus (18,513'/5642m), located on the border with Asia in southern Russia represents Europe and not Mont Blanc (15,771'/4807m) which lies in the Alps on the border of France and Italy.
Then there is the competition between Australia's Kosciuszko (7,310'/2228m) and New Guinea's Carstensz Pyramid, aka Puncak Jaya (16,024'/4884m) both located on the Oceania continent - which is not really a continent but a region of the south west Pacific that includes Australia, Fiji, New Zealand, Papua New Guinea, Samoa and many other islands.
Dick Bass the first 7 Summitter, choose Australia as one of the 7 continents and Kosciuszko as it's mainland high point.
However Canadian Pat Morrow, who was competing with Bass to finish the 7 challenged Bass's summit of Australia's Mt. Kosciuszko as the highest peak in Oceania saying that Carstensz Pyramid on Irian Jaya (Papua) in Indonesia's New Guinea was the true highpoint for the Australasian continental mass.
Italian Reinhold Messner jumped in and agreed with Morrow.
Today Carstensz is considered one of the seven but some 7 Summiteers try to bag the lower Kosciuszko to meet both the Bass and the Messner lists. INFO - from - http://www.alanarnette.com/7summits/7summits.php
The Mountains
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Everest, Nepal - 29,035/8850m
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Aconcagua, Argentina - 22,902/6960m
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Denali, Alaska - 20,320/6194m
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Kilimanjaro, Africa - 19,340/5896m
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Elbrus, Russia - 18,513/5642m
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Vinson, Antarctica - 16,067/4897m
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Carstensz Pyramid, New Guinea - 16,023/4884m
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Mt. Blanc, France/Italy - 15,771'/4807m
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Mt. Kosciuszko, Australia - 7,310/2228m
Records:
First Woman - Junko Tabei (JAPAN) (1992)
Fastest Woman - Maria Gordon (UK) (2016) - 239 Days 23 hours and 30 minutes
1st British Women - Rebecca Stephens MBE (1994) (also First British woman to summit Mount Everest)
1st Women to climb all 7 summits in a 1 yr time period - Annabelle Bond (2005)
Youngest Woman - Samantha Larson 18 years old (2007) - On May 16, 2007, at the age of 18, she became temporarily the youngest non-Nepalese woman to summit Mount Everest. By reaching the top of Everest, she also became temporarily the youngest person to have climbed the Seven Summits (the "Bass list"), the tallest mountains on each of the seven continents. She and her father, Dr. David Larson, became the first father-daughter team to complete the Seven Summits. In August 2007 they climbed the Carstensz Pyramid, thereby also completing the "Messner list" of the Seven Summits.
1st Black Women - Currently going after this challenge is Saray Khumalo - She's done Everest, Aconcagua, Kilimanjaro and Elbrus, and has Denali, Vinson and Carstensz left.
Websites
7summits - https://7summits.com
The most upto date complete list I can find is only up to 2016 - https://7summits.com/info/7stats/statistics_all_basic.php
WOMEN:
- 48 women did the Carstensz version, 37 did the Kosciuszko version, 18 both versions, 71 women altogether. INFO - https://7summits.com/7summits_statistics.php
Updated:
8000ers.com https://www.8000ers.com/cms/en/7-summits-mainmenu-199.html
