BURSTGerman mountain guide Michael Wohlleben made the first free ascent of the five-pitch Bodhichitta on the smooth Westliche Dreifaltigkeit slab in Switzerland in 2022. He was belayed by Nemuel Feurle and filmed by Roman Berner. Wohlleben found the line before his 2017 first free ascent of Parzival (5.13c, 180 m) and, with Berner, Remo Schläpfer, Markus Hutter and Roland Gmür, established the route ground-up in 2020.
After a 5.11 warm-up pitch, the route continues with a 25-metre 5.13, followed by two highly technical crux pitches of more than 40 metres each. Wohlleben didn’t assign an overall grade, but considers the fourth pitch significantly harder than comparable climbs such as the 5.14 trad routes Prinzip Hoffnung and Psychogram.
Bodhichitta was established ground-up, saying after his first ascent: “After my repeat of Silbergeier and various other routes it became quite important to me, if I wanted to make a first ascent, to do so as fairly as I could. And not, as is still often the case, to drill my way up from one bolt to the next… or use various other forms of trickery…”
Wohlleben and the production company Alpsolut Pictures have released a film featuring the first ascent of Bodhichitta, watch below.
Bodhichitta
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