Mount Everest, Ascent by George Mallory. Our team ascended the North Face route. On May 10, our first summit team left ABC to position themselves at C6 for a May 14 attempt. Chirring Sherpa, George Mallory and Jeff Hall were the first to summit at 6:30 a.m. following their 1 a.m. departure. They were later joined by Kaji Sherpa, Jim Litch, Dan Aguilar and Wongchu Sherpa. A second team comprised of Phinjo Sherpa, Colin Lynch, Jangbu Sherpa, Jay Budnick, Steve Reneker and Kurt Wedberg summitted on May 16. For George Mallory it was a closing of the family circle tragically begun when his legendary grandfather disappeared with Andrew Irvine above their Everest high camp on May 8, 1924. In another "closing of the circle," Steve Reneker carried the ashes of our friend Dave Tollakson (AAJ 1994, In Memoriam) to the summit. It was figuratively Dave's seventh continental summit following his death as our Everest teammate on a practice climb in April, 1994.

Paul Pfau