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He Nearly Died on K2 in 2022. Two Years Later He Soloed It in Under 11 Hours, With No Oxygen

French alpinist Benjamin Védrines climbed from advance base camp to K2's 8,611-metre summit in 10 hours 59 minutes on July 28, 2024, without bottled oxygen or a partner — on the exact route where he had been found unconscious two years earlier.

LR 作者 Laxman Rawal · 2026年7月28日 · 3 分钟阅读 · 更新于 2026年7月28日

He Nearly Died on K2 in 2022. Two Years Later He Soloed It in Under 11 Hours, With No Oxygen

At 12:10am on July 28, 2024, French alpinist Benjamin Védrines left K2's advance base camp (5,303m) alone, carrying no bottled oxygen. Just under eleven hours later — 10 hours, 59 minutes and 59 seconds, to the second — he stood on the 8,611m summit of the world's second-highest, and by most climbers' reckoning most dangerous, mountain. It is the fastest anyone has ever climbed K2 without supplemental oxygen.

Key facts

10h 59m 59s, advance base camp (5,303m) to summit (8,611m), no oxygen, solo
Cuts the 1986 benchmark of 23 hours, set by Benoît Chamoux, by more than half
Védrines turned back from the same route in 2022 and was later found unconscious at 8,300m
He is a professional French mountain guide sponsored by The North Face

K2 kills roughly one climber for every four who summit — by far the worst ratio of any 8,000m peak — and it has no easy route. What Védrines did was compress a climb that takes most guided parties two to three days, fixed ropes and bottled oxygen included, into a single overnight push, carrying only what fit on his back.

Two visits to the same mountain, two years apart

The most striking detail is where the record was set: on the same route where, on July 28, 2022 — exactly two years to the day before his record — Védrines had turned back at 8,300m and was later discovered unconscious by other climbers. He has spoken about revisiting that exact spot on his record push: 'I must say, when I arrived at the place in question, it did something to me,' he said afterward.

2022Broad Peak record

Védrines climbs from 4,890m to Broad Peak's 8,051m summit in 7h 28m, a speed record on the neighbouring 8,000m peak.

Jul 28, 2022Turned back, then found unconscious

A K2 attempt stalls at 8,300m; Védrines is later found unconscious by other climbers on the mountain.

Jul 28, 2024The K2 record

Exactly two years on, he solos the same route without oxygen in 10h 59m 59s — a new no-O2 benchmark.

May 2025Mont Blanc, on skis

Védrines sets a round-trip ski-mountaineering record on Mont Blanc from Chamonix: 35km and 3,800m of climbing in 4h 54m 41s.

The comeback took 40 days of waiting at base camp for a weather window, on top of what he has described as months of deliberately unglamorous training — built for one specific day, not a highlight reel.

K2 speed marks, three eras
Climber	Year	Time	Notes
Benoît Chamoux	1986	23h 00m	Base camp to summit, no oxygen
Chhiring (Tsering) Sherpa	2022	12h 20m	Fastest overall base-to-summit time
Benjamin Védrines	2024	10h 59m 59s	Advance base camp to summit, no oxygen, solo

The three records aren't measuring quite the same thing — different start points, different rules on oxygen and support — but together they trace how far solo, unsupported climbing on the world's hardest 8,000m peak has come in under 40 years.

What this means for trekkers

K2 sits in Pakistan's Karakoram, not Nepal, and a solo no-oxygen ascent like this is a different sport entirely from anything we guide. But the instinct behind it — wanting to feel real altitude and real exposure under your own steam — is exactly what draws climbers to Nepal's trekking peaks. Island Peak and Mera Peak give you a genuine 6,000m summit, with full guide support, fixed lines where needed and oxygen back-up if conditions demand it; Ama Dablam's base camp trek gets you underneath one of the most striking technical peaks in the Himalaya without the technical climbing at all.

Védrines has said the K2 climb was closure on the 2022 accident, not an endpoint — he has spoken publicly about wanting to attempt Jannu East next. For a mountain with K2's death toll, a clean no-oxygen solo record is as much a statement about preparation and judgment as it is about speed.

Source: ExplorersWeb

Cover photo: ArtHouse Studio via Pexels (Pexels License).

来源： ExplorersWeb

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