Trail Butter Pro and professional mountain sport photographer, Dan Paititucci (@danpatitucci), shares three of his favorite peak runs in the Swiss Alps from the summer of 2020.
It may not have been the summer we hoped for, but a peek at Dan's photos has us making a solid wish list of things to do in summers to come. Seriously breathtaking in more ways than one!
Each summer, as our mountain fitness begins to peak, we apply it to higher, instead of longer, objectives. There is nothing we like more than big days of vertical, that combine running with some easy climbing or ridge traversing.
On our ALPSinsight: The Alps Mountain Sport Resource, we call these runs #thewayupalps and this summer saw some additions. Here, @moranludwig passes through a Himalayan like landscape on the way to the Dôme, a rocky scramble above Zinal, Switzerland. Learn More.
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We've been running the Mettelhorn every summer for years. It is, in my opinion, the single best run in the Swiss Alps. Starting and finishing in Zermatt, it is 2200 meters of vertical in 21km of running. Up and down!
This year we did it with fellow Trail Butter Pro @hillary_gerardi just two days after her 2nd place finish at the Matterhorn Ultraks Extreme Race. We had the advantage this year of adding in some new, off trail, terrain to the usual trail we do, thanks to Hillary having just done the race route. Learn More.
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Probably the best new #thewayupalps this year was the Gspaltenhorn, 2400 meters of gain in a 22km round trip mountain day. This one is for the climbers as it requires some easy 5th class climbing in very exposed terrain high above glaciers and very complicated terrain. Here's @danpatitucci about to leave the summit plateau behind for the steep north ridge. Learn More.
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We weren't kidding when we said these images were breathtaking. That's a seriously understatement. If running in the alps is on your bucket list, awesome. If it's not - it should be! Interested in learning more about mountain running in the Alps? Follow @alpsinsight.