'Géant dans l’âme', big new climb on Dent du Géant in Mont Blanc massif

It all started in a book, while looking at the beautiful pictures of the topo Mont Blanc Lines in 2023. That year Mathis Garayt, Kilian Moni and myself carried out the first reapeat of Cœur de Géant, a magnificent line first opened eight years earlier by Christopher Baud, Brice Bouillane and Jonathan Charlet.

No sooner had we returned from the only existing route on the mountain’s north face than we were already plotting a new line up its 500-meter wall. The potential was huge!

This is why, in April 2025 and almost two years after our first adventure, we set off for a one-day attempt. Just like the first ascent team of Cœur de Géant did back in 2015. It was going to be a significant challenge for us because we only had a one-day weather window: the Föhn wind was forecast for the next day, bringing with it bad weather. Moreover, the Skyway was still running on its winter schedule, and the first cable car allowed us to start the approach at 9:00 am, meaning that we’d reach the start of the climb at 11:30 am!

With the help of two photographers, Mathieu Garcia and Florent Irion, we set off to capture these moments on my very first new route in the massif. The essence of this climb was to seek out compelling lines of weakness, challenge ourselves by targeting steep, technical terrain, and maintain the most direct line to the summit. Thanks to the photos taken in 2023, we had a rough idea of where the steeper and easier sections would be, but we really didn’t know if our plan would work.

In the end, everything I had imagined worked out perfectly! I led the first half of the route with some mixed sections, sometimes crossing snow ramps. Then, the real difficulties started at pitch 4, with a vertical section on good rock that ended at the base of the crux.

There, we stood below a rocky bastion that overhung for two pitches before the summit slopes.Kilian took the lead on the crux pitch, and after climbing beautifully, his ice axe slipped — he fell, twisted his ankle, and his day was over… I quickly reached him by free climbing the pitch on toprope (I plan to come back one day and lead it, in order to climb the full route free.)

Since Mathis didn’t feel like leading and Kilian was injured, I ended up leading the rest of the route.The following pitch was amazing: a crack, never extreme, but sustained with ice tools while offering good protection. The granite was almost perfect, like in the finest areas of the Mont Blanc massif.

Then the terrain eased off and became slabby, with good footholds but less gear. Fortunately, the rock remained good enough to climb efficiently and without ever being too scary, even when the pro was runout (10-15 meters).

Eventually, at around 8:00 pm, I topped out just below the summit and followed the last 20 meters of the normal route to reach the Virgin statue and belay my two climbing partners..

Géant dans L’âme really stands out due to the variety of climbing styles it offers. Over "only" 500 meters it has pretty much everything, including a very technical and physical section in the middle. You need to be able to climb in rock shoes and without gloves on the upper section, while climbing with crampons and ice tools through the lower section; having done the hardest section in crampons, do consider the option of climbing the crux using cramponed shoes and ice tools — I highly recommend it!

Big shout-out to Mathie and our unlucky Florent, who was hit by a rock on his hand and elbow while descending from the base of the route towards the Glacier du Géant. The road to recovery will unfortunately be long after surgery for his tricky elbow fracture. We wish him a strong and full recovery!

by Arthur Poindefert

Gear: the route required no pegs. Two sets of friends (0.2 to 3) are enough, with size 4 being optional but recommended.