Daniel Jung reaps first repeat of Recovery drink, Favresse's difficult crack climb in Norway
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Fred Moix
German sports climber Daniel Jung has laid to rest his five-year quest to repeat Recovery drink, the heinous 35-metre overhanging granite crack line straight through the Profilveggen wall, a.k.a. Profile Wall, at Jøssingfjord in Norway.
The route was freed in May 2013 by Belgium’s Nicolas Favresse on his second visit to the fjord, after having scoped the line the previous year thanks to a tip-off from Erik Massih with his brother Olivier, Bernardo Gimenez and with Jung. Favresse invested five weeks of effort prior to the redpoint and although he did not proffer a grade, he described it as quite simply hardest crack he had ever redpointed. With fast ascents of trad cracks such as Cobra Crack and Greenspit under his belt, the line immediately became known as one of the hardest crack climbs in the world.
Although Jung started climbing on trad routes, he is better known for his hard sports climbs - read Corona 9a+ in the Frankenjura and La Rambla 9a+ at Siurana. The boltless cracks of Recovery drink proved an irresistible draw though and he travelled to Norway in 2015 and 2017 with this route in mind. Although these trips proved instructive they were, ultimately, unsuccessful.
With renewed motivation Jung returned his year and was joined by another two crack specialists, Britain’s Pete Whittaker and Tom Randall who themselves had made various trips to Norway specifically to climb this crack. As the trio worked the route and made increasing progress, small holds broke forcing them to adjust their beta and making the route even spicier close to the finishing crux moves. Placing all the gear on lead, on 5 August Jung finally managed to stick the "heartbreaking" crux jam to claim the coveted first repeat of this "masterpiece of trad climbing!"
