Annelie Pompe (born 1981) is an adventurer and athlete from Gothenburg, Sweden. She grew up close to the sea and has always felt at home in the ocean and attributes this as being important to her interest in free diving. [1] She is a professional adventurer, motivational speaker, photographer (mainly underwater), freediving instructor, yoga instructor, writer, personal trainer, helicopter pilot and coach. She has also written a book about her adventures. [2]
Despite considering herself a poor swimmer, Annelie Pompe is known for her achievements in competitive freediving. [2] Pompe began her journey into freediving after she received her scuba certification. Within a few years, she realized that she liked diving into the water without equipment. [1] On 5 October 2010 she broke the world record in variable weight freediving, with a dive down to 126 meters. [3] [4] [5] She also claimed one individual silver medal and one team silver medal in the AIDA world championships. She also holds the Swedish record for the deepest freedive without using flippers, 72 meters below the surface. [6]
Pompe has been sport climbing since she was 13 years old. [6] In May 2011, she climbed Mount Everest [7] as the first Swedish woman to summit from the north side. Despite marketing her attempt as a climb without oxygen, she did end up using bottled oxygen in order to make the summit. She has climbed all seven Seven Summits (including Puncak Jaya, and the last one Mount Vinson in January 2016). [8]
Mount Everest is Earth's highest mountain above sea level, located in the Mahalangur Himal sub-range of the Himalayas. The China–Nepal border runs across its summit point. Its elevation of 8,848.86 m was most recently established in 2020 by the Chinese and Nepali authorities.
The Seven Summits are the highest mountains on each of the seven traditional continents. On 30 April 1985, Richard Bass became the first climber to reach the summit of all seven.
Freediving, free-diving, free diving, breath-hold diving, or skin diving, is a mode of underwater diving that relies on breath-holding until resurfacing rather than the use of breathing apparatus such as scuba gear.
The eight-thousanders are the 14 mountains recognised by the International Mountaineering and Climbing Federation (UIAA) as being more than 8,000 metres (26,247 ft) in height above sea level, and sufficiently independent of neighbouring peaks. There is no precise definition of the criteria used to assess independence, and at times, the UIAA has considered whether the list should be expanded to 20 mountain peaks by including the major satellite peaks of eight-thousanders. All of the eight-thousanders are located in the Himalayan and Karakoram mountain ranges in Asia, and their summits lie in an altitude known as the death zone.
Lars Olof Göran Kropp was a Swedish adventurer and mountaineer, the first Scandinavian to climb Mount Everest without oxygen. He made a solo ascent of Mount Everest without bottled oxygen or Sherpa support on 23 May 1996, after traveling there from Sweden by bicycle and foot.
Scott Eugene Fischer was an American mountaineer and mountain guide. He was renowned for ascending the world's highest mountains without supplemental oxygen. Fischer and Wally Berg were the first Americans to summit Lhotse, the world's fourth highest peak. Fischer, Charley Mace, and Ed Viesturs summitted K2 without supplemental oxygen. Fischer first climbed Mount Everest in 1994 and later died during the 1996 blizzard on Everest while descending from the peak.
Edmund Viesturs is an American high-altitude mountaineer, corporate speaker, and well known author in the mountain climbing community. He was the first American to climb all 14 of the eight-thousander mountains, and the 5th person to do so without supplemental oxygen. Along with Apa Sherpa, he has summitted eight-thousanders on 21 occasions, including Mount Everest seven times.
Yasuko Namba was the second Japanese woman to climb the Seven Summits. Namba worked as a businesswoman for Federal Express in Japan, but her hobby of mountaineering took her all over the world. She first summited Kilimanjaro on New Year's Day in 1982, and summited Aconcagua exactly two years later. She reached the summit of Denali on July 1, 1985, and the summit of Mount Elbrus on August 1, 1992. After summiting Vinson Massif on December 29, 1993, and Carstensz Pyramid on November 12, 1994, Namba's final summit to reach was Mount Everest. She signed on with Rob Hall's guiding company, Adventure Consultants, and reached the summit in May 1996, but died during her descent in the 1996 Mount Everest disaster.
Mount Everest is the world's highest mountain, with a peak at 8,849 metres (29,031.7 ft) above sea level. It is situated in the Himalayan range of Solukhumbu district, Nepal.
Natalia Vadimovna Molchanova was a Russian champion freediver, multiple world record holder, and the former president of the Russian Free Dive Federation. Described as "possibly the world’s greatest freediver," Molchanova set an unparalleled standard in the sport. She believed, “Freediving is not only a sport, it is a way to understand who you are,” reflecting her deep connection to the sport. Throughout her illustrious career, she achieved 42 world records and earned 22 world championship medals, 19 of which were gold.
Francys Arsentiev became the first woman from the United States to reach the summit of Mount Everest without the aid of bottled oxygen, on May 22, 1998. She then died during the descent.
Tomas Kenneth Olsson was a Swedish adventurer and ski mountaineer. He was born in Kristinehamn but grew up in Borås. He took an engineering degree at Linköping University in 2001, after which he moved to Chamonix in France to focus on skiing. He specialized in skiing down some of the world's highest and steepest mountains. He had gone from the top of Aconcagua in Argentina, Lenin Peak in Kyrgyzstan, Muztagh Ata and Kuksay Peak in China and Cho Oyu in Tibet.
Deborah Andollo Lopez, also known as Deborah Andollo, is a Cuban free-diving athlete who held several world records in different disciplines. In 1996, she set a free-diving record of about 357 feet. On the "AIDA website’s world record history in both constant weight and No-Limits. In 1996 she excelled in constant 61 metres (200 ft) and no-limits 110 metres (360 ft), and did 100 metres (330 ft) in variable weight in Italy.
Krushnaa Patil is an Indian climber. In 2009, at the age of 19, she became the youngest Indian woman to successfully ascent Mount Everest, earth's highest mountain.
Melissa Arnot Reid is an American mountaineer. She has climbed to the summit of Mount Everest six times.
Samina Khayal Baig is a Pakistani mountaineer who climbed Mount Everest in 2013, all Seven Summits by 2014, and K2 in 2022. She is the first Pakistani woman to climb Everest, K2 and the Seven Summits. She climbed Mt. Everest at the age of 21.
Arunima Sinha is an Indian mountaineer and sportswoman. She is the world's first female amputee to scale Mount Everest (Asia), Mount Kilimanjaro (Africa), Mount Elbrus (Europe), Mount Kosciuszko (Australia), Aconcagua, Denali and Vinson Massif (Antarctica). She is also a seven time Indian volleyball player.
Nataliia Zharkova is a 2017 freediving champion of Europe and Ukraine. Zharkova holds multiple records in the discipline of freediving. She was also a freediving runner-up champion of the world in 2013. She is the first Ukrainian and the second woman to ever dive below the arch of the Blue Hole vertical underwater cave in Dahab, Egypt, on a single breath.
Deeya Suzannah Bajaj is an Indian adventure sports athlete. She completed climbing the Seven Summits on 5 June 2022.
SheikhaAsma Al Thani is a Qatari mountaineer who is the first Qatari woman to summit Mount Everest, Lhotse, and Manaslu, K2 as well as the first Qatari female to climb Ama Dablam. She is also the first Qatari person to ski to the North Pole. On her ascent of Manaslu, she became the first Arab person to summit an eight-thousander without oxygen. She climbed Lhotse for the second time in May 2024, without the use of supplemental oxygen, becoming the first Arab to climb two 8000er without supplemental oxygen. She is Director of Marketing and Communications for the Qatar Olympic Committee. She is also a member of the ruling family of Qatar.
Media related to Annelie Pompe at Wikimedia Commons