I am not sure the others are as committed as Rob Hall and Scott Fischer. I think there is more business now, and I know it will be impossible to stop this Everest business.

This year my role is clear: I am a coach, a coach to sportsmen.

Mountains are cathedrals: grand and pure, the houses of my religion. I go to them as humans go to worship...From their lofty summits, I view my past, dream of the future, and with unusual acuity I am allowed to experience the present moment. My strength renewed, my vision cleared, in the mountains I celebrate creation. On each journey I am reborn.

A review of summit day photographs will show that I was clothed in the latest, highest quality, high altitude gear, comparable, if not better, than that worn by the other members of our expedition.

I travel to Jakarta, I see what an important country it is. I've been working with them for a year.

I think that people ran out of oxygen and don't really know what happened up there, maybe some of them just made things up because they weren't sure what had happened.

Big mountains are a completely different world: snow, ice, rocks, sky, and thin air. You cannot conquer them, only rise to their height for a short time; and for that they demand a great deal. The struggle is not with the enemy, or a competitor like in sports, but with yourself, with the feelings of weakness and inadequacy. That struggle appeals to me. It is why I became a mountaineer.