Japanese skier went on incredible journey to become oldest man to climb Everest

Yuichiro Miura (Japan) made his way to the summit of the world’s highest mountain to break a record that still stands 10 years on.

The skier is the oldest person to climb Everest (male). He was 80 years 223 days old when he scaled the mountain on 23 May 2013.

He was unable to make the descent himself and was helicoptered from Camp 2 to Kathmandu, with some famous alpinists suggesting his climb was incomplete because of this.

But as our guidelines – agreed with Eberhard Jurgalski of 8000ers.com - only state that the participant must reach the summit using their own power, his record absolutely stands.

The use of helicopters for medical emergencies during the descent is permitted.

This was actually the third time Yuichiro secured the record.

He first broke it in 2003 when he was 70 years 222 days old, but three years later, Takao Arayama (Japan) took it at age 70 years 225 days.

A couple others broke the record in the following years, before Yuichiro took it back in 2008 and then secured it again at an older age in 2013, even though no one older had done it since.

The feat also makes him the oldest person to climb a mountain over 8,000 m.

And it’s also worth noting he underwent two heart surgeries for cardiac arrythmia – an irregularity in the heartbeat – in 2006 and 2007.

Yuichiro was featured in a video made for our 60th anniversary that examined many of the amazing feats conquered on Everest.

He said of his record-breaking achievement: “My dream started when I was a student at age 20 when [Edmund] Hillary and Tenzing [Norgay] climbed Mount Everest in 1953, and it’s been my dream and the dream continues and I managed to climb again at age 80.”

Guinness World Records Editor-in-Chief, Craig Glenday, said: “Mount Everest was first conquered the year before Guinness World Records was founded.

Everest represents the ultimate, I think, in man versus nature. It’s taking on the world’s highest peak and it’s a huge effort to do this.

“It’s not the hardest mountain to climb, it’s not the one that takes the longest, but it’s the one that just captures the imagination and it’s the one that every mountaineer wants to get at least once in their career.”

He added: “Mount Everest probably represents the ultimate in record breaking. It is the ultimate icon of record breaking, I think, because it’s the one record everyone understands.

It’s the world’s highest mountain, it’s the place people want to climb and for us at Guinness World Records, it was the first record to ever appear in our very first book.

Yuichiro, who is now 90, has been into snow sports since he was a child, and won his first ever skiing competition when he was in elementary school.

After moving south with his family, he found he missed the snow and headed to Hokkaido University where he could pursue a career in winter sports.

He competed in speed skiing and downhill skiing, and after finding his infinity for climbing mountains, he became famous for skiing down them.

In 1970, he skied around 4,200 ft down Everest, with the feat documented in Oscar-winning documentary The Man Who Skied Down Everest.

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