Davorin Martin Karničar was born on October 26th, 1962 in Zgornje Jezersko. He comes from a known mountaineering and skiing family. He started skiing when he was three years old. As a very active alpine skier, Davo was a member of the National Alpine Ski Team from 1975 to 1982. An alpine climber since 1980, he has thus far recorded over 1,400 climbs and ski descents. He skied down several mountains such as Grintovec, Eiger, Matterhorn, and Mont Blanc.
Davo and his brother Drejc were the first Slovenes to ski down an eight-thousander in a single run. The mountain in question was Annapurna (8,091m), and their descent remained the Slovenian record until Davo’s descent from Mount Everest. At the age of 38, he became the first person who uninterruptedly skied down the highest mountain in the world. He says there would have been no Everest had it not have been for Jezersko, and had it not been for his parents.
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Jezersko is the area where I was born, where I grew up, where I learned to love the mountains. I was lucky to have parents who were hut keepers at the češka koča mountain lodge, and who gave me my first experiences with skiing. When I was growing up and started engaging in sports more seriously, those mountains turned out to be a sufficiently large polygon enabling me to learn everything I needed to learn. Our mountains are high enough and steep enough to teach us all we need to know before going out to face the wide world. Davo Karničar |
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Since 2000, Davo has had the status of a world-class athlete. Since then, he has been a member of ten climbing expeditions to mountain summits all over the world.
He has made descents down the great faces of the Alps. His achievements also include ascent up the Bonatti pillar of Petit Dru, up the Lauper route of Eiger, down the northeastern face of Eiger, western face of Matterhorn, and down Mont Blanc. He was the first Slovene to ski down the frosted Sinji slap waterfall above Jezersko in Slovenia. He also skied down the Fritch-Lindenbach climbing route on the northern side of Grintovec above Jezersko – the most demanding climbing route ever skied down by a Slovene.
He was also the first person to ski down the eastern pillar of the Kamen volcano on the Kamchatka peninsula and down the highest peaks of all the continents. He changed the course of history with the 7 summits project, as the first man in the world to ski down the seven highest summits of each continent in a single run. He started in October 2000 as the first man in the world to ski down the highest mountain on Earth, Mount Everest (8,850m). This was followed by the highest peak of Africa (Mount Kilimanjaro, 5,894m), Mount Elbrus (5,642m), the highest peak of Europe, Aconcagua (6,969m), the highest peak of South America and the highest peak of Australia, Mount Kosciusko (2,230m), and in May 2004, he successfully skied down the slope of the sixth peak within his project, Mount McKinley (6,193m), the highest peak of North America. He concluded the project with the descent from the highest mountain in Antarctica – Mount Vinson (4,897m), thus stealing a march on the rest of the world and placing the Slovenes on the very top of extreme skiing.
He is a ski teacher and trainer, alpine climbing instructor, mountain rescuer, and extreme skier. He manages a mountaineering and skiing school, which also includes alpine education, organises mountain hikes, climbing ascents, ski and ski-mountaineering school and organises summer and school camps. In February 2001, he opened the first ski school for Nepalese children on the Khumbu glacier.