Alain Robert (French pronunciation: [alɛ̃ ʁɔbɛʁ]; born as Robert Alain Philippe on 7 August 1962) is a French rock climber and urban climber. Known as "the French Spider-Man" or "the Human Spider", Robert is famous for his free solo climbing, scaling skyscrapers using no climbing equipment except for a small bag of chalk and a pair of climbing shoes.
Catherine Destivelle (born 24 July 1960) is a French rock climber and mountaineer who is considered one of the greatest and most important female climbers in the history of the sport. She came to prominence in the mid-1980s for sport climbing by winning the first major female climbing competitions, and by being the first-ever female to redpoint a 7c+/8a sport climbing route with Fleur de Rocaille in 1985, and an 8a+ (5.13c) route with Choucas in 1988. During this period, she was considered the strongest female sport climber in the world along with Lynn Hill, however, in 1990 she retired to focus on alpine climbing.
In 1990, she made the first-ever female alpine ascent of the Bonatti Pillar on the Petit Dru, which she followed up in 1991, by becoming the first-ever female to create a new extreme alpine route, also on the Petit Dru, which was named Voie Destivelle in her honor. From 1992 to 1994, Destivelle became the first female to complete the winter alpine free solo of the "north face trilogy" of the Eiger, the Grandes Jorasses, and the Matterhorn. She made Himalayan and high-altitude ascents such as Nameless Tower in 1990, the southwest face of Shishapangma in 1995, and the south face of Peak 4111, in Antarctica, in 1996.
As well as her Alpine free solos, she made other notable free solos, such as the Devils Tower in 1992, and the Old Man of Hoy in 1997. She is the subject of several documentaries, including Rémy Tezier's, Beyond the Summits, which won the best feature-length film award at the 2009 Banff Film Festival. In 2007, she was made a Knight of the Legion of Honour, and in 2020, became the first-ever female recipient of the Piolet d'Or Lifetime Achievement Award.
Jean-Christophe Lafaille (31 March 1965 – 27 January 2006 [presumed]) was a French climber noted for a number of difficult ascents in the Alps and Himalaya, and for what has been described as "perhaps the finest self-rescue ever performed in the Himalaya", when he was forced to descend the mile-high south face of Annapurna alone with a broken arm, after his climbing partner had been killed in a fall. He climbed eleven of the fourteen eight-thousanders, many of them alone or by previously unclimbed routes, but disappeared during a solo attempt to make the first winter ascent of Makalu, the world's fifth highest mountain.
Patrick Edlinger (15 June 1960 – 16 November 2012) was a professional French rock climber. Edlinger is considered a pioneer and a legend of sport climbing. He was the second-ever climber in history to ascend routes of grade 7c (5.12d) with Nymphodalle (1979), and grade 7c+ (5.13a) with Le Toit (1981). He was the first-ever climber in history to onsight routes of grade 7b+ (5.12c) with Captain crochet (1982), and grade 7c (5.12d) with La Polka des Ringards (1982).