"I firmly believe that Reinhold Messner was the first to climb all 14 8,000-meter peaks and that this should be recognized". These are the words of mountaineer Ed Viesturs, who according to the Guinness Book of Records would have been the true king of the eight-thousanders, as the South Tyrolean would have missed the summit of Annapurna by a few meters in 1985. According to writing in the Deutsche Presse-Agentur, the 64-year-old American, "Messner and the other mountaineers did everything they could to climb the real peaks to the best of their knowledge and in the conditions they found on site". Of Messner, Viesturs said that "he was our forerunner, not only stylistically, but also physically and psychologically, climbing without supplemental oxygen. Other climbers, like me, were able to follow in his footsteps by being inspired by him". Like Messner, the American reiterates that "climbing is a personal journey and should not be about lists or records".