On June 16, 2023, the general assembly of the Academic Alpine Club Zurich took place in Linde Oberstrass. This year there was a major change to the CC.
New President, new Quästor
Our long-standing President Gregor Dürrenberger has decided to retire after 28 years on the Board, half of them as President. The club owes Gregor a lot, for which we are very grateful. The election of Valérie Zumsteg as the new AACZ President was accepted with great enthusiasm. In addition, our long-standing quaestor, Markus Gehri, resigned from his post. Markus sorted, optimized and maintained the club’s finances with great talent and introduced the annual budget system. We were able to find a very suitable successor in Manuel Bonnet.
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Gregor Dürrenberger (centre), framed by Valérie Zumsteg (left), newly elected AACZ President and Manuel Bonnet (right), new Quaestor. Unfortunately, Markus Gehri is not in the picture.
Honorary Members
Our club statues allow us to nominate honorary members. Up until 2012, when we accepted honorary members for the last time, this honor had been bestowed on 14 members who had rendered outstanding services to the club in a wide variety of areas, be it for alpine achievements, great commitment to the club, or in their work as Patron.
At this year’s general assembly we had the opportunity to nominate two members as new honorary members. With Gregor Dürrenberger (left) for his great and decades-long commitment to the club and Bruce Normand (right) for his great alpine achievements we have found two more than suitable members to carry on this beautiful tradition with dignity.
Bruce Normand
Bruce is currently the club’s strongest and most famous alpinist. He has been honored with the Piolet d’Or (Xuelian West, 6422m, Tien Shan, 2009) and climbed K2 without oxygen in 2007, assisting with a rescue operation on the descent. He has also climbed Mt Edgar and a total of 76 6000m peaks, 40 as first ascents, and 14 5000m peaks, 7 as first ascents. Bruce was involved in five AACZ expeditions between 1999 and 2022. In his short acceptance speech, Bruce mentions that he is particularly proud to be only the second honorary member, after André Roch, to be elected on the basis of extraordinary alpine achievements.
Gregor Dürrenberger
Gregor looks back on 28 years in the CC, 14 of them as president. With a lot of commitment, he helped the club to grow again and brought about a strong increase in membership. During his time as president, the statutes were revised in 2018, abolishing the separation between old and active members. He was a member of the Alaska expedition that climbed Denali in 1979 and also took part in the very successful Minya Konka Expedition in China in 1981. One of his many achievements is the first ascent of the Via Grischa in the Chöpfberg NW face. Gregor says thank you very much. Honorary membership is a gift for him – one for the heart, not the head. H feels being a member of the right club.