Top trail runner falls to his death after helping trekkers

A RECORD-BREAKING Italian trail runner has died after coming to the aid of fellow trekkers on a mountain he had climbed 5,600 times.

Claudio Ghezzi, 69, slipped and fell while running down the 7,907ft Grigna Settentrionale, a mountain he had conquered several times a week for the past four decades.

Known in the area as “the king of the Grigna”, he had reached a refuge near the summit when he heard that a woman and her children were in difficulty on a section of path that has to be negotiated with the aid of iron chains, at an altitude of about 6.550ft.

He ran off to help them and had planned to climb back up to the refuge, but on the way he lost his footing, fell more than 60ft and died.

When the local alpine rescue service reached the scene, there was nothing they could do.

The woman and her children were helped back down the mountain, which overlooks Lake Como in northern Italy.

Social media was flooded with tributes to Mr Ghezzi, a former warehouse worker who had taken part in mountaineering expeditions in the Himalayas of Nepal and Pakistan as well as the mountains of Peru, Chile and Bolivia.

“I think we’ll only really believe he’s gone when we don’t see him arrive tomorrow with his rucksack on his back and a smile on his face,” said Alex Torricini, the manager of the mountain-top Rifugio Brioschi. “We were preparing to hold a party for his 70th birthday, which he was due to celebrate on July 4.”

Alberto Locatelli, a photographer who had covered Mr Ghezzi’s feats of endurance, said he had been “generous and altruistic”.