Middle Teton is the third highest peak in the Teton Range

Teton Range

The Teton Range is a mountain range of the Rocky Mountains in North America. A north-south range, it is on the Wyoming side of the state's border with Idaho, just south of Yellowstone National Park. Most of the range is in Grand Teton National Park....

, Grand Teton National Park

Grand Teton National Park

Grand Teton National Park is a United States National Park located in northwestern Wyoming, U.S. The Park consists of approximately and includes the major peaks of the long Teton Range as well as most of the northern sections of the valley known as Jackson Hole. Only south of Yellowstone...

, Wyoming

Wyoming

Wyoming is a state in the mountain region of the Western United States. The western two thirds of the state is covered mostly with the mountain ranges and rangelands in the foothills of the Eastern Rocky Mountains, while the eastern third of the state is high elevation prairie known as the High...

. The peak is immediately southwest of Grand Teton

Grand Teton

Grand Teton is the highest mountain in Wyoming's Grand Teton National Park, and a classic destination in American mountaineering.- Geography :...

 and the two are separated from one another by the lower saddle

Mountain pass

A mountain pass is a route through a mountain range or over a ridge. If following the lowest possible route, a pass is locally the highest point on that route...

, a broad high ridge at 11600 feet (3,535.7 m). The Middle Teton Glacier

Middle Teton Glacier

Middle Teton Glacier is located on the northeast flank of Middle Teton in Grand Teton National Park, Wyoming. The glacier is a popular mountaineering route for ice climbing and for access to the summit of Middle Teton and other peaks to the south. The glacier is at the west end of Garnet Canyon,...

 is located on the eastern slopes of the peak. Middle Teton is a classic pyramidal shaped alpine peak and is sometimes included as part of the Cathedral Group

Cathedral Group

The Cathedral Group is a term applied to a collection of most of the tallest mountains of the Teton Range, all of which are located in Grand Teton National Park, in the U.S. state of Wyoming. The collection of mountains known as the Cathedral Group are classic alpine peaks, with pyramidal shapes...

 of high Teton peaks. The 40 miles (64 km) long Teton Range is the youngest mountain chain in the Rocky Mountains

Rocky Mountains

The Rocky Mountains are a major mountain range in western North America. The Rocky Mountains stretch more than from the northernmost part of British Columbia, in western Canada, to New Mexico, in the southwestern United States...

, and began their uplift 9 million years ago, during the Miocene

Miocene

The Miocene is a geological epoch of the Neogene Period and extends from about . The Miocene was named by Sir Charles Lyell. Its name comes from the Greek words and and means "less recent" because it has 18% fewer modern sea invertebrates than the Pliocene. The Miocene follows the Oligocene...

. Several periods of glaciation have carved Middle Teton and the other peaks of the range into their current shapes. From the lower saddle, a distinctive feature known as the black dike appears as a straight line running from near the top of the mountain down 800 feet (243.8 m). The black dike is a basalt

Basalt

Basalt is a common extrusive volcanic rock. It is usually grey to black and fine-grained due to rapid cooling of lava at the surface of a planet. It may be porphyritic containing larger crystals in a fine matrix, or vesicular, or frothy scoria. Unweathered basalt is black or grey...

ic intrusion

Intrusion

An intrusion is liquid rock that forms under Earth's surface. Magma from under the surface is slowly pushed up from deep within the earth into any cracks or spaces it can find, sometimes pushing existing country rock out of the way, a process that can take millions of years. As the rock slowly...

 that occurred long after the surrounding rock was formed.

Climbing

The first recorded ascent of Middle Teton was by Albert R. Ellingwood on August 23, 1923, via Ellingwood Couloir on the south side of the peak. Ellingwood made the first ascent of South Teton

South Teton

South Teton is the fifth highest peak in the Teton Range, Grand Teton National Park, Wyoming. The peak is south of Middle Teton and just west of Cloudveil Dome and is part of the Cathedral Group of high Teton peaks. The long Teton Range is the youngest mountain chain in the Rocky Mountains, and...

 the same day.

What is known as the southwest couloir

Couloir

A couloir is a narrow gully with a steep gradient in a mountainous terrain. A couloir may be a seam, scar, or fissure, or vertical crevasse in an otherwise solid mountain mass...

 provides the easiest route to the summit. Other sections on the mountain are rated as high as class 5.11

Yosemite Decimal System

The Yosemite Decimal System is a three-part system used for rating the difficulty of walks, hikes, and climbs. It is primarily used by mountaineers in the United States and Canada. The Class 5 portion of the Class scale is primarily a rock climbing classification system. Originally the system was...

, with the Middle Teton Glacier route considered to be the most technically advanced.