[curun1r]

You're getting caught up in technical terminology whereas this article is written for non-climbers. Those of us that have done the activity know the difference between solo and free solo, but in the same way that you can't expect articles for non-climbers to get the distinction between sport and trad right (climbing is a sport, so it's all sport climbing, right?), You can't expect them to get the solo/free-solo thing right either.

[improbable22]

To be fair, my first guess from the title was Reinhold Messner. Different kind of solo. (And perhaps a better candidate for having strange biology?)