Road

Posted on 16th September 2015

Col des Aravis descent. Better than it looks.

A change is as good as a rest. Apparently. Road biking is definitely a change from mountain bikes, but I’m not sure it’s a rest.

A game of word association is unlikely to link Chamonix and road biking. Or me and road biking for that matter, but I tried a 29er once (twice now I think about it) and it didn’t seem that bad so might as well give this road biking lark a go. That and I had friends in town who wanted to go road biking.

When mtbers go road biking.....

Hence a quick bit of internet research later a very much not lycra clad crew of riders and borrowed bikes rolled out of Chamonix from a relaxed 10am start. Progress was initially slow as said combination of riders and borrowed bikes resulted in frequent stops to raise saddles, angle saddles, re-align saddles.

It's aa smiles as we cruise through Les Houches. The saddle hasn't attacked yet.

By Vaudagne we’d all began to bond with our bikes and, having negotiated the roadworks…road bike tyres not being as forgiving as mtb tyres when faced with potholes… started making progress past Servoz and along the back roads towards Sallanches.

With the cliffs of the Fiz range towering above us on the right and the Arve valley spread out below us on the left there was plenty to distract, but those slick tyres descend at a fair lick and the handling isn’t quite what I’m used to, so generally best just to ignore the sights. Easier to ignore was the Chaine des Aravis in front of us, which we were planning on riding behind.

Vaudagne. I think Heidi trains cow herding here

Past Sallanches and still we were able to crack on at a fair lick. So far so easy this road bike game. A convenient back road takes you parallel with the autoroute along the Arve valley, but far enough away not to be disturbed by the sound of the road. Even when the back road ended, the 10km along past Magland to Cluses passed quickly, probably because we were heading for the first food break of the day.

From our brief research into the world of road biking we’d learnt that cafe stops are key, we were more than happy to comply with this rule. Espresso and panini prepped us for the main event of the day, the climb to the Col de la Colombière .

Coffee. Apparently caffeine is a drug, so another road rule ticked.

Another part of our research had revealed David Millar’s words on the Col de la Colombière from his 2010 Tour du France. “From the lowest slopes of the Colombière, I was adrift, unable to stop my rapid slide out of the back of the bunch…..There were just under 180 km remaining in the stage and four mountains to climb. I was unequivocally, irredeemably, fuc..” well, you get the idea.

The climb starts pleasantly enough. You cruise out of Cluses and past the first marker post, declaring 17km to go to the col, and currently you’re climbing a 2% gradient. As each marker post past, kilometre after kilometre, that gradient would rise and rise. Still for now, in the first 10km as the road winds through the trees, the climb is deceptively easy. But then, as you leave the trees into the full glare of the sun, and the gradient passes 8%, David Millar’s words start to ring in your ears.

With 3km to go, the col is in clear sight, and is getting closer with every turn of the pedals. Unfortunately, it doesn’t get any lower. Instead the road just seems to rear up steeper and steeper in front of you. As if that wasn’t demoralising enough, by now my backside was beginning to really feel the difference between my 160mm travel, fat tyred, fat saddled mtb and the skinny tyred, razor saddled rocket I’d borrowed. Sure it was fast, but did it have to be so painful to achieve it?

Some random cyclist heading for the Col de la Colombiere. Who obviously I chased down and beat to the col.

The col eventually fell below the wheels, with the view of the Borand valley opening in front and, perhaps more relevantly, the cafe appearing to our right, a healthy number of patrons already installed and recovering from their efforts.

We were half way round, and no matter what we did, it was downhill for a while again. Somewhere between the Col and the next village of Grand Borand we were skipping along at about 50mph, making up time from our slightly slower ascent. The descents always pass quicker than the climbs though and soon enough we were dropping down the gears and climbing towards La Clusaz.

Trying to apply mtb technique to a road bike. Tricky to get your hips out to the side with a high saddle likes.

There’s an open boulangerie in La Clusaz which we rode past as there was nowhere to sit. surely there’d be an open cafe further into town. After much searching we discovered there wasn’t, but the next climb, the Col des Aravis, was only 400m. We’d last until the cafe at the top.

Col des Aravis. Malcolm starting to feel more at home as the weather takes a turn for the Scottish.

After the length and gradient of the Colombiere the Col des Aravis is a walk in the park, barely breaching 8% and soon we were at the top looking through the options for food. Unfortunately these options mostly seemed to be closed until 1830 and with the way the clouds were gathering we were keen to be somewhere else by that time. Anyway, it’s downhill from the col, we could stop for food in Giettaz.

Whit a downhill it was too. Descending on a road bike isn’t the same as the frenetic melee of mountain biking, but has it’s own rewards. Less action movie, more like the opening scenes of the Italian Job, working a classic car through the corners. Drop gear, drop gear, brake, turn into the apex, straighten up, pedal, up a gear, up a gear, coast and repeat. The descent from the Col des Aravais wound beautifully down the hill into the very quiet village of Giettaz and its open boulangerie.

Somewhere near Sallanches. Totally out of place in the photo order, but it breaks the words up nicely, and none of you are paying any attention anyway.

The open boulangerie which had run out of sandwiches, and pretty much everything else. Onwards to Flumet.

Flumet also turned a blank. On to Praz sur Arly.

There was no repeating of our La Clusaz error, at the first open boulangerie we stopped and bought the last 3 items in the cabinet. Ham and cheese croissants. The owner even got some deck chairs out for us to sit in whilst we savoured our savory snacks.

Suitably refreshed we got back in the saddle for the last push. They might be uncomfortable, but road bikes cover the ground a lot faster than a mountain bike, in no time at all we’d given up on more food in Megeve and were starting the long descent down to Le Fayet. A descent that was spurred on by the view of Sallanches slowly getting enveloped by a rain storm slowly rolling up the valley.

The Arve valley getting eaten by the rain beast.

From the Le Fayet train station it’s just 500 meters of climbing back up to Chamonix, but then, there’s several station bars keen to serve you a cold pint of lager, and that rain storm was getting a lot closer, and it was starting to get a bit dark. To cut a long list of excuses short….we caught the train home.

One hour climbing in the rain or a pint. What would you choose?
.

Posted in Road trip , tagged

Pila. Pinning/pining.

Posted on 11th September 2015

Pila. Sunshine and dust.

A long time ago in a galaxy (small highland town) far,
far away….

The first copy of “Dirt the downhill mountain bike magazine” arrived, some time later than it did in the rest of the UK as that’s generally what happens when you live in the north of the UK. For a bunch of kids who were doing a mix of BMX and motocross on bikes totally unsuited to the job at hand, and definitely not wearing lycra, it was a revelation that there were actually other people like us. All over the place.

Start with a banger. Pila summed up in 1 shot, dust hanging in the air, a fun berm, and as a tribute to Dirt mag, backlit rider with reflective goggles on.

Obviously we all started buying Dirt.

Several issues in (canny mind how far in, it’s not important anyway) there was an article about a bunch of riders deciding that the southern English DH races were shite (and they were back then) so piled in a van and drove to Pila to race a round of the Italian series.

Talking of racing, Sandy enduro's up on the IXS DH track. Mmmm, chunky.

That seems pretty reasonable now, but back then it was unheard of. If you were the best of the best at DH then obviously you spent much of the summer driving about the alps to race the Grundigs (and get drunk and smash stuff like a true Brit abroad), but the idea that as a normal rider you could just head off and ride this amazing terrain straight off a lift (this was before the Nevis Range DH was accessed by the lift, you still had to push up) was a revelation.

Braaap. Or maybe Yeeeow. Someone go ask a cool kid what I should write here.

But there was more to it than that. There was the idea that bikes, DH bikes, weren’t just something you did at the weekend or as a kid, but a lifestyle like skiing or climbing. I’d always known that getting out the country and heading to the mountains for the winter was a perfectly sensible thing to do, now I’d had the epiphany that you could do that for the summer too.

Wouldn't you want to do this all summer?

A lot has changed since then. My #enduro bike is years ahead of any DH bike of that time, Dirt has just ceased publication. I now spend most of my summer riding some of the best trails in the world as and when I want to.

And now I’ve finally gone to Pila.

Me, finally in Pila.

It was a long time coming, year after year I would be planning to go only to get injured, break the bike or, most frequently, the Mont Blanc tunnel be too busy. The blog’s even made it there before I did. But finally, I’ve made the 40 kilometre drive from Chamonix and caught the closing day of the 2015 Pila summer.

For 7 short hours Lorne, Sandy and I lapped and lapped and lapped the bike park, both the shorter (500m descent) upper chairlift accessed main park and the lower (1150m descent) home runs. We even failed to stop for coffee during the day which, for a trip to ride in Italy, is probably a first (and the only low point of the day).

Lorne, aiming to land before the corner.

I’m not going to describe the trails, it’s boring to write and worse to read, and Lorne did a good enough job after his first visit. Also we never really knew what trail we were on they all cross so much. But…I will make mention of the IXS DH track as it’s without doubt the hardest ‘official’ bike trail I’ve ridden if you stick to the quick lines, and probably even if you don’t.

IXS DH track. Better than Vallorcine, that's how good!

I’ve new found respect for the strength of DH rims and tyres, absolutely nae idea how you can land in some of the rock gardens at any speed without writing off the wheels. Pretty much anywhere else something that hard would be closed most of the time, but if it’s not hard how can you progress? Talking of which, was pretty cool to see so many weans out on the trail and riding fast. Though what do you aspire to when this is your local hill?

Can I stay here please?

Anyway, thanks Dirt for opening my eyes to another life all those years ago, I’m off to price DH bikes.

Posted in Road trip , tagged

ESI Silicone grip review

Posted on 4th September 2015

Never mind the grips, THAT'Swhat i call a winter playground.

Ever heard a mountain biker whine about a bikes contact points? Grips, saddle and pedals all seem surprisingly divisive for lumps of plastic and metal. Riders sound like Goldilocks as they flit between grips. Too hard, too soft, too thin, too thick. Over the years my preferences for set up have varied (obviously never following fashion and whatever the worlds fastest have been doing) from steep brake lever angles to almost horizontal. Narrow bars to wide bars (well, narrow was all you could get back in’t day) short bikes to long (again, for years you bought the smallest frame size you could find just to get the standover height) but my 1 constant has been:

I hate fat grips.

I also hate grips that spin about on your bars as soon as there’s a hint of moisture in the air.

No moisture to worry about, but the grips weren't spinning anyway. Lorne Cameron photo.

I used to glue or wire onto the bars whatever was the skinniest grip I could find from Oban Cycles (internet shopping for bike parts wasney a thing when I was a wean, or inventive shop names for that matter) and hope that I didn’t need to take any of my controls off the bars. Then along came lock-on grips which cured the ‘spinning on the bars but still able to take them off’ issue, the only problem is that they need to be that wee bit thicker to take account for the plastic collar and the outside lock is pretty uncomfy under the hand, so we’re back to seeing racers glueing and wiring their grips to the bar. At least we can take the controls off a bit easier these days.

So along comes silicone (that’s silicone, not silicon) grips which promise good grip, light weight and skinny diameter. And no worthwhile reviews on the internet.

One pair of brand new silicone grips.

I bought them, put them on the bike and rode them for 4 months, 6 Coupe du France enduro races and an EWS.

They’re still on the bike, they’re doing ok. The grip is much easier to damage than a lock on (the end caps lasted all of one ride as I have a habit of clipping trees) but a bit of electric tape around the last 1cm of the grip seems to stop the damage getting worse and if I’d thought of it before I sent me and the bike cartwheeling through the undergrowth it would probably have stopped the grip ripping. Or I could have not cartwheeled through the undergrowth.

There is plenty of grip in the dry, though I needed to wear gloves in the wet or if my hands got sweaty otherwise it all felt a bit insecure.

More, without the hard plastic layer the grip really does take a bit of buzz out of the trail. Not so much that I’d buy them for that reason, just let a bit of air out your tyres, but it is a help on long rides.

And the same grips 4 months, 7 races and unknown crashes later

Will I buy them again? Undecided. If it was for long rides back in Scotland on a shorter travel bike them maybe. For riding fast down hills in the alps with 160mm of travel and 2.4 front tyre, I think I might go back to a skinny hard grip that feels a bit more solid under the hand.

Was that any help?

I don't really care if that helped, I'm going riding.

Posted in Review , tagged

Tignes Coupe du France 2015 #6

Posted on 27th August 2015

CdF 6 Tignes. Stage 1 starts here, and reaches it's halfway point down there.

“Chamonix Bike Blog” does imply a blog about biking in Chamonix, so I’ll concede there’s been some mission drift with the amount of race write ups from places that are not Chamonix of late. Dinnay fret, this one’s the Coupe du France season finale so we’ll be back to proper riding for the next month.

And it’s my blog so I’ll do what I want regardless.

Friday freeride. And actually free too.

Tignes then. A mere 2hr away and the lifts are free, so Sandy and I headed over on Friday early enough to sample the trails. If your main experience of lift companies is in Chamonix it’s a bit of a shock to wander into the lift office, be smiled at, then given a lift pass for nothing more than your email address. And a wee leaflet explaining that pretty much everything else going on in the summer is free too.

Talking of free, this is part of the Saturday evening free feed. And free beer too. Again.

No idea where the money’s come from, but they’ve spent a wheen on it digging and building trails. There’s mile after mile of berm-to-jump-to-berm-to-wooden-feature-to-berm standing out sand yellow against the pretty much featureless grass of the alpine landscape. Forgot to mention that bit, Tignes is at 2000m altitude, the riding is above that, you’re going to get short of breath. Or at least I did.

Didn't.

So after ragging about on both sides of the hill giggling off drops and chickening out of assorted gaps (I had a race the next day, it was being sensible not cowardly. And the gap’s bigger than it looks) we got down to the town to find an airbag for bikes.

Free. obvz.

I did want to try a backflip, and considered nicking a BMX off a 10 year old that was hitting the airbag too. But then he looked fairly tough and he might have had a big brother of like 12 or something who’d beat me up. So I tried a whip. Pretty easy really.

Old dogs learning new tricks.

Back to the apartment and part 2 of the team arrives, with Nina, Anna and much missed non-racing Spence who’d for some reason had decided that last summers sitting about in rainy carparks waiting to change a tyre, then clean bikes, then cook food wasn’t the best way to spend his weekend and went riding instead.

Sandy sorts his bike, I drink tea. Pre-race stress as usual.

For the final round we went back to the rallye format of obligatory practice on Saturday then race day on Sunday, but with the wee innovation of a cheeky timed race run on the Saturday, giving 5 timed stages in total. Even better, the liaisons which helped the course wander between Tignes, Val d’Isere and Les Brevieres were downhill. Hell, one liaison was 800m vert of descent through bike park, it would’ve been a stage in most places. Instead it was the dangerous combination of relaxed cruising and long trains of racers trying to show off whilst pretending not to try. I don’t think anyone got too hurt, but there were a few unforced mechanicals….

I like this format, getting a stress free day to cruise about the trails chatting to folk and not having to pedal too hard. What’s more, I can run half bald tyres and try and save the good ones for race days. Hence I wasn’t quite so happy about the 1 race run in the middle of the day, but that’s what it was.

Sam n Sandy pre reccy on special 1.

The specials were a welcome change from Valloire 2 weeks ago. Still quite physical in places, particularly S4, but with much more fun in between bouts of pedalling. If you want a better idea of how they looked, then there were pure hunnerts of photographers out there documenting. Try Velovert, Pinkbike and the event video.

A group looking at s1. And the sun. Probably the view too.

Everyone seems to find their own wee groups at these races, generally with folk about the same pace as you. It should be cut throat competition, but mostly you end up cheering on and helping the very people you’re trying to beat. Sport psychologists probably have fun with that one.

Finally, a shot of a rider with a number on their bike! Nina was cursed by mechanicals, but still made an impact on the weekend.

With such gladiatorial combat in mind it was good to be finishing so close to Anthony Martin and Sam Gerret. Like really close. Within .1 of a second at times. Even better, we all managed to get some stage times that we’d hoped we could do but to date hadnae. Sam killing Sunday’s 2nd stage to go 28th (after sharing his headcam footage with me on the lift up, ta Sam!). Anthony grabbed 26th on the 3rd stage, only just beaten by me in 25th, less than 7% slower than some Jerome Clementz lad who’s turned up to take the win for the weekend.

Anyway, a grand weekend of racing over and the series totals tallied, I ended up ranked 45th in scratch for the season. None of the top pilots rode the full series due to EWS clashes, but given the level of enduro riding in France I’m pretty happy with top 50, what with a full time job, no sponsor and all that. Better, when I start playing the “niche” game, I can jump to 39th if you get them pesky fast juniors, dames and masters out the rankings to leave only men aged 19-40. Then there are only 2 riders above me with nothing in the team column on the results table. I can even score 1st in the UK licence category…

Enough self aggrandisation, turns you blind or something. Was a great season, plenty of type 1 fun, some type 2 and no type 3.

Type 1 fun.

As ever, big thanks to eveyone that organised the series. We might grump about various niggles over the weekend but it’s a pretty amazing effort that’s made to create these events and I don’t think anyone’s getting rich out of it somehow. Particular thanks go to the commentator who manages to pick my most exhausted and panting moments to try and get a finish line interview out of me. Also, Sandy, Sam, Nina and Spence for all your help, advice, lent bike parts, shared car journeys,random cooking and quality chat.

Next year?

Posted in Race , tagged

Already?

Posted on 14th August 2015

Valloire, Seventh August, Coupe du France round five.

Not been much activity here for a bit, there’s been some races (Les Orres and Valloire Coupe du France Enduro, the latter’ll do for the photos), some riding of trails I’ve already written about and an injured wrist, but mostly I’ve lost my psyche for writing.

You can tell I’ve lost my psyche because I’m using words like psyche. I’d hate ‘psyche’ even more than ‘bants’ if it wasn’t for the racist/sexist/homophobic connotations you get with banter, but it’s still high up in my list of words wot I don’t like.

Sandy likes his free Opinel knife, best goodie bag of the season, nae hate here.

Other things I don’t like? Lift closing dates, so let’s get all the hate out in one go. Here’s a list of lift closing dates, usual caveats of subject-to-change apply, don’t expect the dates to extend though.

Vallorcine                             30th August
Flegere                                6th September
Grand Montets                    13th September
Brevent                                20th September (re-opens 17th October to 6th November)
Prarion                                 20th September
Le Tour                                20th September
Tramway du Mont Blanc      27th September
Bellevue                               27th September

A riding photo! The 1000m descent wasn't enough so they built a wee drop in ramp to give us that bit more to ride down.

And but a short roadtrip away

Grand Massif 28th Aug: http://ete.grand-massif.com/ouverture
La Thuile 30th Aug: http://www.lathuile.it/datapage.asp?id=211&l=1&s=E
Portes du Mont Blanc 30th Aug: http://www.combloux.com/en/activities/summer/pass.html
Tignes / Val d’Isere 30th Aug (still FREE up till then): http://www.tignes.net/en/summer-sports/free-and-a-la-carte-activities-252.html
Pila 6th Sept…..probably: http://www.pila.it/en/holidays/tariffe/tessere-a-punti/
Portes du Soliel starts closing the weekend of 30th August and is mostly closed by the 4th, except Champery & Morgins which keeps going to 29th Sept: http://en.portesdusoleil.com/summer-lifts.html
Verbier 21st Sept then reduced hours until 25th Oct (if weather’s ok): http://www.verbierbikepark.ch/horaires_fr.php

Free Galibier beer, very welcome to ease the pain in the hand, Frederik also getting in with the pain, his first enduro race obviously leaving him a bit confused, WC DH is much shorter....

And assorted other wee places which have been written about more than enough on the internet already, if you don’t know about them then put some effort in for yourself.

If I don’t get any love for writing again soon, I’ll do an extensive list of words I don’t like instead.

Valloire Sunday morning. It rained a bit.

Posted in Trail conditions , tagged

Enduro World Series round 4, Samoens

Posted on 23rd July 2015

EWS 4 Samoens. Watch out for the smiley rocks.

Aye, so, err….World series enduro racing. Just round the valley from home. Couldn’t really not enter.

Turn up on Friday for registration, stupidly assuming it would be in the same virtually purpose built structure as last years Coupe du France registration. Obviously it’s not and spend 30 minutes randomly riding about till I find the small hall it’s now in. Nina was chatting away to Joe Barnes in the queue so I shamelessly skip in.

Five stickers, free mudguard and a signature later, you're ready to race.

After tracking down some more water and joking about the mudguard in the goodie bag we chat to Isa and Enrico, then with the stage map being released (not that any of us ever got to see it mind, which begs the question, how did people know where the stage was?) we headed over to walk Saturdays stage 3 behind the full rocky mountain team. By the top it seemed every name I’d ever read about or watch videos of was kicking about. And speaking to Nina. The name dropping getting too much for you yet? I’ve not finished.

We get down and go for ice cream.

It’s too hot for northern Europeans.

Ice cream!

Saturday. With a race number of 190 I’m safely in the nobodies again. A mix of British, Kiwi, Irish, French and German around me. With English crossed with French being the main language it’s a bit less work for me to communicate than inflicting my franglais on folks at the Coupe du France.

Course walkin' Look, there, hashtagenduro cut line.

We reccy the stage, race the stage, and repeat until about 5000m of descent is clocked up. Or that’s the plan. As I arrive (late, the loading system for the gondola leaves a little to be desired with about 350 riders on the start list) for my reccy there’s a few drops of rain in the air. Twenty minutes later I’ve finished my reccy and am droochit, though the ground which hasn’t felt rain for about 4 weeks is soaking it up, begging for more and not getting too muddy. The thunderstorm stops after 30 minutes.

Later riders aren’t so lucky. Chamonix rider Dave Hughes finds another rider on the ground with his handlebar through his thigh. He tourniquets with a tube and the helicopter evacuates. The course is on hold for 1 hour.

The chiefs. I think Fred only organises these so he can rag about on the gasgas.

I’m not going to describe the stages beyond stage 1 had the most pedalling, stage 2 the most bike park, stage 3 the shortest, stage 4 the most brutal on the upper body and stage 5 just the most, one of the best trails out there.
Stage 1 passed, seemed ok, no terrible mistakes. Spencer who was back on mechanic duties (Formula 1 pit ain’t got nothing on him for tubeless tyre changes) meets me at the pits and says the second run on stage 2 is cancelled due to the time delays so I kick about waiting to see if it’s going to stop getting hot and sunny and return to rain.

It rained roughly this much on Saturday morning.

It doesn’t. Then the stage times go up. I’ve landed in 73rd place on the 1st stage. This is something of a surprise. Heading up for stage 2 I’m no longer relaxed and just having fun with no stress of trying to do well (because obviously there’s no way I’d do well at an EWS). Instead I’m now worrying I have to try hard and take “good” lines.

The day was still fun, but by the end I was riding so cautiously I’m surprised I’m not still up there. The plus side of this was that the bike didn’t need fixed overnight.

Multiple DH world champion Nico Voulliouz chilling out and not worrying about his lines.

Sunday morning and we get re-seeded according to our Saturday finish. I ended the day 83rd. Instead of the relaxed piss taking of Saturday’s riders I’m now surrounded by riders with their name on their jersey and bike. Presumably this is as they change sponsor every year so it’s hard to remember which bike is theirs. Also, instead of wondering how many riders I’ll overtake, I have Phil Shucksmith 15sec behind me, Eddie Masters 30, and Chris Kilmurray 45 . There’s still plenty piss taking, but I really don’t feel I belong here with the “real” riders. At least I’ve got my good riding top without any holes in it saved for the race runs.

Turns out clipping a rock and bending frame, cranks and pedal will put a damper on your day.

Blowing straight through the tape on the practice run for the last stage (not the first to do so, the marshal is already pulling fresh tape off the roll as I career past him) I walk back to the trail to meet Eddie Masters doing the same. Me and the 3 riders behind me are now in a train of 4 whooping and whipping our way down one of the best trails in the alps. It’s not what racing is about, but it’s a lot of fun, and the only time I relax on the bike all day.

Jerome recovering from illness is faster than pretty much anyone healthy.

Racing over, the Dude’s of Hazzard suggest swimming in the Giffre. This seems like a good idea until I put my feet in the river and decide I’ll just paddle. Nina does the same. Spencer decides even that looks too cold. It’s left to the rest to go swimming. James Shirly goes one better and has his post race wash. 100% commitment to the van life. A stone skimming contest then starts to get a little out of hand.

So was that a race weekend? I mostly seemed to be chatting to random folk with a common interest in bikes. Some I’d never met, some I knew only as the stars of the sport, some had been at the same races as me in the past. Then there were the friends who’d headed over to see just how good the best of the best are get some riding in when the racing moved on (cheers for the cheers everyone, apologies if I was a bit distracted and didn’t say hello on the course!)

Finish line Stage 5 Sunday.It's all over bar the swimming.

Cheers to Luke Jarmey Photography for bumping up the standard of photography, Spencer for standing about a carpark in the rain and sun giving encouragement and everyone who cheered for me and chatted away over the weekend.

Posted in Race , tagged , ,

Last chance to see. Samoens

Posted on 13th July 2015

Samoens. leaving nothing but traces in the dust.

Life is a temporary affair. As an organism you get between a few seconds and a thousand or so years on earth. As a species it seems you get about 10 million years until you’re outta here. As a rule, it’s the mass extinctions that’ll get you. There’s probably been five already (alas details are sketchy, there’s not many folk left afterwards to keep a record), which between them mean that 99.5% of the species that have been, have been and gone.

Today we’re possibly going into a sixth mass extinction with species getting the chop at a rate about 100 to 1000 times faster than “background” extinction. The interesting thing with this one is that whilst the others were as a result of natural events, the blame for this one is pinned square on our love of carbon and aluminium bits made in China.

This way to "Paradise" mostly because there's 1 turn that could kill you. You do need to have a paradise in your afterlife beliefs for that to work though.

Of course mass extinction isn’t all bad news (unless you’re the species becoming extinct I guess), every event has been followed by a period of diversification as new species arrive blinking into the light and leap up the reordered food chain. It’s how we got where we are today, thank you Cretaceous–Paleogene extinction event.

What’s this got to do with a bike blog then? Very little.

Spence probably killed a worm with that foot plant. Does he care?

The Enduro World Series circus arrives in Samoens this week ready for the racing weekend next. Whilst you’re not allowed to practice the special stages under French rules, there’s nothing about driving 45 minutes over to have a go on the trails 8 days before the race. With so many trails and no idea which will be used, it’s unlikely you’ll ride the right ones.

Nina trying out spd pedals for the first time on her "wee" bike.

Either way, as of today all EWS riders are banned (that needs some caps-lock. BANNED) from the whole Samoens bike park. On foot or bike. So the weekend there was your last, err, chance to, umm, see the trails. Too tenuous a link?

At least deep in the woods the dust wasn't so bad. And the trails were just grand.

So Spence, Nina and me met in Samoens last week to get a feel for the trails in the dry. This is an important point as the last time we were here it was not dry, which is sort of where the intro comes in.

This trail was very, very dry.

The Coupe du France race here last summer was a quagmire. One of our first trails of the day included sections of Stage 1/3 which had been killed by the passing of 300 riders twice the year before. But, springing from either side of the trail was numerous new trails, similar but different.

Compulsory rolling endo round a corner shot.

After next weekend, when it will no doubt have rained and large quantities of earth transported from the hill to bikes and into the back of 300 riders cars and vans, there will be another set of destroyed trails on the hill with hub deep ruts and blown out berms. And hopefully from there more trails will be built, the old trails will be absorbed back into the forest and no one will die out.

Never too hip for puns.

Anyway, for anyone that wants to know, the trails under the GMC lift in Samoens are amazing. A lot like Innerleithen/Pleny off piste/Les Houches (pick according to geographic experience) in that they’re fairly steep, rooty, tight n twisty though trees yet often silly fast in straight lines (still through trees). The pictures probably say more. And if you’re reading this to get some handy tips for the race, Nicolai, Clementz, Graves is my thoughts, with cut down spikes and some Gore-tex. See you there.

Ooo I do like a loose dusty berm these days.

Posted in Road trip , tagged

Millau, Coupe du France 2015 #3

Posted on 2nd July 2015

A bridge, a city and some extreme sports. Yup, Millau Natural Games 2015.

I re-read last week’s blog on Val d’Allos, and it was shit. Nothing to say, and said badly. I suspect this is because I had a great time and was pretty happy. Happiness does not create art.

Edvard Munch and the Scream: Not happy
Ian Curtis and Closer: Not happy
Sylvia Plath and The Bell Jar: Not happy
Pharrel Williams and Happy: Shit.

Therefore, this should be a cracking post. (Don’t get your hopes up).

Liaison to Special 1. Looks like what the Mendips do in Mint Sauce cartoons.

Round 3 of the Coupe du France was down in the Midi Pyrenees in Millau. You’ve probably not heard of Millau but it’s where Norman Foster got to make a bridge that everyone seems to like. It is quite a good bridge. I took a lot of photos of it. I probably should have taken more photos of the race.

Special 1 with yon bridge in the background. This is probably the flattest bit of the course.

With no expectations of what the trails would be like, it was a surprise to ride four technical tracks, each of which could easily be used as a DH course, demanding and hardly any pedaling.

No, all the pedaling was saved for the liaisons.

In themselves the liaisons weren’t too bad, spinning the pedals up hills on black, black tarmac. No the problem was that it was apparently 35 degrees on the Sunday and, well, Scot’s don’t do heat. Anything above 25 is a bit warm and once you pass 30 it’s a write off.

This is my main memory of the weakend.

Back to the specials. A huge amount of work had gone into creating these tracks, many thanks to the organisers for it. Quite loose and dusty, but beyond that a mix of very fast to slow and technical, tricky rock slabs, river bed toboggan runs, some pretty big drops. Not sure what order all these features were in but…they were all there. Special 3 seemed to be the stand out, I think. I do at least remember the excited chat at the end of each Saturday practice run as everyone recounted close calls and railed turns.

Nico on one of those cursed e-bikes. He later lifted it above his head.

Anyways, I’d love to write more about just how great the trails were, but I can’t really remember much at all. For each stage on the Sunday I would be sat waiting for my run trying to recall anything, ANYTHING, I could to help my time. But nothing.

Given this, I was fairly happy to be teetering along, riding safely, and sitting in the mid 60s position. Alas, it all went wrong on special 4 where I finally succumbed to the heat and lost the ability to ride a bike.

Sam Gerrett reaching the finish arch. About a third of the entrants didn't make it this far!

Completely lost it. My first crash came on a flat, straight, pedaling section. The next 4 followed on what was a steep loose trail anyway, nevermind riding it with the motor skills of a groom on his stag night. Somewhere along the line I managed to split my helmet down the middle. No idea which crash of course.

Sandy checking his stem. I don't think Froome has done much enduro.

I wasn’t the only one struggling mind. I’ve never seen so many walking wounded at an enduro race before. Of the 340 riders who started practice on Saturday only 227 made it to the end of special 4 on Sunday. A sign of how good the trails were I guess.

The legend that is Anne Caroline Chausson, on probably the only boring bit of the trail. My photography suffered as much as my riding in the heat.

So if you’re hoping for a detailed report on Millau, best check other media outlets and the official video. If you’re looking for art, then no matter how grumpy I get you’re searching in the wrong place here.

Posted in Race , tagged

Val d’Allos Coupe du France 2015 #2

Posted on 25th June 2015

Val d'Allos, coupe du France round 2. If you've got a panoramic thingy on your camera, might as well use it.

“Moasting” Verb: Signifying the combination of moaning and boasting, often employed by celebrities. cf: “Yeah Bro, around about my 12th lap of Brevent of the day my arms really started to feel the burn. etc”

Yes, you learn a new thing every day, and on Saturday that thing was the word moasting. Mostly because we were all complaining about how we had to ride a 20 or so minute mostly DH piece of singletrack, then ride some more pretty good trail (and 1 awesome trail.). It’s a hard life and I can tell your heart bleeds.

Stage1 practice. Fair to say this was quite a long trail.

So goes Val d’Allos. Last year it was my 2nd favourite place I rode, alas this year for political reasons (the official line, general chat was the land owner had fallen out with folks) the upper chairlift wasn’t working and so most of the vertical was out of the way.

Instead, with only a few weeks notice, they came up with a pretty good new plan. Parc Ferme for the bikes at the top of the Col d’Allos on the Friday and Saturday nights (2250m, they were probably chilly, one Nomad owner put a blanket over his, presumably to stop the carbon getting a cold) then aforementioned looooooong trail, a liaison, another trail but this time only loooong to Allos, lift back up to the race village, food, another lift, 10mins liaison then down, before repeating the lift/food/lift/liaison for the final stage of the day back to the finish. And food.

Parc Ferme. A great chance to upgrade your current bike, if you can pedal away fast enough.

This last trail had the most in common with the traces we raced last year, mostly because it was a combination of 2 of them. A huge, huge amount of fun, if you’re looking for somewhere different to go flat out on rolling singletrack, it’s hard to think of somewhere better.

Start of stage 2. Cross the field then drop into the landscape for 10 minutes.

The rest of the trails were pretty good too, lots of fun on Saturday practice where you could coast along the flat bits and push the ups, but everyone was a little concerned about how the ups and flats would feel come Sunday. Talking of practice, the rallye format is for 1 untimed lap with no stopping of each trace on the Saturday, then 1 lap racing of each on the Sunday, except they sneakily timed us on the Saturday and put the numbers up. Turns out Nico Voullioz is fastest even when going slow and, for perhaps the only time ever, I was 7 seconds slower than Fabian Barel on a 20 min stage (when he hasn’t had a crash or mechanical). And 42nd overall. Be nice if they could have just used those results…..

When Barel, Nicolai & Voullioz stop to discuss lines, you eavesdrop. Stage 1.

My weekend didn’t get off to the best of starts when a series of minor mishaps on Friday were crowned by me walking straight into a glass door, splitting my lip and eyebrow and dislocating my nose. I don’t know if you can dislocate a nose, but it went squint and made a good crack when I pulled it straight again. And hurt.

Can you spot the youth heading back up the hill? A bad place to drop your helmet!

Saturday could only be better, which in good narrative fashion, it was. (Or at least it was for everyone but the poor kid who’s helmet started rolling down the hill from the start of stage 1, and didn’t stop for a long long time. You might need to zoom in to see him…..) Leaving aside the riding, come the evening as the mid-summer sun shone and the air stayed balmy a massive paella was cooking on the fire and the free beer was flowing. #enduro is serious business.

Signs you want to see. Saturday night at Val d'Allos

Sundayfunday. Have you ever seen someone practice a sport and realise you will never, ever be that good? Watching Nico Voullioz and Florian Nicolai on the opening straight of Stage 1 was one of those moments. I can’t explain just how fast they went down the hill, other than to say I wish everyone gets a chance to see their heroes do what they do best, then try and copy them.

Me heading off down stage 1 race day. 10.4% slower than Nico did. Accuracy counts when chasing E.T.

Strangely having been put so firmly in my place I went on to have a pretty good run, if you discount trying a blind shortcut and going headfirst into a rock, cutting and bruising my cheek through the full face helmet and disturbing my nose a bit. My first top 40 stage time and just 10% shy of Nico. I think I’ve moved on from moasting to plain and simple boasting here.

Nico showing how it's done, Stage 3.

The rest of the day went pretty well too. I’m here to have fun and there were some amazingly fun bits of trail. Every so often I even managed to go genuinely as quick as I think I can which one of the wee things racing can give you that riding trails just canny do. After Saturday’s worries that the first two stages would be too pedally they actually raced pretty well. Still physical, but not xc race physical.

Fabian Barel and Nico Quere. Two of the best, with 2 different lines.

As a result of being the anglophone with the lowest number board, if not fastest finishing,  (Meg Bichard turned up and gave Isa Courdurier a run for her money taking the win, whilst Kiwi Mike Cowlin nabbed 29th in mens) I even ended up being interviewed at the finish line. I look forward to my interpretation of the French language becoming a regular comedy act…

Sandy, heading for the finish.

Sandy was on his first outing with the new bike, and turns out having a fully functional bike does make a bit of a difference to your enjoyment of racing, and finishing. For other peoples results, try looking at the result page or event video, I’m not doing it, what do you think this is, Pinkbike?

Sandy, frustratingly close to top 100, but without doubt the fastest loon on the course.

A week to turn up work occasionally then racing again next weekend. It’s a hard life (see opening paragraph)

Sante.

Posted in Race , tagged

Border.

Posted on 8th June 2015

Tracing the border between France & Switzerland

It was the Les Gets opening weekend last week and I got a bit excited at the prospect of a whole day in the bike park chasing down Nina & Spence’s new local friends on their DH bikes. As a result I ended the day with an old thumb injury flaring up again and needing to take it easy on the bike for a couple of weeks.

This seems like a perfect time then to go and explore some new trails, with a guarantee of a maximum of faffage and a minimum of actual downhill riding time to aggravate my ulnar collateral ligament.

Riding uphill with views. Good for the thumb!

One of my favourite ski tours from last winter was the little known Barberine Couloir near Loriaz so what better than to try and repeat it in summer.

Obviously this was a stupid idea as the places that give the best skiing are rubbish for the bike (Champex-lac) and the best riding is poor skiing (Les Houches) and to save you the bother of reading on, the ride followed this theme with predictable accuracy, so you can just look at the pretty pictures now.

Oooo. Pretty pictures.

Still reading? Must be a slow day in the office.

A bad day _insert preferred outdoors sport here_ is better than a good day in the office.

To be fair, the ride started pretty well. Train with no conductor hassle to Buet, painless climb to the Loriaz chalets then starting across some fun traversing single track with amazing views in front to Switzerland and behind across the Mont-Blanc Massif. There were a few short sections that were a little to tricky to ride with a dodgy thumb, but nothing too harsh.

A good traversing trail must be one of the most under rated things in biking.

Some trailrunning friends had said that the traverse across to the Emosson dam was mostly rideable, with only a couple of technical sections with chains. This was much the case and as Lorne pointed out, most of the best trail have rock climbing with chains somewhere along the way.

Rock, chains and a drop below, all good. Carbon bike under arm, less good.

Once over by the Emosson dam (obviously it would have been easier to have just climbed the road to the dam carpark, but where’s the fun in that?) we had a break for me to discover I’d forgotten to pack any water and to pop pads on for the main event, the descent down below the dam to Barberine.

The start of the descent wasn't all unrideable, but it certainly wasn't all as good as this.

We’d been getting glimpses of the trail below us on the traverse, which looked good. Alas we’d also been getting glimpses of the steep upper slopes covered in scree where the trail emerged from. Turned out for the first 100m or so of vertical we were carting the bikes down a rubble filled gully. Not ideal, but not so bad if the trail below is worth it.

Better....if only it lasts.

Which it wasn’t. Quite. There were lots of great sections, but the flow was constantly being interrupted by awkward rock steps and slow speed boulder runs where you were constantly fighting to stop the front wheel getting hooked up. Not ideal with a bad thumb.

The granite slabs gave some of the most interesting riding.

The lower third gave the best riding as we traversed on fast trails through the forest, which was kinda the theme of the ride. Traversing trails good, descending trails bad.

Wouldn't fancy this in the wet.

Eventually we arrived at Barberine, the collection of houses masquerading as a village, and started the long spin up the road to the Col du Montets and home, after a much needed stop at the random buvette before Vallorcine for a can of coke.

The lower trails were grand, though we could have saved a bit of effort by just going there directly....

Not a ride we’ve got plans on repeating, but nothing ventured nothing gained and there were some excellent wee sections that we’d never have ridden otherwise. I’ll be back with the skis but.

It's not a bad life when this is your cruisey trail home.

Posted in Chamonix ride , tagged