Got back last night from weekend biking based in Champery. Great crack! If you get the chance, it really is rather good fun. We did a day's fun in Les Gets on Friday, Passportes on Saturday, and a days guiding in Villars on Sunday.
All absolutely cracking. Bloody knackered when we got back.
Highs:
The sheer concentration of bikers and good atmos is brilliant
The singletrack around Les Lindarets and Chatel/Chatel bike park was absolutely fabulous (i think, there was so much it was hard to keep track)
29er with massive tires and massive bloke (me!) monster trucking over roots and mud, overtaking lesser mortals strewn on all sides on small wheeled bikes 😀
Meeting Matt and Jon from this here mag, nice chaps (hope we get piccies in the report)
Clattering down some juicy singletrack on a high plateau, to find a helicopter popping up over the brow of the hill ahead and filming/photographing us from about 20m away whilst flying along beside us. Apocalypse Now - tastic.
Hope tech M4s with organic pads are amazing, zero fade. zero. although did go through 6 sets of pads over the 3 days.
DIssent 29er 2.5 tires are remarkable, grip on everything, but at 1.4kg EACH (i weighed mine), you reeeeeeally feel them, esp on roads, as soon as the angle points up! 😯
these guys were ace: www.skichampery.co.uk and www.alpinedescents,com , us lot and families spread across both, and they are amazing places and totally bike friendly.
Learns:
it is pretty relentless doing 3 alps days, and 120mm, even on a 29er, was not really enough.
You cannot hydrate too much in hot weather
take sun screen
make sure of directions, I ended up in Morzine three times by mistake on the passportes run, adding about 20km and almost scuppering our chances of finishing 😳
Don't muck about at food stations for too long, there is really not a lot of spare time
I am really not that great a rider compared to some of these boys!
And for your eyeball pleasure, without the need for too much bleach:
we were hungry on day 1!
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The cable car start from Champery at about 9am on Saturday - we're going way up there?!?!
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At the top, ready fro the off, Huey and Neil consider if this was wise
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Me and El Cap, chillin' on the way up (near Avoriaz i think)
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Me and Neil having made it (just!) to the last lift up Champoussin for the last run down
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Hmmmmm, nice sunburn you idiot!
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If you were there, hope you had fun!
Kev
Oh, and for all of us, Passportes itself was injury free. Same cannot be said of guiding day on Sunday in Villars. Some of that was STEEP and ROCKY, enough that major flying OTB incidents were comon.
Injuries a little more tender today! 😆
And i need a replacement saddle. That's 2 in a year (Gobi - snapped body in half, SDG rail snapped), do you think I am too fat?
Actually, don't answer that!
Kev
Top report, still in the van on way home did passportes on Friday and Sunday with lots of great riding on the other days too....will miss the Alps till next year.
Sounds good.
Did Passportes on the Friday, previously an alpine (biking) virgin. Great fun will definitely be back next year.
We started from Chatel, had to miss out the Morzine to Les Gets section as some idiot (me) had 5 punctures and another member of the group snapped a mech hangar and mangled his mech so had to singlespeed a lot of the route.
I liked it. Did it Sunday in lycra on a borrowed DH bike.
Lots of folk to overtake, great fun.
Sounds great.
Agree - it was a stunning weekend. We did it on Sunday, completed the full route in exactly 8 hours. We also joined friends who were doing it Satureday and did about 1/2 the route with them by just buying a lift pass - hadn't realised you could do that beforehand.
Weather certainly helped, made for a great atmosphere at the food stops and in the demo area.
cynic-al - how were the pedally sections on the DH bike? We re-passed a ton of folk on big bikes who were deeply unhappy (about pedalling, but also about getting out of the way on the singletrack of a fat bloke on a 29er going a lot quicker 😀 )
Mossimus - We had amazingly no mechanicals, a shame you missed the Les Gets/morzine bits as there was some sweet singletrack in there also!
Runswithscissors - doesn't it make the day to day riding just seem that bit 'smaller'? In the alps the riding is just. so. damn. big.
Still buzzing thinking about it all.
Kev
phil56 - 8 hours was good, I reckon we'd have done that if I hadn't done missed the Les Gets turn off from the top of Morzine, twice. Instead, it was 9.5hrs and my GPS said 108km of riding. Ouch!
Kev
Oh Oh going there on Friday - you're pics have got me all excited!
We did it last year for the first time. It really is a revalation, isn't it. Looks and sounds like you had as much fun as we did 🙂
You didn't encounter any stuffed goats on casters did you?
Saturday from Chatel. First time in the Alps, so had no expectations really. A really good day out, a complete mixed bag of riding, from mud and roots to rocks and gravel. Descent into Morzine from Avoriaz was so good.
Ended up cutting out the Morzine/Les Gets/Morzine bit as I was with my girlfriend who is a relative biking novice, and the day was starting to slip away, so wanted to make sure we didn't need to start rushing later on. Which was probably a good decision, as that last descent into Chatel on the gravel road is a killer on tired arms and legs.
Happily, we made it around with no offs - so proud of the missus for coping as well as she did, if you spotted a little blond lady with no pads on, that was her. She probably stood out quite a bit, we christened it the 'Pass'portes du Sausagefest' in honour of the lack of female participation.
how were the pedally sections on the DH bike?
Terrible - I did it on a Stab last year and decided that it was too much. Did it on a coil-sprung Patriot this year, which was far better
binners: WTF? 😆 unfortunately no.
😆nickf - Memberhow were the pedally sections on the DH bike?
Terrible - I did it on a Stab last year and decided that it was too much. Did it on a coil-sprung Patriot this year, which was far better
torsoinalake - there were indeed relatively few burds, classic at the Les Lindaret rest stop, at the way into the refuel bit there was a lady taking off her top to get some air about her in the heat. Standing in the sun stripping off to only sports bra, there was almost the worlds biggest bike crash/domino pile up as eyes were distracted from what was in front of your wheel. Classic.
Actually, she was wee and blonde, if that was your missus - good work fella. 😀
Kev
I just got back, did friday, was really good fun.
Did the extra loop so did pretty much 100km in one day, my arms were suffering.
Definitely something i recommend to everyone.
B_S_N - Our Garmin said we did 97km,so sounds about right. It was confusing at the top of Morzine, we ended up asking loads of other riders the way and trying to translate the various answers!
BSN riding back home sure is smaller esp here in the mountainous wilds of Cambridgeshire!
They put the Torgon loop back in 🙂 . That was missing from last year and had some of the best trails in the circuit last time (Along with Rippaille single track) but I remember the lift being shonky as. The food stops are the best bit.
I was with my girlfriend who is a relative biking novice
I am in a similar situation to you. Mine is not a complete novice but certainly walks quite a few sections on your average uk red trail. Was there enough riding for you both given you would have had take less technical trails?
How much normal XC stuff is there?
Most of th stuff I read about the Alps is all DH related.
How much normal XC stuff is there?
Absolutely loads.
Much of is is more XC-with-lift-assist rather than full-on DH (though obviously there's loads of that), and there are a lot of options for climbing if that's your idea of fun. It's all a fair bit harder than the UK though - you'll certainly be using your brakes a lot more (obviously) and there are a lots of rooty sections which are tricky in the mud (of which there can be loads - rain is never too far away in the Alps).
Prior Proper Planning Prevents Piss Poor Performance
Rode on Saturday. First time on a bike since breaking my arm 2 months previously.
Misread my phone when I woke up- ended up down in Morzine at 6:10am, waited til the boulangerie opened then feasted on a coke and a croissant for breakfast. Realised I'd forgotten the suncream, and too far to ride back to the campsite. Not an ideal start.
Rode with two known problems on my bike, both of which failed to last the distance- a stripped crank thread, which gave up leaving Chatel, so I had to return, buy a new crank and wait nearly an hour for that to be fitted. 98 euro for a complete XT crankset was a bit of a bargain though.
My dodgy rear brake gave up completely on the descent in Champery, followed very quickly by the front on the descent from Les Crosets- I had to walk a lot of this. Huge thanks to the guys (can't remember who they are) who operate the wee van at Les Lindarets, for spending another hour sorting out my rear brake, and lending me a replacement front unit.
A great day out, with nice scenery and good food, though a bit hot for me.
Oh, and as usual I got overtaken by a lot of [b]really[/b] fast riders.
I rode the event last year, it was great. What was in this years bag of goodies? I'm after a lift pass or two 😉
big_scot_nanny - Member
cynic-al - how were the pedally sections on the DH bike?
When your bottom gear is 36-23 and that skips most of the time...not great! I walked most blimbs.
I'd planned to do it on a hardtail but that went awry, I'd say a Heckler-Nomad with big tyres would be perfect.
Ambrose - nice wee PPDS waterproof courier bag.
If you don't mind me asking, how much did the trip cost you?
Tempted myself to go in august but wary of the costs...
It certainly adds up, I did a bigger trip including bike touring & camping, hostels and city stuff, trains etc, spent £1K in 17 days.
The event is ace value at E50 or so.
i was planning on going two weeks back but the weather turned and it pissed it down all week so didn't bother. 🙁
Price of event included BEER, don't get much better than that!
You can do PdS cheaply it's about what you want to spend, if there is a group of you it can be done for peanuts. Flights are relatively cheap (although not what they were) group hire a chalet at £70 ish each for the week, baguettes ham and cheese from supermarket for lunch, cook in some nights in large group. Sorted. It does not need to be anywhere near £1000!!!!!!