gravitysucks – Member

and Wiggo’s def a rider I would put down as having a totally clean career, whenever that ends.
You’ve got to be kidding me! How naive are you? Have you read any of “Wiggo’s” statements regarding Lance and Landis? The guy totally supports the Omerta in the Peleton. Hear no evil, see no evil, speak no evil. If he was really innocent he’d be supporting the likes of Landis and Kimmage for blowing the sport open and going after the real truth, not the manufactured idea of truth that Contadoper, Pharmstrong and Schleck want you to believe.

Switzerland: Rhone Valley incl. Zermatt or Graubunden.

Huge mix of everything. Easy transfer by train from Geneva for Rhone Valley or Zurich for Graubunden.

I use Nobby Nics and Big Bettys for most of my riding. I had Fat Alberts too and threw them out. They had a very unnerving habit of losing grip for a second when going into a turn. They work fine on the back but I’ll never put one on the front again.

The Betty’s are a pretty decent all round tyre and I rate the nobby nics as XC even though I’ve done a lot of high alpine stuff on them. The 2.25 measures up about the same as a 2.35 maxxis and the 2.4’s are probably a touch bigger then the 2.5 maxxis. I run 2.35 or 2.4 on all the ones I have.

Yip, sure is.

currymad – Member

Hi ir12daveor

That looks alot like the Matterhorn and the Aletsch Glacier in Riederalp, Valais…oder?

Great photos and brings back memories of my times spent in that lovely country – thanks for sharing

There have been so many, but this one took in many of the best parts of other rides in one week.

A week riding some of the best trails in Switzerland I’ve discovered so far with good friends.

3

Did it on an Intense 5.5. Worked great but maybe a very slightly slacker head angle might be nice occasionally.

Doing it again on either the same 5.5 or if I somehow manage to scrape the pennies together maybe an Intense Tracer.

Having ridden it my personal perfect bike for it would be something with a head angle of 68-69ish degrees and 5-6 inches travel upfront. Something not much over (or even less than) 13kg would also be nice due to the amount of carrying involved. With those figures your choice whether you go fully or hard tail… You’ll get beaten up a bit on a hard tail though!

The eggs were great… I had to go back for them though. Me being the ultimate numpty walked out without them. :-/

Good honest to goodness Jura chickens. :-D

I left the theatre after watching life cycles feeling I’d never get that 40 minutes of my life back again. Truly terrible. Trying to be cool for the sake of being cool rather then putting a good bike movie forward.

Vast on the other hand I can watch over and over again (Virtuous too). But that’s basically because I know and get to ride regularly nearly all of the trails in both of them.

Yetivaud, are you who I think you are? If so hope you got home safe on Saturday.

It fair to say Switzerland is expensive, but as Dave said above there are ways to more cheaply….. we chose the grow as much food as you can tactic (the climate is very good for this). It works well with some graft, but you don’t have to go to those lenghts. Try and buy stuff (like bike bits) online, and get them posted over, even with import duty it still comes out cheaper. Also if you’ve got anything to fix, try and DIY, swiss labour is expensive. Theres loads of stuff to do in the mountains though so just get out there and keep exploring.
Oh and we’re based in canton Vaud (in case the user name didn’t give it away) near Lausanne. There is alot of riding to be had in both Vaud and Wallis. We packed our bikes away for winter for moment, in favour of the boards and XC skis, but give us a shout come spring and we’re happy to share what we’ve found so far.

Rich

Car insurance is fairly straight forward. You’ll pay more than you do in the UK, it’s about the same as I used to pay in Ireland. You might have a bit of trouble insuring a UK car still on UK plates but it is possible. AFAIK, you’re UK insurance will only cover you for one year. After that you’re car has to be registered here anyway and you’ll have to change to a Swiss license (straight swap).

Mobile phones, there are three main operators (Sunrise, Orange, Swisscom(Vodafone partner)) and a few cheapy prepaid ones which piggy back on the main networks (Yallo, Migros, COOP etc). You will be roaming when you cross the border to France, you also need to be careful with Data on your phone when riding near border areas. I’ve had emails come in when riding close to the border with Italy and got charged roaming rates even though I was still in Switzerland. We use Sunrise for mobile, landline and internet. I can’t remember what we pay but it’s not too expensive and the internet is thrown in for free. You’ll need to find which one suits you the best but we are quite happy with Sunrise.

Whatever people say Zurich doesn’t have to be expensive as it’s made out. By living a little outside the city rent can be halved and train connections can get you to a city centre office in less time then some of the trams would take if you lived in the city!

Some stuff is expensive but in general I am far better off here then I would ever be living at home in Ireland and I am certainly not in the CH high earning bracket. It’s quite easy to avoid the exorbitantly expensive places and shop or eat out where the locals go.

I’ve been here six years now and coming on a regular basis for 10. I second everything that Ash said. Wallis/Valais is breathtaking in every way you can think of. If you are planning on riding a lot the halb-tax is invaluable and there is also a yearly ticket to take your bike on the train. The two together are great for doing bike routes that don’t start and end in the same place.

In my book Graubunden compares with Valais in terms of the trails but the best stuff is a little bit more hidden and the scenery is not quite as spectacular in Valais. It’s still stunning up there though.

The country is small enough that day trips are possible to almost anywhere and the crew that I ride with make use of that quite often. I don’t know the area around Fribourg too well but I’m sure you’ve got to have some good stuff on your doorstep and some amazing stuff within a short journey.

If you want to see whats on offer within about 1-2 hours of where you are just check out the “Vast” and “Virtuous” videos. It’s nearly all here and all very easily accessible to anybody who wants to find it.

If you do find yourself heading east give me a shout, or occasionally we’ll be riding down Wallis direction once the snow starts to melt, as we’ve got to get fit for an event that some bloke who frequents this forum is organising in the south of France. :-P

BTW… I’d also second what Ash said about learning the language. It really helps with finding the off the beaten track stuff.

So… Scotland won in 2009 and 2010.

2011? Republic of Ireland?
Not unless there is another Paddy registered! :-/

Apparently I’m allowed to come and play in Provence again too! :mrgreen:

I live in Switzerland and ski a large number of different resorts averaging about 40 days a year so I get to see a fairly good representation of how it is here in Switzerland.

The vast majority of people (more than 80% from rough counts I’ve done standing in lift ques) wear them now. The people that don’t are usually tourists… and of those tourists I reckon the largest group to not wear them are English tourists. Everyone I ski with wears one.

Anecdotally, the people who put up the biggest arguments about not wearing helmets are the ones who think they are good, but in reality are not as good as they think they are! The really good skiers all wear them and the ones that have a good estimation of their ability all seem to wear them.

The Grisha is three days point to point. You start in one resort finish in another then overnight there. You’re bags are moved for you during the day so you just rock up to the finish, grab your bag at the hotel reception and go to your room.

With teams of 2-5 its got a good social vibe to it and its the trails that are the most important from a competition point of view.

Entry is not too easy. I think it opens on January 3rd but all teams who have been there last year get invited back. We have priority on places until the start of January then anyone who mails for a place will get the remaining places. It’s worth trying to get a place it’s a fun event.

For accommodation once you have a place in the event you get a list of hotels that offer a special deal for participants. It’s quite easy to get accommodation.

Unless you like your biking high on the endurance factor and low on the technical factor I wouldn’t bother. Grindlewald and the Jungfrau regions tourism policy on biking is that mountain bikers are allowed to use fire roads and almost nothing else! They do open up a couple of sections of trails to be used for the Eiger Bike Challenge but it wouldn’t be enough to interest me for sure.

If you are looking for an event you won’t forget at around the same time of year try the Grisha TrailRIDE. It’s in the Graubunden area of Switzerland and the competition format is a mix of navigation and riding as much technical singletrail as you can in 6 hours. It’s a three day event and in those three days you’ll ride more singletrack then you know what to do with!

This is the official website in German:
http://grischatrail.alpen-challenge.ch/

and this is my blog post from last years event:
http://swissalpineadventure.blogspot.com/2010/08/grisha-trailride.html

I did the event two years ago. The riding is superb, but as someone mentioned you need to be fit. Its 7 days in a row of between 1500 and 2100m vertical height gain in a day. While these figure may seem small compared to something like a trans-alp the climbs are proper steep. A lot of them you are going to resort to carrying your bike. When you get to the top the trails are a real flow-fest. They are not hugely technical (except 1 or 2) compared to proper high alpine riding but they are fast and flowy with enough tech to keep them very interesting and keep you on your game.

Despite being tired on the tops of the climbs you will come out of the bottom of all the trails with such an incredible smile on your face and on such a high you will want more. I found myself missing being there this year when the event was going on.

All I can say is DO IT. But be well prepared.

I’d say try to find some Euro based paragliding forums. They might have some info on it.

It’s more commonly called Speed Flying, at least here in Switzerland where its gotten fairly popular in the last two years or so. I’ve seen it a good few times and spoken to a few people doing it. I also have friends that both Paraglide and Ski at a high level but believes Speed Flying is too dangerous!

As far as I have been told you should be able to fly a paragliding wing and ski at a very high level before attempting it. With paragliding altitude is safety, you have more time to get out of trouble is something goes wrong. With speed flying you don’t have altitude on your side and the wings move much faster then paragliding wings which means if something goes wrong its gonna happen faster with less time to react!

Why not try snow kiting instead unless your other half is already paragliding. Of course if she can already do both then there are schools which can teach her. I saw some people being thought in Davos, Switzerland last winter. I think it was the local paragliding school doing the teaching but I’m not 100% sure.

June can be awesome in Switzerland. The italian part (Ticino) will have a Mediterranean climate and a good mix of riding on offer. The area around Brig also has a lot to offer with a good mix of lift assisted and self powered touring. Both areas will have lift assistance in June and in my opinion the riding there is 100 times better then anything I found in PdS.

If the weather is good there is also a lot available further North in Switzerland but the lifts there don’t tend to open until between mid June and Start of July. They stay open ’till October though. :-D

Have a look at the following site and see if anything grabs your fancy.

http://www.swissalpineadventure.com

Graeme’s Twitter is his first and last name as one word. Sorry I don’t want to post it properly on a public forum, but those that know him should be able to get it from that.

It was great getting updates from him the whole week. I spent the whole week thinking what trails you would be all riding at any particular point. I hope ye all had as good a time as we did and made as good friendships over the course of the week as we did.

If you mean my picture no. It’s in central Switzerland well away from the crowds of PdS.

Near Balmeggerhorn, Switzerland.

Personally I wouldn’t use the Sandals. A good pair of shoes like the Shimano or Pearl Izumi walking style shoes that take a cleat are the best option. I wore specialized carbon sole MTB shoes last year and pretty much killed them (and my feet) when I did it last year. Since then I’ve got the Pearl Izumi ones which are great for T-P style days. I’ve still got a cleat but when I’m off the bike there is less time spent sliding around and its far more comfortable.

Pretty much everyone who rode last year rode clipped in and pretty much everyone concurred at the end on the shoes thing.

Thats what a lot of us said last year. All I can say is fair **** to you if you can ride all of the liasons. The terrain is steep and there is a lot of hike-a-bike. Don’t bring the Sidi’s bring the boots, you’ll be glad of them.

As far as I remember nearly everything was ridable up on Day 1 and 5, (someone feel free to correct me on that) but every other day had generous amounts of hiking in. Believe me though its worth it for the trails on the other side. Some of the specials leave you with the biggest grin on your face that you can imagine.

Oh… and while the trails are relatively technical it is all very ridable. Apparently the most technical stage from last year has been taken out of the event for this year.

Just in case anyone else is thinking of going, here are a few more pics.

and some other nearby areas:

Switzerland is rubbish really.

The trails are not “officially” bike trails (except for the DH course) but if there is no specific biking forbidden sign then we are allowed to ride them. It means almost the whole hiking trail network throughout Switzerland is open to mountainbikers (it varies slightly from Canton to Canton). In Zermatt there are only one or two trails I know of that are specifically forbidden to bikers, everything else is fair game. The majority of hikers are quite ok if you slow down and give way, there are always a few cranky ones. I find if you sense that you’ve got a cranky one a friendly hello (Gruezi) and “have a nice day” (Schone Tag) go along way to alleviating the situation, and you are usually gone by the time they get around to complaining! ;-)

Most of the trails that are marked as bike trails with the red bike signs are actually fireroad, you are better off following the yellow hiking sings, but be aware that these could lead you to some seriously technical sections too.

It is a bit good isn’t it?

What trails did you ride?

I did it last year and it was awesome. I’m not doing it this year but will definitely do it again sometime.

As for training big days on the run are the key. You want to practice the descents as much as possible. A lot of people were astounded by the length of the descents last year. Its great fun but descending for 30-50mins in one go can be more physical then some people think.

The vast majority of the Switchbacks on the TP route are not that bad. They are all rideable around with pace. There are very few that I would consider to be really tight Alpine type switchbacks. The TP ones are really really fun to ride.

Enjoy it I’m a bit jealous that I am not on the last run up to doing it this year.

The new Revalation is 150mm of travel and you can get it with a 20mm Maxle light. So you'd have the guts of the weight savings, a stiff front end and save a little weight over the Fox 36. No choice for me. If I ever get around to changing my 5.5 for a tracer it will be a Revalation on the front and not the Fox 36.

I know a few of those trails… and yes they are rather good. You might find some of them on my site, there will be a few more on it when I get time to update it.

http://www.swissalpineadventure.com

jhw – Member

These guys run trips in Zermatt and Verbier (they're based in Lourtier). I don't know where the trails are though, even approximately. Does anyone else? Looks amazing.

http://www.ridebig.com/trip_switzerland_alpenrock.php

http://www.flickr.com/photos/14156894@N03/sets/

To be honest I think you'll be ok with the weather. Some rain forecast on Saturday afternoon and good for Saturday morning and Sunday. Get up early on Saturday morning and go riding. Once the rain gets too heavy call it a day and head up for a big one on Sunday.

I rode there last week on a bad forecast. It rained in the morning and stopped at about 12:30pm, we headed out on the bikes at about 1pm and the trails were dry and dusty by about 2:30!!! The terrain is steep and drains really well so it dries very quickly. A lot of the trails are quite rideable in the wet too, just look out for a couple of slippy rock sections in the woods.

Once the rain settles in go and look at the guys racing in the Swiss championships crashing on the DH course.

Enjoy it the riding is great.

Forgot to give an accommodation recommendation. The youth hostel costs about 71CHF per night Bed, Breakfast and evening meal which was really good the nights we stayed there.

As for the tips about staying off the brakes… please be considerate of hikers if you are doing this. At the moment we are tolerated on the trails in Zermatt. The trails there are really awesome and it would be a shame if they started banning bikes on all the singletrails like Grindelwald seems to do.

Hoon it by all means, but be in enough control to slow down to walking pace past hikers.

There is a lot of really good woodland stuff underneath the Sunnega area including the Downhill course that will be used for the European Championships next year. This course will be used for the Swiss Downhill national championships this weekend though so access to the Sunnega, Blauherd and Rothorn areas might be restricted.

If you can get up to Rothorn take the fire road down the back of the mountain as as you come to a saddle turn left. The fireroad soon turns into a trail which brings you back down to a fireroad just near the Sunnega station.

The same applies for Blauherd, off the lift and stay left, there is a trail that will take you down to the same place as where the Rothorn trail finishes.

From Gornergrat take the hiking trail down towards Riffelsee. The top section is really nice rocky high alpine stuff. as you get lower down it becomes a little more flowy until you get to Riffelalp where you cross the railway lines and drop into the woods.

There is also some great riding to be had in the Schwarzsee area.

At the end of the holiday if you can get someone to take your bags down to Tasch for you there is a trail that starts a little bit up the hill behind the police station that will take you down to Tasch.

There really is silly amounts of riding in the area. There is some info and photos in the following site and blog post.

http://www.swissalpineadventure.com/mountain-biking/wallis/zermatt
http://swissalpineadventure.blogspot.com/2010/08/where-to-begin.html

Enjoy Zermatt, I was up there last week for a couple of days and the place put a huge grin on my face.

Switzerland, more lift assisted trail riding then you know what to do with.

If you ever intend passing through Switzerland again you would be better off paying it. The will nab you at the border and whack on some juicy admin fees and interest if they catch you down the road.

If you never (ever) intend on entering Switzerland again its likely nothing will happen.

These ones:

I'm riding in Wallis on Saturday, but might be tempted to head Lenzerheide direction on Sunday depending on what my better half wants to do. Unfortunately I've got the dreaded day job to keep me busy during the week so won't be able to head up that direction mid week.

When are you travelling?

The area around Lenzerheide is great. You are spoiled for choice in the region even though the main lift in the resort itself is closed this year.

It is possible to ride quite easily between the resort of Davos, Arosa and Lenzerheide on some great single trail. There are quite a few routes from Lenzerheide itself depending on whether you want to ride up or use the lift.

Lenzerheide is 20mins by car from the new Alpen Bike Park in Chur which has 5 lift assisted runs (Haven't ridden them yet though). Its possible to ride down from Lenzerheide to Chur on a mixture of trail and fire road and then possible to ride from the top of the lift in Chur predominitaly down hill on some good singletrail with a bit of fire road thrown in too.

Lenzerheide is 40mins from Flims/Laax which has a couple of long freeride trails and also some really nice natural trail riding in the area.

Lenzerheide is just over 1 hour from Engadin which has more trail riding then you can shake a stick at.

You could Ride from Lenzerheide to Tiefencastle (on trail) then get the trail from Tiefencastle to Davos, Ride tons of singletrail in Davos and then ride single trail almost the whole way back to Lenzerheide at the end of the day.

In the Canton Graubunden (where Lenzerheide is) MTB is allowed on nearly all of the hiking routes. Its much more bike friendly then the area around Grindlewald appears to be. If you need some tips for the area let me know. If I'm around when you are here I might come up and show you some stuff.

Grindlewald is not the most bike friendly resort in the Swiss Alps. I've been trying to come up with a route through there on an off road tour of Switzerland and all the singletrails seem to be forbidden for bikes, or the lifts near them don't take bikes which would mean an extra 1300m of climbing for my route.

TBH, There are a lot of places that are much more bike friendly and if you are going for more then a day or two probably more worth while to go to.