There is always the danger of early season over enthusiasm and we got caught out here with a hour of hiking through knee deep snow with bikes on our backs in Davos. The descent was worth it though!

It was even nice to get out on the road and do some big mountain rides in the sun. A day on Furka and Grimsel passes have to be some of the most dramatically stunning rides around (just be prepared to share the road with millions of motorbikes, it makes you appreciate the peace and quiet of trails!). Hairpin after hairpin surrounded by huge cliff faces, waterfalls, glaciers and lakes. Getting wild sprinting back down the hill at 80 kmph is of course awesome too!

This one was a big adventure ride near Flumserberg, a small ski resort an hour from Zürich. With no lift access for bikes there was a 2.5 hour climb up steep ski pistes and technical rocky singetrack up to an isolated pass at 2300m. A super steep, technical, rocky descent made it worth while before some more climbing to some of the best loamy trails ever hidden in the woods lower down.

Next up racing in the European Enduro Series at Reschenpass in Austria at the weekend…

After a while darkness, grey skies, millions of layers of clothing, rides where meter deep snow meant more time spent going over the bars than going forward, and the novelty of variety began to wear off and all I wanted to do was ride a bike properly. So at the end of February we drove 5 hours south to Finale Ligure for a weekend to ride in the dust, swim in the sea and eat icecream. A solution that solves all problems. Since then the benefit of a few years Swiss riding experience has paid off and learning to hunt out the south facing slopes has meant getting a good bit of riding done on real trails, sometimes even up in the Alps.

Then I fell off my bike and snapped a rib. Doh! Broken ribs are painful things that prevent anything that remotely involves fun. It’s been nice to chill out for a week or two, get wired on coffee and do other things but I’m starting to crave movement and adrenaline and its not raining as much as I would like. 2-4 more weeks to go, heal dammit!

Spent all of the next day dreaming of mountains!

Prologue

This was a short sub 2 minute sprint around the race centre which I rode blind but it seemed most people had practiced it (although you technically weren’t supposed to). A fast downhill fireroad pedal came into a tight gravelly corner, a short rooty singletrack, super tight switchback, short rocky rooty trail and then a flat out pedal through an underground carpark, short lung-busting uphill and a grassy drop to the finish with an awkward corner to catch you out at speed. Good fun, barely long enough to notice but practice would have been a big advantage!

Race Day – 5 Stages, 850m climbing, 1900m descent

After a short climb from the gondola the race started with a long, technical stage from high up the mountain. Full of big sharp rocky and tuffy grass there were line everywhere and it was really hard to see the best way to go through. In the middle section lot of really tight switchbacks required perfect line choice to get around and rain overnight had added an extra layer of grease making the trail tougher. I always seem to struggle to get into the flow starting the first trail cold had one crash trying to change line and generally felt I rode like a bag of potatoes down this.

Stage two was shorter, I rode most of it blind and still struggled to get into the flow. Lower down it was a mix of roots and rocks through the trees. Stage three was very short but awesome fun. I tried to force my head to get into gear before we set off but took it a bit too far, going into overdrive and riding like a hyperactive kid. A fast grassy section turned sharply into the woods and I got carried away totally overshooting the corner and getting tangled up in my bike. After that I calmed down and rode better as the trail was full of roots and fun loamy corners finishing on a short flat out sprint.

A longish climb took us up to stage four, a long man-made trail down to Flims town (the Runca Trail), which I rode half of blind. I’m not normally a fan of these trails but racing it flat out was fun, not so technical so you could almost switch off, get into the flow and ride flat out. The upper section has lot of bermy corners, tabletop jumps and pumping sections before coming into a loooong fast pedal across the grass. I whacked my saddle up and got on the pedals giving it all when suddenly out of nowhere there was a  half meter drop that I nosed dived off and somehow just got enough weight behind the saddle to keep the bike upright but it was properly sketchy! the second half of the trail was down north-shore type wood at high speed which was kind of fun but a crash would have had high consequences. Good fun.

Stage 5 I hadn’t practiced at all but it was fairly short. A narrow rough grassy trail traversed along a ridgeline with a steep drop off one side. After that was a flat fireroad pedal, a fast downhill and some loose drifty corners down to the finish in the race village.

Overall a great race with a nice mixture of trails and a good format that meant stage start times were relaxed so you could ride around at your own pace with a group without stressing about being in a certain place at a certain time. I finished 12th, a bit disappointed to be honest (results). Arriving tired from a tough week at work and missing most of practice didn’t help but enough excuses, I need to sort my head out at the start of these races and get the balance right between being focused and being relaxed. It was nice to race with mates from Zürich close to home and fun meeting up again with Irish rider Michelle Muldoon who had a great ride to finish 8th. 

Next up, EWS in La Thuile!

One trail was the fairly well known Brazilian, often called the best trail in Switzerland. I’m not sure I would go that far but it was pretty damn cool. A bus followed by 1000m pedaling took us to 2800m and from there it was one long descent down to 500m. The second half was incredible, loads of fast swoopy corners with dust flying everywhere.

The other days were even better as we got up high with spectacular views of glaciers and snow capped mountains before dropping into the woods for amazing loamy fast singletrack descents. One side of the valley is dry and dusty like Italy, full of rocks and loose tight corners. The other is more forested, loamy, fast and flowy. Amazing weekend, I’ve had withdrawal symptoms ever since.

So where were we? top secret, I’d have to kill you if I told you

It turns out this year there was no need for psyching myself up for embracing snow sports in order to survive a freezing cold snowy Swiss winter, winter has been cancelled. Before Christmas it was cold and snowy but since then its been mostly above freezing with hardly any snow in Zurich. Suits me, lots of muddy biking! the problem is one day of snow can can stick around a week or two and on the trails quickly turns to unrideable sheet ice so sometimes the road bike is a better option but thats nice too when you’re surrounded by snow.

Pictures below from a crazy January adventure in the Alps where we had to go to 1200m to find snow and after a short mega avalanche style snow descent we were riding dry sunny trails all day. Awesome.

The nights are slowly getting lighter, the race season is fast approaching – exciting times ahead!

At the weekend I raced the BMC Chauxmont Super D in Neuchatel in the french speaking Swiss Jura. 5 times stages over 16km with 2200m descending connected by 19km/1200m liasons and two uplifts. The weather was pretty wet with on and off downpours all day and although we timed it well to avoid being drowned, the steep ground was very muddy and slippery.

The race was ridden blind with 10-15 minute stages mostly through the forest. In between some lung bursting pedalling sections the trails were pretty steep with lots of rocks, roots and drops. It made a nice mixture and the course was really fun to ride but the mud added a different dimension. The Jura seems to have an ability to make me ride like an idiot and after crashing early on my head went and I spent most of the day crashing down hills. At one point I came hurtling towards the end of a trail and only realising at the last minute that there was a good 80 cm drop onto a fireroad, I panicked and tried to slow down too late so ended up flying off it and landing on my head/elbow (finding a large pebble wedged in my elbow in the showers after). The rest were mostly emergency exits or wiping out and sliding down things tangled up in a bike.

In between times when I managed to ride there were some really cool bits of trail, some fast flowy sections that complimented the technical bits nicely, and a few pedally bits where I could make up some lost time! It was a long day out, by the last descent it was getting dark in the woods making it very difficult to see the trail or judge distances and drops so it was good to reach the finish where a bike wash, hot showers and homemade pizza cooked in an oven in the back of a van made an enjoyable end to a great event. Other than learning to ride I must learn French if I’m going to do more Enduro racing, the last 2 years learning German is proving useless and its rubbish not being able to talk to people!

Nice video of the race here, I’m demonstrating how not to ride at 3 mins (there were far worse moments luckily not on camera, at least I saved this one!). Enduro lesson of the day: do not think, just do. Every time you question yourself, hesitate, dab, run you suddenly loose a minute and the race is over.

Next weekend racing in the Alps with snow forecast…