Taissoun

Quick report on the Ronde du Taissoun, in Colomars just behind Nice. Usually, this place gives a great vantage point to look over Nice and the entire Cote D'Azur. This time though, after a lung bursting hike/pedal through the fog we got treated to a different view which, as you might have noticed from the pictures, was absolutely phenomenal.

While on the short side of the enduro spectrum, at about 26km, this was a ridiculously punishing event. Each of the three stages required a hike a bike section, resulting in searing hot legs. Added to that was the fact that all the stages were extremely rough and physical, with a relatively large amount of uphill sprints required. The first two stages went pretty well, I came in 25th and 26th out of about 80 riders despite 2 falls in the first stage, and several mistakes in the second from coming into corners too fast or simply not seeing turns in time. 

I was pretty pumped for the third stage which I know very well from many spins with LeChris, and which was by far the longest and most physical, two aspects which played to my strengths. After a good top section, I got to the section I had been fearing all day: le GR. A wide, flat hiking trail, which doesnt sound too bad, but the problem is it is pretty easy to hit ludicrous speeds on it as it alternates between smoothish for 20-30m followed by extremely rough for 5-10m, and many a tube and tyre have fallen victim to this section, which I now slow down considerably for. But this was a race, so F--k that! Full speed ahead, I was gliding over the rough sections like they wern't there, until I heard a horrible noise which I assumed was my tyre exploding but turned out to be my derailleur, derailleur hanger and gear cable all snapping at once... To add insult to injury, as I mentioned previously this stage had a very long uphill/flat section a few minutes later, meaning I had to push the bike for a good 10 minutes without even being able to coast...

Fun day overall, a proper challenge. Team mate Anthony and regular competitor Seb both posted impressive results in some of the stages and ended up in the top twenty overall, it would have been nice to see where I would have ended up without the mechanical. Oh well, time to peruse chainreaction for some drivetrain components...

Rallye Hivernal de Levens

Just finished the first enduro of the 1001 series which runs through the year. The winter enduro in Levens is known to always have a bit of snow to add to the challenge. Unfortunately, for me anyway, the massive snowfalls from 2 weeks ago meant the trails were more then just a little challenging.

Started off with a massive climb, just under 2 hours, half of which was on compacted snow. Got to the top for one of the greatest cups of tea ever, and then straight into the first stage of the race. The format was 3 man starts, and I was starting with my buddy Seb who usually posts identical times to myself. The first 5 seconds of the race set up the theme of the day: I took the lead, pedalled hard to get away from the 2 others, slight bend in the road, leaned into the corner, slip, crash, covered in snow. Over the next 10 minutes this happened over and over... Eventually I finished last in my group, soaked and frozen...

Things picked up massively in the second stage, which started lower down the mountain and thus had much shallower snow. I managed to just about stay ahead of Seb (some bad manners required), until half way down when the track was dry and I was able to ride properly and took a reasonable lead in my group.

Pumped up from the second round, I thought things would go great in the third. Sadly this was not the case. The last special was probably the steepest track of the day, and while not under snow, it was covered in mud. No proper excuse, despite 3 years of mud riding 100% of the time back in Cork, I just couldnt hack it on the (seriously) steeper parts and rode very poorly. By the time I got to the dry section of the track I had psyched myself out and couldnt feel my fingers from the cold.

So a pretty terrible performance all-round from myself, ended up with a not quite so terrible 89th with Seb trashing me with a 73rd. Pretty bummed at how poorly I rode anywhere that wasnt either dry or flat. Really well organised event tho, and definitely planning on heading back up there later on in the year.

About half way up the 1st climb. Levens in the foreground, the sea in the back

Tea with a view. Really needed it after 2 hours pedalling/pushing up in the snow

Lotsa bikes

New year, new gear, new club...

SS1 Start gate

Race on

Fall number 1

Should have pushed him off

If this was me, I would be even more sideways, but also more lying in the snow

Spot the biker

Everyday heroes

Photo credit: Seb, Will from Levens. Thanks

Razorbike 2012

Just finished the first enduro race of the year out in l'Esterel, a small mountain range near Cannes, which ends abruptly into the sea. Early start to the day to get to Theoule-Sur-Mer on time for sign-on, but I was excited due to the absolutely stacked list of riders: World cup juniors and veterans, a female world champion and every single top enduro rider from the region were in attendance as part of the 250 entries.

The format was 1-man starts every 30s over 3 stages, with short climbs (~30mins) in between each stage, but a reasonably tight time allowance (50mins). At first, I was a bit annoyed at the 1-man starts as it meant a huge wait on the start line for high numbers, like myself with #160. However, the reason they had this system was that the riders took off for the first climb from the main square in front of everyone, and were introduced and questioned by one of the organisers "rugbyman". It ended up being a good fun, with a couple of people getting sent off to the sound a carefully selected music to maximise embarrassment.  

Top riders got their achievements and sponsors broadcast

Nobodies talked about the spelling of their name and Irish beer

Probably the scariest part of the day: "What if I fall in front of everyone?" 

So a quick pedal up a fire road to get to the top of the hill, where all 3 special stages began, reasonably close to each other.  SS1 was the longest of the day taking about 5-6 minutes for an ok rider. It started at the very top of the hill, on a tight singletrack almost hidden in the pine trees. The first minute or two was spend dodging through narrow gaps between trees and on north shore ladder bridges. Then, a short yet punishing pedal up a slight uphill, across a fire road and into a long high-speed rocky section with some nice technical drops down slabs of rock.

The first section was so narrow that as I pedalled hard through a flat section, my left knee hit a small tree, which just bounced me sideways off track into a bush, losing a few seconds. The rocky section was more a case of courage than skill, sadly I was not doing well on either front, but came down clean.  

Good view on the way to SS1

The SS1 hill. The track went from top to bottom.

Small step on the road crossing

So happy enough with my first run, I pedalled up for SS2, with a mandatory pit stop to shove orange slices and chocolate in my face. SS2 was the shortest run of the day, and also the most technical and steep. A little bit of single track to get the speed up at the start. Then sand/dust switchbacks, followed by a very steep section down a rock formation and finally a flatter section with some interesting features: boulders and near vertical chutes.

I lost the front wheel on a dusty switchback... Actually let me rephrase that: I came into a switchback with a pretty good trajectory, when the corner just disintegrated into dust flowing down the side of the hill, taking my front wheel with it. Landed on my feet, running, but lost a few second walking back to get the bike. Also had trouble keeping my feet on the pedals in the steep section where I lost a bit more time and must have looked quite dodgy. Overall a good run though.

SS2 start line

Always good views in this place

Good tracks too

A quick hike-a-bike followed by a short pedal got me back to the top for the final run of the day. This was lauded as a new track purpose built for the event. It started with a sprint zigzagging a fire road, then plunged into a steep, dusty singletrack all the way down the hill to the edge of the village. This was the only stage with almost no rocks, so it was easier to take a few more risks, due to the hugely diminished penalty for failure. I got down at a pretty decent pace with no mistakes and not too much braking.

A small rock step before entering the dust

Ended back at the village square for the complementary pasta and cheese with Sebastien (thanks for the photos). I ended up 57th, which I am very happy with, despite being further back than the last few races, simply due to the incredible turn out. Local youngster Florian Nicolai came out on top, beating a host of big names, incredible.

Massive thanks to the organisers for the smooth running event and not so smooth tracks!

Videos of the trails available here: http://www.wix.com/theoulevtt/fr#!videos-speciales-2010
sound off button is at the bottom left ;) 

Pretty much the only reason I come to these things

Mont Aucellier

Big uplift-assisted day out in "St Sauveur" today. Badass name, unreal scenery, amazing trails and good company. Can't ask for more!

Epic saturday: L'Escarne/Coaraze

So a race blog is a great idea when there are races on... In winter though, not so much.

Anyway, just to keep in the habit of updating this thing, im throwing up a few pictures of the epic (32km, 1670m vertical) spin I was on the other day. Big thanks to Chris for his perfect guiding (this time :D!) and Jean.

Not enough pictures to tell the full story, but some nice shots of the biggest climb and one of the descent which was oh so worth it!

Two Frenchmen in the middle of nowhere, but where are they going?

To the Col de St Michel of course, you can see the trail in the top right corner. A push up for the Irish, but a pedal for the French...

Good view of where we came from, in fact we cycled up or down nearly every mountain in this picture, bar the ones in the distance of course!

The view from the other side of the mountain, with the first snow of the winter in the distance.

The best part of the day! Half way down the descent to the village of Coaraze, which leads directly into a second descent down the left flank of the village. By the way it's not perspective, Chris really is a giant.

The view from further down, Coaraze dead center, the descent goes from the top of the picture to the bottom, amazing spin, amazing day. 

Le trefle Vesubien: Not a lucky shamrock

The last enduro race of the year was held in St Martin de Vesubie. It gets its name "Shamrock" from the trace of the three stages making up the main race. Oddly enough, the start and end locations of the race were very far apart. So I started off the day meeting up with Seb, so we could leave one car at the finish and drive up to the start. I should also point out I stole a few pictures from him for this entry, cheers! A lot of people turned up for this race, including junior world cup phenom Loic Bruni. Luckily, the race started at a ski resort so we got to use a chairlift at the start to cut out an uphill start!






Pretty much the best way to start any day's biking!














SS1 aka "Singletrack heaven": The first timed stage was a brilliant 14 minutes of singletrack. This was a fairly straightforward stage although there were a few problems due to poor marking resulting in a few riders taking a wrong turn and losing minutes (and thus the race) early on in the day. The only problem I had was that my arms were very sore from the speed and frequent braking over this relatively long stage.

Pictures never look as stepp as in real life,
you had to be there.

L2 aka "feel the burn": At the bottom we started the first climb of the day. I had been warned that this race was particularly tough physically, and it certainly was! The climb started off with a decent amount of trail pedaling, but was soon followed by the climb of death. It was like climbing the Devils Ladder, but with a bike, and bag full of gear, in between doing downhill races... Luckily we had time to spare and there was a great food stop up top.

















SS2 aka "You will get lost": This stage started at the same point as the first, but headed in a different direction. On paper this had it all: Singletrack, alpine prairies, rocky chutes and finally a hilarious section racing through the streets of Venanson. I started off strong, overtaking a few riders early on. Unfortunately, in one of the prairies, there were no markings so I decided to keep going forward following tyre tracks in the grass. I eventually caught up to a guy in front of me who told me this was the wrong way, and then took a few minutes to push back up. I was pretty gutted as it meant waving goodbye to any kind of respectable result, especially as I got stuck behind all the riders that I had overtaken previously. When I finished the stage I found out a lot of competitors had made the same mistake due to poor course markings.

L3 aka "goodbye legs, talk to you next week": Heartbreakingly, we then cycled down a main road losing several hundred meters of altitude to get back to St Martin. This was particularly tough as we then had to carry the bikes up a never ending set of steps followed by a steep pedal for almost an hour. My legs were shattered.








SS3 aka "The Man Maker": This stage basically had 2 sections, first a 3 minute DH run, then an urban race. The DH section was up there as the steepest track I have ever ridden, I even overtook a few people that were carrying their bikes down. It had everything, jumps, drops, roots, inside lines on 1/2 the turns. Insane, but brilliant.

Then the urban section, the question was "do you like steps?". Jump down steps, climb up steps, turn on steps, come around a corner and freak out at the sight of steps. They even had a crazy part where you had to bunnyhop over a stream in the middle of the street! In fairness the atmosphere was brilliant with loads of villagers on their balconies cheering the riders on. (Video, minutes 1->2 and 6 onwards are well worth a look)

In case you can't see it, there is traffic as far as the eye can see!

In the end, It turns out that I beat Seb by 1 second on SS1 but he beat me by 2s on SS3! So even though I had never met him before and we were not in the same heat, it turned out we were battling for the same position and were posting identical times (except when I got lost on SS2). Nemesis found!
What was really impressive was the entire organisation of the event. While the enduro race was happening, they also ran an event for disabled people riding buggies, and brought in huge moveable climbing walls to teach kids on.

Crazy event of the day: getting stuck in a 2 mile traffic jam in the middle of nowhere in the mountains.

Funniest event of the day: When the organiser announced they had forgotten to get medals for the winners, and instead gave all podium riders "saucisson" i.e. sausages...

LINKS:
Seb's photos here