Report
by: Aidan Bishop
Pictures
by: PhotoBreton
& Pete Lawrie
Good to see the best in the world using
our RRP NeoGuard
The Big One! The
Megavalanche has been around for approx 15 years now and is
a legendary race that is THE marathon DH mass start race putting
riders through every type of terrain and conditions. An old
school crew was signed up for this year’s race, so Myself
Stefan Gleed, James Allaway, ‘Cheesy’ Pete Lawrie
and another ‘mega virgin’ Mike. Speaking personally
I had always wanted to do this race, but money was always used
on travelling and racing DH world cups back in the day and so
the Mega always passed me by....until this year!
How do you describe the Megavalanche!?! Mental really! There
were 1,800 male entrants (about 40% of them British), from that
you have to go through qualifying where the top 350 make it
into Sundays main final. The final has the 350 riders lined
up at the crack of dawn on top of the Pic Blanc glacier at 3000m.
You have to try and stay on or with your bike as you speed down
the snow, then a long rocky singletrack path. This brings you
out above the town of Alpe D’Huez where you have a long
pedalling traverse before you start heading down again into
more singletrack and forest trails with plenty of roots and
dust (if it’s dry!), before some more fast singletrack
paths until you finally end up in the town of Allemont at the
bottom of the valley 32km later!! An hour is the target time
to break if you want to be competitive...but for most, survival
and completion is reward enough!
So, we loaded up the five of us in Stef’s van and set
off early Wednesday morning. It was a good trip as road journeys
go and as we arrived near our destination it was time to call
Mackie to find out how to find the chalet he had booked up and
we were all staying in. As it turned out Mackie called me to
say he and another friend (old school) Rob Stobart had missed
the last shuttle bus back up to town and so needed a lift from
us to get back to the chalet...good timing!
So, to the riding! Through the year we had picked up tips on
what to do when we got there with regard to preparation and
so Thursday was all day practice. We headed straight to the
top to practice the snow early so as to experience it as close
to race time and conditions as possible. As it turned out this
year there was LOTS of snow still at the top, and with the hot
sun each day riding (well trying!) it was extremely difficult.
Basically there were two sections of it that were steep enough
for you to ride if you could stay upright and the rest you had
no option but to walk/run...it was soon clear the race was going
to be a battle! So we got down the snow eventually and continued
to ride the whole Mega course. The afternoon we set off to practice
the qualifier track which was different to the Mega track. We
did 2 runs of this track and we were done for the day. It doesn’t
sound a lot does it, but that was probably 5 hours riding! So
it’s probably a big reason for the insurgence of Brits
to this event as you get endless amounts of riding time.
Playboy Lifestyle
Friday was qualifying day. The track was 20 – 40 mins
depending on ability, and was predominantly more DH than the
Mega course, consisting of a lot of cool singletrack then a
fire road climb then more singletrack along the hillside and
through a forest to the bottom. Arm pump and finger cramping
was a big issue on this track (especially for us old codgers!),
so the abundance of top world cup downhillers and seasoned enduro
riders there had an advantage over weekend warriors on this
course.
Myself, Stefan, Rob and Mackie were up in the first qualifier.
There were 10 races in all, 9 races of 200 men in each and one
race for the ladies. You had to finish in the top 38 to make
the main final on Sunday, with 1-3rd place making front row,
4-6 second row, 7-9 third row and so on. Before heading out
I had checked our race numbers and I had board number 4 (cool!),
Stef got 14 and poor old Mackie had 196, meaning me and Stef
were seeded on the front row and Mackie at the very back and
so had to have the race of his life to qualify! The tape went
up and I sprinted for the first corner, I had a good start getting
into 3rd. The following loose hairpins came and went and I stayed
near the front in about 6th place, Stef also had a good start
in about 12th place but then punctured (should have used DH
tyres!) and so watched the whole field go by. I got up to 5th
place by the end of the climb midway but then shortly after
my chain managed to jam up solid meaning I was going into technical
corner wrong foot up, etc. Luckily we had a gap and so only
one rider passed me meaning I finished 6th, good enough for
2nd row in the final, first job done. I had finished a while
when I heard an elated Mackie finish, he had managed to overtake
173 riders to finish 23rd and get himself into the final, awesome
job!
Stef didn’t manage to place anywhere unfortunately. Pete
and Mike were racing together in the 3rd qualifier, Pete punctured
out but Mike finished in 78th meaning he was front row for the
‘C’ final on Sunday. James was up next, I went up
to the last corner before a sprint along to the finish for any
needed encouragement...turns out it wasn’t needed and
he came through in 14th, easily qualifying for the main final
on the 5th row. So Myself, Mackie and James were all through
to the main.
Trek Remedy - Best bike in the world
for extreme mixed terrain
Race day!! After
a nervy night we were out of bed at 5am to be at the first lift
for 6am. We were at the top of the mountain with plenty of time
before the race and were greeted with bright sunshine reflecting
off of the glistening, groomed piste in front of us all iced
over from the night. The sun soon melted through meaning it
would be soft for the race and a running/walking battle would
be ahead for all of us! All riders were called up, the front
row containing the likes of Vouilloz, Absalon, Wildhaber, Clementz,
Fairclough, Lehikonen, Simmonds, Blenkinsopp, Amour, etc so
no shortage of big names then, it was good to see the best riders
in the world using our NeoGuard mudguards despite the dry weather!!!
I lined up far right as it was clearest ahead of me and a straight
line to the first corner. I opted for the quicker, run off the
line start (as you couldn’t really pedal!), I managed
to pass the riders in front of me and stay on the bike to the
first corner, ran the next path section then jump back on and
ride the next piste section, at the bottom of this part Remy
Absalon (2009 winner) came past me, turns out he crashed on
the start straight and then had to go hell for leather to get
past people. From there it was THE hardest physical challenge
I have ever done! The combination of high altitude and deep
snow just killed me and the best I could muster was a walk,
just about the same speed as the people I was around, except
this is where I needed to be passing people to get up the front
of the race.
From there I stayed with riders in front of me until I was able
to pass. When I hit the pedalling traverse section I passed
Rene Wildhaber (6 time winner) who had punctured, he then fixed
it and passed me just before hitting the next DH section so
I tried to hang onto his tail. I managed to stay in touch and
soon caught up to Cameron Cole (Rocky Mountain DH pro) and I
stayed with Cole for a long time. Eventually we caught up to
Matt Simmonds of the Chain Reaction Cycles team and when we
hit the technical rooty woods I couldn’t match their DH
speed. After a lung busting sprint at the finish I eventually
crossed the line in 29th place. I was pretty happy with that
as my race went pretty well with no mechanicals or punctures,
but at the same time had hoped for a bit more. I finished 6th
in masters which is quite satisfying, as the winner in that
category was DH legend Jurgen Beneke (from the very early days!),
and a finish time of 1hr 04mins which was 8 mins off the leader
(and importantly 3mins faster than the ladies!).
James was next to finish from the team, he unfortunately crashed
up top on a fast section and went straight over some catch netting
and so had to check himself over and then try to rejoin the
race when there was a gap in the riders. He did and finished
the race in 126th and a time of 1hr 16mins, good going when
it was his first race in about 5 years! Mackie had worse fortune,
annoyingly he punctured on the top section of the course, and
although he had a crowd pit crew to help him fix it, he didn’t
have the best race he could have and ended up 248th and a time
of 1hr 28mins.
So all in all a great riding/racing
trip was had by all. And even though it was probably the hardest
thing I’ve done......I’ll be back!!!
