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Day 53: Driving in the heat

URT Day 53 Bardoneccia

Day 53: Heading west to Alpi Bike Resort and Bardonecchia. Back down to earth with a bump today carrying a World Cup hangover from Val di Sole. After a brilliant few days watching the pros and checking trails with Sergio there was no choice but to get in the van and hit the road. Six hours driving in 36°C is not appealing but the air-con in the battle bus held up and we made it to Bardonecchia no problem.

Just in case there is confusion about location we’ll explain a bit about the set up. Alpi Bike Resort is actually a collection of 8 individual towns that operate the lifts for mountain bikes over the the summer: Bardonecchia, Cesana, Chiomonte, Claviere, Pragelato, Prali, Sauze d’Oulx and finally Sestriere. They are in the same general region but are pretty spread out. Do not expect to be able to ride between them and use the lifts to help you along the way- some of the distances require a drive. Of these locations, Bard, Prali, Sauze and Sestriere are billed as offering the ‘downhill/freeride/enduro’ trails associated with a classic bike park; the others are more suitable as starting points for epic XC adventures. So given that we are running out of time on the URT we decided to concentrate on the one location this time around, hence our arrival in Bardonecchia. We said a quick hello to Carlo and Alex from the bike park before having a quick wander around the town. It’s bigger than your average alpine ski resort and was part of the Turin Winter Olympics in 2006, so has the infrastructure to cope. We got back to the hotel to discover the URT feature had gone live in the new issue of IMB – see that here if you’ve not found it via the website or our FB page. Now off for a quick half hour of bike tech before Jersey Shore on the TV. Awesome. Back on the bikes tomorrow…

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