Day 65: So much more at Chatel

3 Sep 2011

By David Scorer

Day 65: Still can’t cover it all at Châtel. Today was a landmark day. It was the last day of riding on the URT – the last day dragging the bikes out the van, the last day kitting up in riding gear, and the last day hauling camera equipment all over the mountain. After 65 days of awesome trails we have taken our last chairlift of the summer, but what a great place to bring the riding to an end. As it was a Saturday things were much busier, with queues for the lift that suggested a long wait. But the reality was not that bad – it’s a fast chairlift and it gobbles up riders so that it was never more than a 5 minute wait. It helps that there are always 2 lift staff on hand to load your bike, so all you have to do is sit down. The large number of riders made it easier for Tim as he was never short of a rider or 2 to hit something of interest. Although he still had to get to each trail spot with 18kg of equipment on his back which is no easy task with other riders chasing you down the hill! Whilst Tim took some pics I went to investigate some of the other trails, starting with the red graded ‘Ric et Rac’. Off the top this is a rocky single-track with sections of slate that get slippy in the wet. It comes out at the natural break-point where loads of trails criss-cross and give you the option to change your mind. Then the rest of the trail is open sweeping berms with big-hit jumps all the way to the bottom.

The ‘Serpentine’ trail is the green grade trail running round the outside, and is similar to the ‘Panoramic’ trail on the top lift. It’s rolling berms and jumps, but just be careful on a couple of the jumps – it might look like a table-top from the front but there are a couple of deceptive looking stream-gap jumps and you don’t want to end up hitting them too slow! At various points along the trail the serious stuff drops off to your right. The black and double black trails are accurately graded – the Gueps’ trail is root-infested, steep and tight. There are added drops and jumps built in to the trails, often with no chicken runs. And you are warned of this fact on signboards at each trail-head. A case-in-point is ‘Châ-Nada’ which drops off ‘Serpentine’ with a cool 5ft drop through the branches of a tree – no other way to get your bike down!

There has been immense work to build northshore trails here, with 3 dedicated ‘Shore’ trails near the base of the hill. And of course there is ‘The Face’ mountain style zone. On the top half of the mountain, you can see it as you reach the top of the main lift, and then all the way up as you ride the second lift to the peak. The scene of the Châtel Mountain Style event this is serious, no nonsense, professional standard riding and is the most advanced section of trail we have encountered on the URT. I promise I would have done it, only my shoulder is still a little sore from the other day...!

And that was that. No tears when packing up the van. To be honest we’re battered and need a rest. Tomorrow we celebrate at the World Champs in Champéry – in the inevitable rain and total mud-fest the pros will demonstrate a level of riding that 65 days and 19 bike parks has not got us close to. But we sure had a good time trying!

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