PILA: Berm Factory in Dust City

PILA!

What a day, where to start? Perfect berms and dusty-ness.

Four of us headed to Aosta to ride the resort of Pila, about an hours drive away including the Mont Blanc tunnel (€25 return with my tunnel pass, and €5.10 road tolls each way). A long slow gondola ride takes you to the main 'bike park' area. We did a couple of runs riding perfect downhill trails, with perfect berms, then decided to head down the 8km freeride 'home run' and get the gondola back up before it shut for lunch at 12:45. What a run, more berms, jumps, drops, roots, tight turns, and a whole ton of dust! AMAZING.

After ascending we then stopped right by the chair lift for a mega sized lunch. I had a gnocchi cheese feast and the other 3 lads had Gran Paradiso sized portions of tagliatelle ragu. All of this was washed down with an espresso to get us moving again.

More laps followed lunch as wed tried out the variations that litter the small, but diverse bike park area. There everything from gnarly world cup sections to flowing loamy singletrack.

Our arms were starting to feel it by now, Andy bought us all ice creams (thank you) and then we decided to head down the home run. This time we left even bigger gaps between each other to try and allow a glimpse of the trail surface through the dust!

AMAZING!

Andy from Bluebird Chalets on the IXS course step-up

Tom H (Numero97 Photography) railing one of the perfect berms

Rich E taking in some shade after a morning descent of the home run

Andy (L) & Tom H (R) not taking in the view of Mont Blanc

Rich railing another perfect berm

Andy on the home run dust fest

me on a dusty berm

Comments

What guides do between work in the peak of July

Summer is here, and after fantastic spring riding in Southern France and then all over Valais, Aosta and Haute Savoie with good friends it's been time to get back to summer guiding, taking hikers around the Tour du Mont Blanc circuit. There's much worse things to do, but with three weeks off the bike I was itching to get back on some trails. With a carefully planned week between tours I was excited and made some plans to hit up some classic lines, and some new stuff too. It's mid July now, so in Chamonix valley you have to think carefully about where to go to miss the crowds, and to avoid going on the bike ban trails (July & August). Luckily it's still easy to find quiet trails in nearby resorts, or to simply drop round the back of a hill away from the frontside lifts. It went a little like this: Day 1- La Thuile with Wayne of newly qualified French legal mountain bike guiding service Chamonixmtb.com . Enduro race venue at it's best, rough and raw.

Provence Posing

Early spring road trip with Team NL The Dutchies had work to finish before they'd start the mammoth 14 hour drive from under the sea to herb filled mountainsides. Work for us guys in the Alps is more seasonal & temporary, as it is for some Easyjet pilots which meant that the native English speakers left for 'The South' a day earlier. Digne les Bains was the rendezvous location for Saturday night but this meant going so close to Gap and Lac Serre Poncon. The lure of a trail in the Haute Alpes ( the northern most department in the Provence Alpes Cote d'Azur Region ) was too much. 3 of us wild camped lake side with giddy excitement for what lay ahead. Rob & Ben knew each other from ski touring & paragliding, but had never ridden together, nor had Ben ever met team NL. Rob and I briefed him on the impending fun. In the morning, a classic was called upon to give Ben his first taste of Southern singletrack. Mont Colombus, and a few hours later aft

Servoz storm destruction

Deep in Servoz below the Fiz 75% of trail is ok. But where it is washed away is really bad. Click here for photos What rode was as good as ever for this begining/end of season trail 1hour & half pedal from Serviz village.

Search This Blog