There’s been a little race going on in France this month you might have heard about. But while waifish men on skinny tires confine themselves to the roads of the Alps and Pyrenees, there’s a series of enduro/DH races like the Megavalanche that are way more dangerous and thrilling than anything in the modern history of the Tour de France. Descents might cover 20 miles and plunge 9,000 feet. There are waves of mass starts, with the pros going first and amateurs getting later guns. Sure, there’s no hazard of a car hitting you, but that’s not so much consolation when you’re bombing a glacial scree field at 30 mph.

Incidentally bikes of choice are typically not DH rigs — there’s a lot of climbing and at that altitude, with a full face lid and body armor, you want a bike that will pedal up as well as bomb down. Bikes with five or six inches of travel are increasingly common, and ideally you’re at 30 pounds or less.

For the 2011 Alpe D’Huez Megavalanche, the crown of the Mega series, Remy Absalon elbowed and jostled his way to victory off the top of 9,840-foot Pic Blanc. It took him a forearm-cooking 40 minutes. Read that again: a 40-minute downhill (compressed in this video to six minutes). In Absalon’s pro/am class, the last finisher was Joe Rafferty of England, who took 348th place with an exhausted time of 2:08. Some more regular Jane and Joe racers stacked yet another hour on top of that to descend the 6,000 feet and 30 kilometers to the finish banner.

Tagged as: daily bike, mountain bike, mountain biking