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Beldina debut

There had been considerable snow on Saturday, enough to ski in the valley. I saw les 7 Laux had opened its cross country ski area with all pistes open and on free access.
2020-12-06 09:32:44

Bernin Wall

A ski around the fitness trail in Crolles because there was too much snow to go further afield. Not too bad on classic skis.
2020-12-05 09:57:01

Cormet d'Arêches, French Alpes, Savoie

The Cormet d'Arêches are how Grand Tour cols used to be: nasty, long and brutish and the cherry on the cake, the top 6 to 7km are unsurfaced.
2020-10-25 14:21:41

Le Collet d'Allevard back door, France, Alps

Note: this road is closed in the winter months. It is also poorly surfaced before the main Allevard road.This used to be a departmental road but has been abandoned to the elements for a dozen years.
2020-10-08 11:54:10

Windy Miller

Quite a good ride today. 47 minutes for the climb (VAM of 940 m/h) which is not too bad. Nice to be feeling on better form due to cycling a bit more.
2020-10-04 16:19:35

Croix de Chamrousse, Belledonne, France

The Croix de Chamrousse is the summit of the Chamrousse ski pistes at 2250 meters. It can be reached from the Recoin, la Roche Berenger or Casserousse at 1400 meters.
2020-09-26 11:30:57

Alpe Loccia - Lake Orta - Italy

I'd spotted the Alpe Loccia while searching for new routes around lake Orta in Italy. According to the mountain bikers it is an uber steep climb with sections over 20%.
2020-08-15 10:20:50

Cassano, Lake Orta, Italy

Usual mix of steep Italian ramps and bad roads. The surfaced road ends just after Cassano so this is just a little tour of the foothills. The Orta backcountry is not overly interesting.
2020-08-14 16:44:45

Toppidrettsveka - Virtual World Classic Tour

I decided to enter the Toppidrettsveka - Virtual rollerski challenge.
2020-07-26 08:46:12

Montebuglio

Seriously, I'd vowed not to come back after last year but here I was, struggling up the first killer wall out of Monte Buglio cheered on by the usual assortment of deranged Italian cani.
2020-07-16 07:46:06

Scareno and Ponte Romana, Lake Maggiore, Italy

I'd never cycled up to Scareno before and to be honest, there isn't much reason to. It is a long way up a big of a rough road.
2020-07-13 08:10:03

Down and up

Classic style, double polling down, kick double pole up finishing with a bit of diagonal stride.25m56 down. 4m47 pace. Looking quite slow compared to skating now where I'm in the 3m05 range.
2020-07-01 07:38:24

Sk'Urban

A variation on the route today. Decided to try and skate the Chronovélo from Meylan to Grenoble city hall. The Chronovélo are high speed cycle routes where bikes generally have priority over cars.
2020-06-27 10:51:32

Col de Chamrousse via the Col du Luitel

There is a heatwave at the moment and many people on Strava were complaining about the temperatures. At the same time the weather service predicted afternoon storms.
2020-06-25 11:47:12

They rode at dawn

Early start due to the heat wave and a lot of people had the same idea. I was working on technique: high on the skis and using body weight to push, bending the knees as well as the hips.
2020-06-24 07:49:36

Skating Technique

More technique work. Trying for balance and feeling the outside edge of the skis.Overall 3m29/km, which is pretty good plus a PR of 19m28 on the south leg - previous PR was 20m43.
2020-06-15 10:55:04

Trip to look at the wrecked VW

JG wanted to check out the wrecked car and get its license plate to see if it was still registered, it is not. It must have been in the woods above the Croix du Trousset for 20 years.
2020-06-12 17:43:04

GPS Bug

The gps didn't start properly but time was around 3m50/km.
2020-06-08 10:53:12

Singles and company

We'd not been through the rock garden on the single du Champ Bertin since it rained a couple of weeks back (too greasy) but today the approaches were dry which was a good sign.
2020-06-01 17:01:28

Lake Tour

A quick tour along the lake to check out conditions. It was pretty hot after lunch with a bit of a breeze from the north.
2020-05-30 12:05:16

Col du Petit-Saint-Bernard

The Colle del Piccolo San Bernardo is the only mountain pass that links the Italian Aoste valley from the Tarentaise.
2020-05-29 14:48:34

Evening Skate

20m44 for the leg south, just 1 second off my PB - I'll have to try harder next time. There was a little bit of a tailwind mind. That's a pace of 3m26 / km; which is okay really.
2020-05-27 17:25:28

Croix du Trousset singletrack

JG, Matt and I decided to do a short loop via the Chemin de la Pivolle and Croix du Trousset singletracks. The Pivolle is great climbing or descending.
2020-05-25 17:33:48

Corbonne under the rain

With the end of the lockdown we decided to push out a little bit to this classic switchback descent. Unfortunately it started to rain, hard just as we were arriving.
2020-05-23 11:41:24

Col du Coq with too many Kilos

I'd not road cycled since before the lockdown and it was hard. Far too many kilos to carry and no real zip up the hills. Had to use my x32 far too often on the climb.
2020-05-21 16:55:28

Evening Ride

Taking advantage of the end of lockdown we rode across town on the bikepath then up the zigzag trail at Montfort to come back along the Coteaux trail.
2020-05-19 17:43:30

Lunch Classic

Mix of double polling, diagonal stride and pole double kick. Got under an hour for the return trip, which is not bad. Starting to get a bit more slide and at least had good poles this time.
2020-05-19 10:59:56

Côté Borne Evening

Evening ride with JG, Chris and Matthis. The trail was new to them. We trundled over to the Larguit climb then back across the Côté Borne. A bit of a change from the usual singles.
2020-05-18 17:34:04

Manival MTB

We wanted to push right up the Manival valley to the cabin but due to lack of time stopped about 200 meters short. We returned via the main trail as it was damp.
2020-05-17 11:07:56

Back to skating

Back to skating, a little 20km roll in 1h20 at 4m/km average. A tail wind on the way home meant I moved up to 8th place on the Gieres-Domene segment in 10m40. Not bad.
2020-05-14 16:26:24

Deconfinement classic rollerski

After doing a few short climbs near the house I decided to go over to the local towpath for a "flat" out and back.
2020-05-12 09:26:16

Tour de Longchamp, Paris, France

3.5km circuit in the Bois de Boulogne to the west of Paris. Very popular with road cyclists who form big "chain gangs" and are not always keen to share "their" space with other users.
2020-05-02 05:30:15

Speed and Power

Trip within our 1km radius up to the viewpoint then along to the cascade. 10m30 for the climb to the viewpoint, a bit off my PR but 2nd best time I think.
2020-04-01 11:17:52

Fraggle Rock

We decided to cycle to the Climbing Rock to take the technical descent down. It is still pretty tricky for us but getting a bit better on the easier top section.
2020-03-29 10:20:28

Charmant Som pte 1722

A little summit on cross country skis / crust skiing before the lockdown. I skied to the top of the small peak in front of the Charmant Som. Good fun on the crust. Climb took 33:32, 2nd fastest time.
2020-03-14 12:08:08

Aulp du Seuil avec Thibaut

Thibaut had suggested we ski the Couloir en Virgule.
2020-03-10 07:44:00

Allevard Steeps

After a long morning x-country on Saturday we decided to have a cool 2 hours downhill skiing on Sunday.
2020-03-08 14:16:52

Le Desert d'Entremont

The Desert d'Entremonts has around 30km of cross country runs prepared for skating and classic (claimed 45km but a number of kms are double counted in this figure).
2020-03-07 12:44:36

Charmant Tour

I'd originally wanted to ski to the Charmant Som and return but the piste was not prepared 1km after the col so I skied over the link (in good condition) to the main pistes and took the big loop aroun
2020-03-06 12:36:12

First (only) le Sappey of 2020

Rumour had it that le Sappey was opening up. Well it seems to have been a bit of rumour that also caught out one of the piste workers as the area had not been pisted.
2020-03-04 07:49:44

Lunch ski at the Col de Porte

Skiing was heavy going, snow was pisted this morning but by lunchtime it was like skiing fresh powder with skis sinking in 5cm as well as poles. The south loop was open and in good condition.
2020-03-03 12:32:12

Charmant Som en Classic

36:36 for the climb compared to my record of 32:20 (for both skating and classic). Not bad at all and my 6th best time. I put it down to better technique as well as fitness.
2020-03-01 16:04:12

Les 7 Laux

It had snowed about 20cm overnight, the pistes were a bit slow going, maybe a wax issue but generally in very good condition.
2020-03-01 11:55:04

Spring skiing at the Col de Porte

I wanted to check out what the weekend's record temperatures had done to the slopes. Quite a lot of snow had gone from the upper red piste, it was skiable last Friday but now was just bare earth.
2020-02-24 12:32:16

Charmant Som classic style

I hadn't been out on my classic skis much so decided to climb to the Bergeries of Charmant Som.
2020-02-23 17:32:48

Les 7 Laux (Buggy GPS)

A morning whizzing around the pistes of the 7 Laux. Surprised by the lack of half term crowds. Only the Oursiere had queues of about 2-3 minutes.
2020-02-23 15:48:40

Allevard

We just went up for a couple of hours in the early afternoon, worried about half term crowds but in the end things were pretty quiet. Maybe the changover day effect.
2020-02-22 14:58:08

First Murianette of 2020

I don't usually road bike until the spring but as the weather has been spring like I thought, why not? The Murianette is a shaded climb so not ideal at this time of year but it is relatively easy comp
2020-02-21 12:48:40

Pas de la Coche pt 2060m

I saw a TR on skitour which spoke of parking at the reservoirs and snow from 1500 meters.
2020-02-20 16:31:44

Evals

I came up early to do some skate skiing then helped Leonie with the evaluations of the school groups. Was surprised somewhat by the closed sectors due to lack of snow.
2020-02-20 10:58:40

Windy Sept Laux

We got up early to ski for 3 hours around the 7 Laux pistes. Tot took 2nd overall on the Vallons run on Strava.
2020-02-16 11:28:41

Skating session

Midday conditions were totally different from the morning. The foehn had started and the snow was soup like in the sun but not too sticky and waterlogged in places.
2020-02-15 12:49:32

Lessons col de Porte

Shadowing day with a private lesson group of skate beginners then on classic with the ski club.
2020-02-15 11:36:44

CdP

Decided to do a quick tour around the pistes, not great skiing, very hard work especially on the climbs.
2020-02-14 12:30:36

Shadowing D4

With the Montbonnot school again. Today 2 hours on classic, they were a bit tired.
2020-02-13 10:57:00

Allevard Afternoon

Start of the school vacation so where to go? Skiing? Lake? Finally skiing with a trip back to Allevard for lunch at the excellent Squirrel restaurant.
2020-02-09 14:12:28

Grand Plan with totster

Most of the small ski areas have been suffering from lack of snow but the Grand Plan actually is at a similar altitude to the 7 Laux so within the fortunate range where the snow has fallen enough to b
2020-02-08 15:56:52

Shadowing D3

L said it would be interesting to come on Saturday and so I was set for a long session, first with the SNC groups (saw some old friends from last year) then with the SNC kids.
2020-02-08 11:36:44

CdP + part of Charmant Som GPS battery flat

Second day shadowing. We had a different group of kids, this time on skate skis. Main problem was balance, although they were not bad. L.
2020-02-06 12:11:16

Shadowing with the Ecole de Porte

I'm doing some shadowing with the Ecole de Porte after my BASI Nordic course. Started by helping with the laser Biathlon then moved on to a 2 hour session with the schoolkids who were doing classic.
2020-01-30 12:47:40

Buggy gps

After a quiet weekend a return to the Col de Porte for a lunch ski - currently very little open in the Chartreuse so I'm using my season pass when and where I can.
2020-01-27 12:30:24