I had hoped this run was going to be a chance to calm the nerves and put myself in the right frame of mind but instead I felt like I had been transported to a scene from wacky races, all manner of bikes and rider abilities descending at a range of generally high speeds and various levels of ‘out of control’ on snow that ranged from hard and icy, grippy, through to soft slush and wheel swallowing holes. It was quite a scene with riders stacking it and then people unable to stop piling over the top. Carnage was a pretty apt word at times and once again I thought, ‘why the hell did I sign up for this for?’ But all the while this emotion was balanced by the sheer fun of it all, and the lack of control only compounded this.

Looking through the field of entrants it was quite an eclectic bunch, not your typical downhill race, there was definitely an emphasis here towards the experience of the event, perhaps exemplified by the sheer number of helmet/chest cameras on riders. Genuinely every other rider had one on, and then there was of course a serious element of competitors in lycra, skin suits and/or running the bullet lid.

Race day began with an early wake–up call to get to the top of the mountain in time, the air was colder, everyone was silent in the cable car and funicular and I’m not going to lie, I was bricking it. The chaos in a few of the turns in the practice run had done little to settle any nerves as people had ploughed into, through and over each other during that run and the thought of 150 riders all charging at speeds over 60mph was a little unsettling.

There was an hour’s wait between arriving at the top and the start time, much of which was spend trying to find the best position for your bike and making a snow stand to hold it upright, anything to occupy the mind, then it was starter’s orders back to the riders line some 100 metres away from the bikes for the ‘Le Mans’ start.

Go, Go. Go…it was elbows out and jostling to stay on your feet, as many didn’t, and hold your position over the 100 metres or so, at 3,500 metres altitude this wasn’t easy. Once on the bikes a pedal across the flat separated people out before you accelerated up to speed into the first tight switchback turn. Once through this turn riders began to space out almost instantly as the speeds rocketed, the leaders seemingly accelerated off into the distance and you were left with your own battles to contend with. The super steep panorama drop gave a huge burst of acceleration pushing my speedo up to 84.4mph, so the leaders in skinsuits and bullet peaks must have breached the 90mph mark, without a doubt. The next major feature came around half way down the course with a steep and long piste that boiled brakes into two reasonably tight (at this speed) 90º left hand turns. I couldn’t slow down to set the bike up for the turn and lost the wheel as I tipped it in binning it down into the soft snow berm that had formed on the edge of the piste.