adidas Transalp Challenge
A Guided Tour of the Alps
Pete Webb and Sauze Holliday - Sponsored by Fat Face and Rocky Mountain Bikes / 18.08.2004
We left Imst the next morning at 8, well slightly late as there was a train due to cross our route ten minutes down the road. So they delayed the start and as the leaders reached the rail road crossing the train was almost passed, and the real start was as the barriers of the crossing opened! This figure of 22,000 meters of climbing has to be attained by daily clocking up the vertical ascent, and this morning’s climb was a 1400m … about two hours for us mortals. These climbs go on and on, normally winding up the hillside, around many hairpin bends. Quite often the start is on the road but at some point it will turn to a gravel track.
We would get to see a lot of this type of route as we were starting in large towns and heading out into the mountains. Again the scenery took us along rivers and along mountain sides, where at one point the single track had such a steep drop that the mountain rescue had put up ski net to catch anyone who got it wrong and disappeared over the edge. Another day of the ultimate in mountain bike trails faded into a long climb on small roads that clung to the hillside. Locals lined the route through the small villages, then after a long day in the saddle we crawled into the town centre of the popular ski resort of Ischgl. Ski resort? What do ski resorts have lots of? Big mountains!
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