Pierramenta day 3 (Skiing)

Saturday 19 March 2011 03:49PM

Today was a total contrast to yesterday’s beautiful weather. We were racing in fog of varying thicknesses, rain, sleet and snow. Because of this the organisers decided not to send us up the Grand Mont, which is traditional for the Saturday of the Pierramenta. However, they still managed a fantastic course of 2456m ascent spread over four climbs, with two sections on foot, and one scrambling up an exposed arete clipping into fixed ropes. Although it wasn’t quite the ambiance traditional for the Saturday of the Pierramenta, there were still hundreds of hardy supporters, mostly kitted out with enormous cowbells, keeping our spirits up around the course.

Finally, on our third day of racing, Tom and I had a day without equipment problems, and we took advantage of this to race well, having our best day yet and coming in 71st in 3:34:58, nearly an hour after the winning team of Kilian Jornet and Didier Blanc, who won today by a second and maintain a slender lead of a minute and a half over Guido Giacomelli and Lorenzo Holznecht (who were second today).

Today’s result pushed us up into 89th position overall, out of over 180 starting teams, which considering the problems we had on the first two days, we are pretty happy with. Jon and Ben also had a good day today, pulling away from us half way up the first climb, after which we just couldn’t catch them, they finished 65th today, in 3:29:41, and a very respectable 69th overall after three consistently good days. Tomorrow is the final day, and typically a shorter, faster affair. It’s been raining hard all day in Arêches village, meaning lots of fresh snow up high, but it’s clearing now and is forecast fine for tomorrow, so it could be a very special day to wrap up this year’s Pierramenta.