Champéry matters for 3 reasons to most people: Sam Hill 2007, Danny Hart 2011, and the fact that it’s steep as shit. Take it from Danny Hart, not me: Champéry is special because it’s so steep you don’t need to pedal. It’s just gravity. There are no islands of safety. I asked an Elite racer if they “ever let go of the brakes on this track?” To which they replied: “only in the corners and in the air.” From the moment you drop in, to the moment you roll into the finish corral, you are almost sky diving with no parachute. I could write whole articles on the feeling of weightlessness in the corners, or that time I rode it with a backpack full of grey market Quebecois maple syrup after crossing the French-Swiss border, or the time my friend Dyl rode mountain bikes in Europe for the first time here. I was 12 in 2007, so for over half my life the Champéry race track has been an important character in my plot, from inspiring me to ride, to humbling me with the biggest crash I’ve ever taken. There’s a 4th reason Champéry matters to me: it’s a childhood dream that’s become part of my week-to-week reality. When an opportunity came up to be a Course Marshal at a Champéry World Champ’s, I jumped on it.
I managed to score two marshaling spots. One on Friday for practice and Junior Qualis. The second for – drum roll – Sunday Elite practice and Finals. Boom. The preparation to marshal is pretty simple, thankfully. You have to register, watch the training videos, and sign a waiver. As long as you speak French, are willing to risk life and limb to toot a whistle for a day, and are wildly lucky, you too can be a marshal.
You might wonder what a course marshal does. I, admittedly, had no idea going into this. I just know them as the whistle tooters who stand beside the track and wave flags around sometimes. Which, more or less describes the gig. Our primary goal is racer safety, and our second priority is ensuring race fairness. In terms of tasks, we blow a whistle as a rider goes past, to inform A) the marshal uphill the rider has exited their zone and B) to inform the downhill marshal of an incoming rider. If you don’t hear a whistle, it’s a sign something’s gone awry. If we see a stopped rider or an accident, we wave a yellow flag if a line is blocked, and wave a red flag if the course is blocked and communicate it on the radio. Its also our job to call for medical aid should it be required.
Shift 1 started at 6am on Friday, which meant that I needed to catch the train from Zurich on Thursday (which worked out for other reasons, more on that in Part 2 of this series). It takes another 20 minutes to walk to the venue from the closest accommodations, Jolimont. Thankfully Jolimont, which is normally a children’s summer camp, opened up to volunteers for just 40 CAD per night. I stayed there from Thursday through Sunday, so 120 CAD total for accommodations. Worth it. It’s pretty simple, a bed in a dorm with shared bathrooms and a kitchen. All you need to bring is your “sac à viande” (“meat bag” which is alpine code for a sleeping bag liner). While the accommodations were comfortable, I barely slept. I was too excited.
Champéry from the Lift: Red dot is my accommodations (Jolimont), the blue dot is the Marshal meeting point, a 20 minute walk. The yellow and purple dots are for Part 2 of this series, so stay tuned.
By the time my alarm went off at 5:15am, I was already wide awake. Thankfully my dorm mate was also a marshal who was up early too. I jumped into my clothes, packed my backpack, brushed my teeth, and was out the door at 5:30am. It was dark and drizzling rain, so I donned my jacket and headlamp for an alpine start. At the meeting point we were greeted with croissants and espresso – Europe has its perks – and bagged lunch. Honestly, the lunch was mediocre, especially given how amazing the food in this region typically is. But I am spoiled by memories of volunteering at BC Bike Race a decade ago, where I ate as much salmon as a Fat Bear Week contestant.
We walked across the street to pick up our marshaling gear: a vest, a radio, flags, and the venerated whistle. After a further 20 minutes of training and briefing, we made our way to the chairlift and headed up the mountain. It was still drizzling, so while we tried to wipe off the lifts we knew it was futile. The day would be wet and cold. I was dreaming of my drysuit already, and we weren’t even on the hill yet. As we made our way to the track, the blue sky started to peek out. Then, suddenly, hail. Proper, peppercorn-sized, hail. I pulled out my phone and texted racer Henry Sherry “Good luck today man. It’s clearing up here, but it did just hail.” Probably not a helpful text in retrospect. While we were slipping and sliding over the peanut-buttery ground to our posts, a figurative dark cloud hung over us as well: yesterday there had been one helicopter rescue, for a marshal who’d slipped and fallen down the trail, breaking their leg. Champery in the wet is not nice for anybody.
I was posted with three paramedics – two military and one civilian. As we set up, one of the military paramedics took his rescue stretcher from his bag and stuffed it in his cargo pants. He looked me in the eye and said, “if a person crashes, we’re going to need to move them to the helicopter lift point quickly. You’re going to need to help drag them.”
Rescue stretcher stowed at the ready.
Thankfully, the sun began to peek out between the rolling fog. We never got warm, but we did dry out a bit. Marshaling on Day 1 was amazing. It was a mix of absolute chaos and total calm. Marshals are posted roughly 50 meters apart, from the start line all the way to the finish line. On day 1 I was at #4, right at the end of the first straight away, so I got to see people hit some sweet jumps and lock in for a narrow racing line just inches from a tree and a cliff. The audience was very friendly, and in my downtime I had a few great conversations. I met Canadian Ken Stojak, who raced in the 3rd ever Downhill World Championships in Bromont Quebec. I met parents of racers – a lot on this day, given the number of juniors. One parent, observing my suffering, even gifted me a foam sit pad – a real savior. Several people I met, from marshals to trail builders, were here watching the legendary laps of Danny Hart and Sam Hill back in the day, it was amazing to hear their stories and the secrets tidbits of what transpired those days.
The main perk of marshaling, of course, is getting the best seat in the house. Marshals are standing close to the racers, and our job is literally to watch them. Seeing childhood heroes like Fairclough rip past, followed up by modern legends like Gracey and Jackson, to the guy I was rooting for – Henry. There’s a few videos out there where I’m convinced you can hear me cheering them on from the sides. Practice, and in particular Junior practices, is a somewhat underrated part of racing. I learned the most from this.
Riders were stopping, checking out lines, and experimenting. While watching Gwin fly at mach chicken over a hip directly into the steeps is amazing, the riders who roll the jump and grab a fistful of brake before creeping into the steeps was much more relatable. I’m stoked to go back to ride the track and apply what I learned.
By the end of Day 1, I was clapped. I was tired of being cold, I was muddy, and my legs were sore from standing around. And oh boy was I hungry. I was also grateful that I managed to go a day without having to call a red flag or render aid. I was spent after 12 hours on the hill and being awake for 17 hours that day. I had no energy to cook, or even go buy dinner, so I crammed some Gruyere and brioche down and went to sleep.
The B-Zone was busy, full of media, marshals, and first responders.
A highlight of standing trackside was the cool people. This is Ken Stojak. Ken raced in the Bromont 1992 World Championships.
While my day was quite relaxed and I only pulled the yellow flag out a few times, the course was not. Lower down, in “The Canyon” there’s a set of steep, greasy corners that have a few very narrow lines between marshal posts 28 and 30. The issue is, the only place to safely stop above post 30 is post 25, 250m away and way out of the line of sight. You could hear the chaos all day long. It felt like red flags were called every couple of minutes. It’s a tricky balance, calling a red flag. For rider safety, it’s better to call a red flag early to prevent a multi-rider collision (several of these happened, owing to the unstructured nature of practice and the wet course). That said, calling a red flag shuts down the course and stops training for everyone. You’ve got riders getting cold at the top, who aren’t getting the practice they need to race, both of which add risk. It’s a hard call that you have to make in a split second. I overheard a handful of non-racers in team tents complaining about the marshaling. It’s easy to armchair marshal when you have a heated tent and hot coffee to go back to. We didn’t even have it that bad that day; I cannot imagine marshaling at Les Gets in the mud. As much as I hate crashing, I was attracted to the chaos of post 28. I wanted to see the gnar, and I knew where I was going for race day.
Sunday’s marshaling shift started in much the same way. An alpine start, this time with starry clear skies. A good sign for race day. Another croissant breakfast. Another marshal briefing. I placed myself in Sector 3, where post 28 is. We were not, however, allowed to choose our own radios today. Lessons had been learned, and there were challenges ranging from managing spectators to red flagging at the correct time. Our Sector Chief handed out the radios first to those who were returning and had previously marshaled at those posts. He grabbed the radio for post 28 and hesitated before he looked up at us. Immediately I reached out my hand and said “J’ai faire le course, je connais le défi,” “I’ve ridden the course, I know the challenge.” Without another word, post 28 was mine. Terrifying. I was paired with another marshal as well as two paramedics for the day.
The view from Jolimont walking to the Marshal meeting point
Marshal briefing before Elite Finals
Seb from Quebec was a marshal here when Danny Hart won.
My partner Jacopo, overlooking Post 28 pt 2. New to mountain biking, he was here for the vibes.
Post 28 sits atop a gnarly rocky left hander. There’s no smooth line. The big challenge comes at the bottom, where there’s a soft, muddy, corner that sucks all your speed. This corner was causing over-the-bars moments constantly in the previous days. It hadn’t rained on Saturday though, and Sunday the forecast was looking sunny. The course was noticeably dryer, so there was some hope of a carnage-free race day. With the sun peaking out over les Dents de Midi, it was game on. The day would start with Elite Practice, followed by Elite Finals. Some racers took 3 laps in practice, and others opted to rest and not practice at all. Riders were stopping and watching others ride through this section, likely to observe the impact of the drying conditions. This was a much more technical spot to marshal. I had my yellow flag in one hand, my radio in the other, and the whistle in my mouth. My co-marshal on the platform had a line of sight to Sector 29 to see the high risk zone directly. I had the flag and radio, though, as I was in a position to guide the racers. Whenever a rider would have an off and pull off to the side, he would have to indicate to me so I could raise the flag. It was a team effort. I’m grateful we only had to wave the red flag twice, and in neither instance did anyone need medical attention.
Crowd control at Post 28 was also an enormous challenge. The audience and teams know this is where the gnar is. The team scouts who check course conditions and radio live condition updates back to teams were out in droves, as were their social media teams. Team staffers are allowed to get as close to the track as we are, so long as they are wearing their UCI issued team jersey. This is critical because it indicates to the spectators that these people have special privileges, so the audience in skate shoes doesn’t try to get as close to the course. Unfortunately, a few team staffers forgot their jerseys and were quite annoying to deal with.
This poses a risk to rider safety, as my attention was split between racers and non-compliant staffer. People think this rule is nonsense, but there was one pretty big accident during the Elite Men’s run. A rider came off the course and went into the audience. The rider was fine, but an audience member had to be airlifted to the local hospital. Of course, the race was paused. Helicopters are the only way to access most of the course for a rescue, so the helicopter being occupied meant rider safety was at risk in the event of an accident. There were several medical airlifts over the weekend, for everyone from course marshals to racers to audience members. Champery is dangerous. I cannot wrap my head around why people would continue to breach safety rules after watching a heli pick someone up. Not to mention how those types of accidents affect the racers, it’s so selfish. The B-Zone exists for a reason, please respect it.
The audience was mostly great, though. It’s just a few bad apples who caused us a headache. Most people were stoked and respected the rules. Chainsaws ripped. People cheered for every rider that came down. I was amazed at how many people were walking up and down the strenuous and steep trail beside the course. It’s comparable to the Grouse Grind, but less developed and much slipperier. Kids, adults, even the elderly, were out in droves and committed to watching the racing.
I have to say, though, Post 28 was the most interesting place to be on course. My hands were busy, one on the radio, one on the flag, with the whistle in my mouth so I’m short of action photos. But I was right there watching the world’s best riders spend time learning, and then racing, one of the most technical features I have ever seen in person. It can be compared to some steep and gnarly optional lines on Cypress, the ones that are typically mossed over because no one rides them. I was so close I could hear the racers breathing. Tahnee Seagrave took a wild line, a tight inside that required avoiding pedal and axle strikes most of the way through a very narrow racing line. I got to see Danny gamble huge, taking a wide outside that he’d only practiced once and no one else even attempted.
One rider took a spill in the corner just above me. In under 2 seconds, they were back on their bike at race pace. It was also incredible to see how riders turn it on, or off, depending on their risk tolerance. For SuperBruni, this was especially interesting to see. During practice, he was riding with his body preloaded like a puma chasing its prey and about to pounce. After his crash, he was noticeably more relaxed and calm. He did not eke out that extra split second. He was still precise and fast as hell, but it was clear that he was not laying it all on the line to win. Watching the racers close enough to see their body language and hear their breathing was amazing, and it’s something that just does not come through the screen with cameras cutting back and forth or drones zipping about. It’s way more intimate on course.
Spectators pour down the course.
When the last rider was down, the spectators immediately started to walk and run down the course themselves, marvelling at what they’d just seen people ride. You could see the inspiration, people standing at the top of features and either gawking at the gnar or pondering their potential lines through it. I was not the only one who’d learned something about riding that day, that’s for sure. People walked right down into the podium area. I still had a little work to do on the hill – cutting down some branding signs – but I managed to catch the Canadian National Anthem, played after Jackson received his medal. That was pretty cool.
I then walked back to Jolimont, to pack my gear, prep for dinner with racer Henry Sherry and his mother Erin, and process what had just happened. I was exhausted, sore, and somewhat fed up with crowds. But I am so grateful to have had the experience, to get to watch the racing, and contribute a little bit to the community. It was also nice to be one of a few people of colour there (I counted 5 all weekend), but we’ve got a long way to go in terms of representation in this sport.
Marshaling was hard work, and most of the marshals were not “core” downhillers. Marshals, and volunteers at large, were members of the community, many of whom were not even mountain bikers. Volunteers, on the net, paid money to be there too. We may be wearing shiny vests, but beyond a little training and commitment we are not any different from the spectators. Next time you are watching a race, either in person or on the screen, say a little thank you to the people tooting the whistles and cleaning up the trash. It takes a village to support these events.
*An aside, in putting this together I realized how hard it is to take nice photos, do a job, and get it all together quickly for a post online. Shoutout to those who do this daily to keep us stoked!