The Friday bike technical check and registration was a far easier affair than I imagined. With 4000 people to get checkin and bikes checked I thought there would be a massive que.

The registration was a breeze; turn up and pickup your entry plate with your first name on nice touch (I was to get plenty of cheering on while on the route with hop hop Lawrie) and the speed tag. I was in and out the registration within five minutes.I then clipped my spped tag on and off to find the technical checkl area. Where i imnagined I would spend a few hours waiting.

There was a festival atmosphere in Sion. The entire bike camp was in a sports field in what I figure is a school. There was plenty of stands and people showing off the latest gear. I found a nice pair of assos gloves in a bargain bin.

Looking around the technical area was not visible as a huge crowd of mtbers disappearing into the distance. I follower the signs and eventually joined a que that was ten deep in a few channels with someone at the front checking the bikes over. Fifteen minutes after joining the que I was out and ready to go shop. Alongside my assos gloves I ordered a technical body warmer that will be engraved with my name and “hero” as this was my first endeavour into the swiss alps and Grand Raid.

With all the necessities completed I headed back to the car and hour drive to Verbier the start of the Grand Raid. The impressive things about a[pproaching mountain towns, like Verbier and Grimetz, is the winding roads up the mountain side with the valley disappearing into a void many hundreds of meters below.

Verbier was relativelly quite other than MTBers mingling about and a sign showing “depart.” I was in the right place all I needed to do was wait for dawn and my second summer endurance challenge of 121km across six alpine valleys and 5000+ metres of climbing. The first climb I could see disappearing to the heavens.

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