Megève Mont-Blanc Cycling: a radiant edition!

A flagship event in the Haute-Savoie sporting landscape since 1989, the Megève Mont-Blanc Cycling once again met every challenge this year. Everything was there: a brilliant blue sky, radiant sunshine, and over 1,000 cyclists who came to challenge themselves and enjoy the superb roads and trails of the destination.

Source: Press Release – Photos: ©David Machet

One month, to the day, before the arrival of the 10th stage of the Tour de France, all participants in the 4 events of the Megève Mont-Blanc Cycling were able to truly put themselves in the shoes of these professional riders, by taking the same end of the course, leading them from the center of Megève to the mythical site of Cote 2000. A 7 km climb, certainly difficult but oh so splendid, leading cyclists into the incredible cirque that is Cote 2000.

Gravel on Saturday for some, road cycling on Sunday for others, or even both to push this challenge to the extreme: all the events were a great success, a success made possible thanks to the Megève Sports Club and all its volunteers. A true cycling celebration!

Gravel, the new trend!

This Saturday saw the second edition of the Gravel event, composed of 70% trails with incredible landscapes such as the Beaufortain massif and, of course, the Mont-Blanc massif in the background. This 75km course with 2,720m of positive elevation gain was once again unanimously praised by the 47 “gravel riders” entered, including 2 women!

Already a winner last year, Bruno Morel from Annecy wins “L’Aventurière” for the second time in 3h35mn07sec. While he led the race from the start, Bruno did not have the very large lead of last year, as the first 4 riders were within 10 minutes of each other. Arriving 2nd, 2mn33 behind Bruno Morel, a formidable opponent, local rider Antoine Socquet-Juglard gave him a hard time. A nice battle took place between these two men, forcing Bruno to give his all until the end.

Bruno Morel: “From the start, the race went really fast, the pace was very high and Antoine caught up with me 10km before the end of the race. It was tough because I planned to do the 150 km loop tomorrow! I wanted to save myself a bit but it was impossible.” The ranking of this young discipline straight from the United States, a discipline halfway between road cycling and mountain biking, fully reflected this cross between two practices, with Bruno Morel from the “road cycling” world and Antoine Socquet-Juglard, the local mountain biker.

Swiss rider Kévin Boscardin completes the podium in 3h43mn06sec, a rider also entered in the cyclosportive the next day for the “La Phénoménale” ranking (Editor’s note: La Phénoménale is the ranking based on the cumulative results of the Gravel L’Aventurière and the L’Originale cyclosportive – 15 riders chose to take on this 2-day challenge with 175km at stake.)

Rankings: HERE

L’Originale “cyclo”, the flagship and historic event!

The next day, Sunday, it was time for the cyclosportive: a competition celebrating its 32nd edition this year. An event that, once again, was a great success as the organization was fully booked 48 hours before the start of the event. Thus, nearly 850 cyclists set off from the center of Megève at 8:00 am, under a magnificent blue sky, in a sporting and friendly atmosphere.

For 2 years, the credo of this event has been freedom! So you get on your bike, you cover the first 60 km, then you choose to stop or continue up to 100 km or even push the counter to 150 km with a positive elevation gain of nearly 5,000 m. A real sporting challenge, within everyone’s reach, for all these cyclists who came to sweat… and they did, given the summer temperatures of this beautiful day!

Over the 60km distance, it was Félix Perrillat-Boiteux, from Thônes and a member of Team SQR, who won in 1h46mn57sec. He finished 4mn27 ahead of Romain Champenois and 6mn01 ahead of Alexis Betrix. The first woman, Anne-Lise Desjacques, ranked 18th overall out of 152 classified riders over this distance.

On the 100km loop, which takes the winding roads of the Col de l’Arpettaz, the first 4 finished in a sprint on the difficult climb of Cote 2000. In this exercise, Maxime Jarnet took first place in 3h20mn20 ahead of Romain Gauthier and Mathis Lauras.
Of note is the excellent 10th place of Swiss rider Kévin Boscardin, allowing him to win the “La Phénoménale” challenge, the combination of the Gravel event and the 100km loop.

Just like last year, Loïc Ruffaut largely won the 150km loop in 5h22mn50sec, finishing 16mn38 ahead of Vincent Arnaud, two-time winner of the MB Race. Guillaume Janvier, from Orléans, completed the podium.

Rankings: HERE

The Megève Sports Club is already working on the next edition of the Megève Mont-Blanc Cycling scheduled for June 10 & 11, 2023. Registrations open in December on https://megevembc.com/

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