Braaaaap!
This guy has the action gene in his DNA: Manuel Lettenbichler. The man from Rosenheim has been riding a trial motorbike since he was five years old. Today, the 27-year-old is one of the stars of the Hard Enduro discipline (if you haven't seen it, be sure to search for it on YouTube). When "Letti" is not winning competitions such as the legendary Red Bull Erzberg Rodeo, he is shredding in the bike park - like here in Leogang. Always with a fat fountain of dust on his rear wheel, of course. Photo: YT/Florian Ecker
Awaken the Jake Taylor in you and surf the trails like the Madman from Canada.
- BIKE editor Dimitri Lehner
Old paths
Cart tracks, smugglers' trails, escape routes across the green border, trenches ... Today, it's fun to explore the remnants of the past by bike - like Kilian Bron (above) exploring the old Gebrigsjägerstellungen in the Dolomites or David Cachon rolling through the Chemin de la Mâture in the Pyrenees. Paul Marie Leroy had this rock route chiselled into the mountain in 1772 to transport tree trunks from the mountain forest into the valley - for ship masts for the French fleet.
When paths tell history. Historic places lend the bike ride a special fascination.
Chemin de la Mâture in the Pyrenees: a path like a cut in the rock
There is a 200 metre vertical drop into the "Gorges de l'Enfer", the Gorge of Hell. Above it, as if drawn into the wall with a ruler, runs a 1,200 metre long balcony made of stone: the Chemin de la Mâture. Four metres high, four metres wide, carved directly out of the rock for almost a kilometre. Opposite, on the other side of the gorge, the Fort du Portalet stands guard like a film set from another era.
You don't just walk here. You feel your way forward - with your hand on the rough stone, your gaze between the abyss and the horizon. The path sticks to the rock as if someone had carved it with defiance.
For the fleet of the Sun King
The path owes its existence not to a romantic travelling impulse, but to big politics. From 1660, Louis XIV and his minister Jean-Baptiste Colbert wanted to make France a maritime power. But good wood was scarce - and expensive. So they turned to the forests of the western Pyrenees. Tall, straight fir trees for masts, beech trees for rudders, boxwood for axles and pulleys.
The problem: the best trunks grew where nobody wanted to go. A passageway had to be built over the narrow, rugged gorge, wide enough for ox carts pulling logs weighing tonnes. The work was completed in 1772 - an engineering feat, planned by naval engineers and carved out of the rock centimetre by centimetre by workers.
The felled trees were then floated down the river towards Bayonne, into the kingdom's shipyards. In 1778, the forest was exhausted. The road remained.
From military project to long-distance hiking trail
Today, the Chemin de la Mâture is part of the GR 10, the legendary long-distance hiking trail that crosses the Pyrenees from the Atlantic to the Mediterranean. Backpackers now pass by where ship masts were once transported for the navy. Or David Cachon rolls along the cliff edge on his enduro bike. However, we advise against this feat, please leave it to the trail world champion.
The rock still bears the marks of the tools. And anyone who walks along here will realise that sometimes the most spectacular paths are not the result of wanderlust - but of power politics, the need for wood and a good dose of engineering courage.
Pilgrimage site
Pilgrimage site Moab, Utah. Mountain wilderness. A place of longing for all mountain bikers. In this photo, you can't help but hear the eagle scream and see mountain man Jeremiah Johnson standing on the cliff with the Hawken .50 calibre in the crook of his arm. We say: a trip to Moab belongs on every bucket list. A must: the legendary Slickrock Trail - the ultimate mountain biking pilgrimage site. Photo: Forest Woodward
Long jump
Jackson Goldstone was the clear favourite at the Red Bull Hardline in Tasmania. Nobody "flew" through the course as confidently as the reigning downhill world champion. But shortly before qualifying, the 22-year-old crashed in training. The final run was cancelled due to rain; the quali was counted - result: "only" ninth place for Goldstone. In terms of style, however, he remained the undisputed number one. And we're not talking about his salmon-coloured outfit. Photo: G. Murray/Red Bull
Dome of light
Pillars of light in Blackrock, Oregon. Biker Austin Hemperley contorts himself in the air towards the Eurotable, while photographer Caleb Ely transforms the sun's rays between the trees into pillars of light and is already dreaming of the Red Bull Illume photography prize - because that's what he'll be submitting this Supershot for later.
Dimitri Lehner
Editor
