Act 5 - MILLET SKI TOURING COURCHEVEL - Wednesday 13 January 2016

5th Millet Ski Touring Courchevel, new records for Gary Ozeray and Corinne Favre.

This 6th season of the Millet Ski Touring Courchevel (MSTC) is well and truly under way. Since last week the snow has arrived, and for this 5th round of the MSTC a snowcat groomed the snow accumulated over two days on the course a few minutes before the start of the race. A real treat for the 110 participants, who were able to make this ski touring climb of 3.2 km with 500 m of elevation gain between Le Praz and Courchevel 1850 on a velvet carpet. As every Wednesday, the ski mountaineers estimate their climbing time when registering before setting off in a time trial. The slowest people start first and the fastest last, so that beginners do not find themselves at the back of the pack and can sometimes even arrive before the elites!

This Wednesday 13 January, the men’s podium was decided by a whisker. Gary Ozeray of ESF Peisey Vallandry won, setting the new provisional record of the season in 24min44s. A few seconds later came Alexandre Vionnet Fuasset of the Club Multisports d’Arêches Beaufort in 24min52s and Arnaud Mazet in 24min57.

Among the women, Corinne Favre did it again, improving her own record by more than 40 seconds and lowering it to 28min10s. Géraldine Bau took second place in 32min10s ahead of the new recruit of the organising club "Courchevel Sports Alpinisme", Corail Bugnard, who finished in 32min41s. For several years, Corail has been one of the best female trail runners in France, having won numerous trails including the mythical "SaintéLyon" race in early December. This young trail runner, whose future in this discipline is very promising, has chosen, like many other trail specialists such as Kilian Jornet, to do winter preparation in ski touring. This Wednesday was the occasion for Corail to receive her baptism of fire by climbing on touring skis for the first time. "It wasn’t easy to find the right technique for this first climb but I really like it. It’s a very good complement to trail running. I will come back to do the race, but also the Plum KV Courchevel and the Dynastar X3 Courchevel. All I have left to do is train," she told us with a smile at the finish.

For 2 years, a French Ski Schools (ESF) challenge has been set up with the help of the 3 ESFs of Courchevel. This challenge allows instructors from all the ESFs of France to be ranked and, at the end of the season, to name the best male and female ski mountaineer of the 2016 ESFs. In this 5th round, it was Gary Ozeray of ESF Peisey Vallandry who, with his time of 24min52s, rose to the top of the provisional overall standings, and Pascale Gachet-Mauroz of ESF Courchevel 1550 who took the lead of this ranking among the women instructors in 39min05s.

1st Grand Slam next week…

The first round of the Vertical Kilometre (VK) of the Plum KV Courchevel (PKVC) will take place on Friday 22 January. At the end of the 4 rounds offered this season on this 5 km course with 1,000 m of elevation gain, approved by the French Mountain and Climbing Federation (FFME), the 2016 French VK records will be awarded.

In the weeks when the MSTC and the PKVC are organised, a ranking is drawn up for those who complete the “Grand Slam” (taking part in the 2 events in the same week).

Next week, the season’s "1st Grand Slam" will take into account the combined times of the MSTC on Wednesday 20 January and those of the PKVC on Friday 22 January. The 2015 "Grand Slam" records were won by Yoann Sert (1h05min03s) and Charlotte Le Roux (1h32min04s).