Hi there, everybody. Welcome to another episode of the Cloudbase Mayhem. My guest today is Manu Bonti, a legend in the sport. He's been on the show before. This is the second one we've done with him, but I didn't know this. He was the weather router and one of the supporters for Pierre Remy in the X-Pyr. And he sent me a text right after the race, and I was, of course, glued to it for the week. An amazing race, and Pierre was actually out in front going into the end. And then Chrigel and Maxime got him. They made a couple of really nice moves. And, of course, Chrigel, very crazy ending. And Chrigel was able to beat Maxime against all the odds yet again. So I thought it'd be really fun to talk to a supporter.
Usually we talk to the athletes, but talk to a supporter and get their take on the philosophy and the risk and how it all comes together. This was Pierre's first hike and fly race. He's, of course, a very famous comp pilot. And a really big name in the sport. But this was his first foray into hike and fly, and he got third against some pretty tough competition. So he had a great race, and obviously they had a great team. And so this is a story from kind of behind the scenes. I think you're going to really enjoy it. Cheers.
Manu, good to see you and have you on the show again. It's wonderful to see your smiling face. It sounds like you guys had quite an adventure. Yeah, it's been a lot of fun. So we're going to be talking a lot about the race. But I thought where we should start would be to talk about Pierre a little bit. For those who don't follow comps very much, who are listening to the show, may not be familiar with Pierre Remy, one of the more famous pilots in the world. But tell us about Pierre, and then we'll get into it. I want to talk to you about what it was like supporting. That's something I'm going to do for the first time here in a month over at the Dolomiti. But, yeah. Yeah, tell me about Pierre, and then we'll get into your adventure.
Hey, Gavin, cool to meet you again on Cloudbase Mayhem. So Pierre is, for people that do not know him, was a really classic comp champion. He won the FAI Awards in 2017 and the PWC Superfinal in 2018. And starting from that moment, he started to pay attention to those. And he started to train. So that was really 2018. He really started to physically train, you know, for this type of comp. And he had, you know, the ambition to participate to the XPEAR 2020,
which was canceled due to COVID issues, you know. And here we are. He arrived in 2020.
And he was physically really ready, but the team was, I would say, kind of improvised. You know, he called me a few weeks before the comp, asking me if I wanted to be support. And then for the two other guys, you know, it was pretty much the same. So we went there just to see, you know, a little bit. But, yeah, finally, we had a good adventure. Good sensations. And it was pretty fun.
Yeah. And I was watching the race. I got up at 4 o 'clock in the morning all week to watch it. It was going on during our U.S. Nationals. So I was up early anyway. But he made some nice moves, you know, really. You know, the big day, day three, where all the leaders got way out in front and had some really nice flying. But the weather at the start was tough. And he was fast on the ground as well. There was those first couple days. It looked pretty miserable.
Yes. The two first days were pretty miserable. And I believe Maxime did the best job, you know, from the team. Even if at the end of the second day, Chrigel managed to make a move. Yeah. But the choice of Maxime, they were a little bit better. And the third day was the very first day we could fly. And looking at the weather forecast, at that moment, we believed maybe it would be the only flying day of the comp. You know, but finally it happened that we had some other flying days. Yeah. But everybody was like, that day we must be at the right place, you know, at the right moment.
And we had a third day, you know, a group of leaders where we had mainly Maxime and Chrigel. And also they were together. We. Noah, maybe, and Simon, for sure. And so basically we had those leaders, you know, in the front. And Pierre was a little bit behind. And we made a weather forecast and strategy. And for us, it was clear that in the high altitude, the air was quite stable until late. And it would be unstable in the lower layer. So this is the reason why we did not follow them, because we arrived a little bit later in Kandanshu.
And my plan was to go on the east face, stay relatively low to benefit, you know, the instability we had. And finally, Pierre, I think it took off two hours before the other guys. Well, they made the first glide, then they climbed again, and then they had to wait for conditions to take off again. And at that moment, you know, we were able to fly. So Pierre was flying for a while. We had probably, I would say, three, four hours. We were three, four hours behind at that moment. And during the flight, at one moment, we passed first. And then they had a good line. And, well, in the Peña Montanesa, we had only six kilometers. You know, we were just six kilometers behind.
But that was definitely a good move we did. And in my opinion, you know, in this type of competition, they had no other choice because they wouldn't wait, you know, three hours to take off in the lower layers. So basically, they went, they had to go ahead. And this is sometimes you're trapped like this. And we had the same situation, but reversed. We had to wait, you know, later on. And then they caught with us again, you know, that was on day five. But in some moments, you know, you just need to do something because the athletes, they say, hey, I'm not going to wait. And so, of course, you know, you choose, you know, one option. But you know that later on, you know, in another place would be better. And this is, that was perfect for us because we were late and we arrived exactly at the right moment to take off on the east face low.
And they just took off and they climbed, they arrived super high, but it was not in place and they had to wait. And so basically, I would say we passed them. And then, you know. Yeah. They got a little bit lucky on that because normally when they arrive, when you arrive from the route they took, there is a place where pass it is rather complicated. And I really believed we would pass in front, but it worked very well for them. And so everybody was kind of surprised around Broto, how they could pass, you know, the national park. But yeah, that's, that's the game. But finally, the move was quite good for us here, for sure. The decision and. And the way Pierre put it, you know, in, into reality was, was quite good.
That was kind of tricky, you know, because we know that to pass from the east face, you know, to the Coyote Radar, that would be kind of tricky. And he was actually, there were two together, you know, to cross. And finally one landed and Pierre managed to escape. So it was not, let's say, crystal clear. It would be good. But he managed. To do it. And then he was clearly in the front. So that was, that was the first move that was not too bad. And then, well, then as the guys, they had a good line, he was chasing them till the end. And they were putting like a crazy rhythm. And, and that was virtually impossible to catch up with them. And I know he kept the distance, but he couldn't catch up with them.
That was a very intense flying. Everybody was so. Motivated and, and, uh, yeah, I have something to say also about what happened in that flight is that what, what Krigel, Simon and, and Maxime did, you know, um, from Mon Lude to go to the first point of the X, you know, like, uh, um, our bus is just amazing. That's route. We hardly, I don't think, I mean, I know a little bit what happened. The Pyrenees, but maybe I'm, I make a mistake, but I don't think anybody ever reach from Mon Lude, our bus using that route. They just went, you know, in the mountains on the lee side of little hills.
They were barely protected. And then they managed to catch thermal, you know, to climb in the thermal and then push into the wind to pass in front of the mountain. They did that four times to reach, um, our bus. And for me, what they did was just from another one. Probably one. Part of the X-Pyr. I was so impressed with what, with what, um, Maxime Krigel and Simon achieved, you know, in terms of choice of, um, of, of food, which, you know, we know it's impossible. They didn't know it's impossible. So they did it, you know, basically. So, but, you know, it opened eyes, you know, and we were, we were just like, what?
When I saw them, you know, from Mon Lude. Go in direction of that south face. I just said, okay, they are dead. You know, it's never going to work, you know, and then, you know, it worked for a time. So basically we learn, you know, we learn from those comps for sure. I
was going to ask, you know, because you live in the Pyrenees and Pierre lives in the Pyrenees. How I've always thought that with the X-Alps, you know, the pilots who live in Europe, you know, have a, have a pretty clear advantage because they just, they know it's a complicated thing. It's a complicated place and they know the different systems and the Valley winds and everything. And it's, it's really important to have knowledge of a place. But when I look at the Pyrenees, it's, it's even in many ways, much more complicated. You know, the, the roads never go in the direction of the route. And so the walking is, it looks really hard. But how important is it for the athletes to have knowledge of what the flying is like there and the fern and all that?
But what do you, what do you think about that? Because it's, it is interesting that you said, you know, Simon and, and Chrigel, they're, they're doing these things that the locals would go, nah, that's, you don't do that.
Yeah. On one hand, it's good to know the place. On the other hand, when you know it, you're limited. So that's basically when you open, when you get in a place with fresh eyes and you come with your experience from other places. Um, basically, you know, like the, the famous day, um, Chrigel took off from, uh, that was on day, um, four. He took off from Pic du Midi. In these conditions, we never fly. Nobody flies, you know, in France. Like, uh, we, we are, we don't fly. Just, I mean, Pierre doesn't fly in these conditions, uh, regularly. And what did Chrigel, I looked at the track and that's an amazing.
Understanding of what could be wave flying. Okay. But when you learn paragliding in France, uh, for the first thing you learn, you know, in the French Pyrenees, you don't fly when it's south wind. And then little by little, you learn that when the south wind is not too strong, then you can still do things. And maybe the best days that we are with a light south wind, but then, you know, when the wind is that strong, everybody stays home and take care of the tomatoes in his garden, you know? And basically. Um, he just amazed us, you know, there, but that was just, you know, like a certain type of flying in very specific conditions. It's amazing. It's Chrigel. But what they did, you know, between more Lude and our bass for me is something we could do, but we never do because we don't believe it might work in competition.
They go that route, uh, with the, uh, the strong. Feeling that it's the best thing to do and actually it works. So that's on, as I said, you know, on one hand, you know, you know, some stuff for regular conditions, but the, when the conditions are not regular, maybe, um, uh, the guys are able to invent something super special, but even in regular condition, because that day was regular condition. They're able to invent new routes that finally, uh, you know, from the dogma we have, everybody has, you know, more or less dogma. You are not really ready in your mind to break the dogma and invent this type of solution to get from one place to another one, pretty much they stayed on the line, which shows, you know, uh, strategically, well, when you, in terms of out of flying in the Pyrenees, that was kind of super weird.
And they stayed on the line, shortest line, you know, from one point to another one. And finally they, they managed to achieve, you know, the, the task to reach the goal. I mean, the place they wanted to reach and following this line was for me, at least, you know, really amazing. But Pierre, he did another route, more classic, and finally got to the place, um, not so long. I wouldn't say what they did was crazily efficient because finally at the end, Pierre got to, um, Arbas just a little bit after them. And at the Peña Montaneza, he had at least, you know, six kilometers, you know, behind. So I wouldn't say what they did was, uh, just, uh, mega efficient.
And then they put everybody, you know, back in the wind, but however it worked and that's already is quite amazing. This is basically, um, my opinion.
I don't remember Menuh if it was day five or six, but I was watching and pretty much that was the day that was supposed to be 70 kilometers an hour wind. At the top of the peaks, really, really, really strong Southwest. And when I, I just got on and watched a few times and, and everyone was on the ground, uh, Maxime and, and Chrigel were quite close to one another. They had kind of taken a different route the night before, but they were pretty close to one another hiking up in the Alpine. And then the next time I refreshed Pierre was in the air and, and got way out in front of those guys. And he just, and I was watching his speeds and they were fast. But they weren't too crazy. You know, I was seeing a lot of, you know, 55 K an hour, 60 K an hour.
So it seemed like it wasn't too rowdy, but was that a scary flight? Was that because the forecast that day looked pretty unflyable. It looked really, really strong. And I would have thought it would have been pretty scary. The nice thing is he had a little bit of tailwind. And so, but he made a move there that, uh, that was, was incredible. And it looked to me like. He was in a position that he could win the race. You know, the, at the end, it was the very, the end of the day, those guys didn't fly the, at the end of the day. And, and Pierre got, got quite a ways out ahead.
Yeah, that's that day was a pretty incredible, the strong wind day was the day before. In fact, that the day where Chrigel took off from, uh, from, uh, from peak to midi. Well, Pierre also took off and Maxim took off, but, um, Chrigel was the first to take off. And it was kind of hairy the, the day after this is the day we did that special move and I'm so surprised for me, it's just, you know, um, uh, something I don't understand how, um, uh, Chrigel did not see it for me. It's maybe, uh, um, you know, Chrigel doesn't make many mistakes, but I think that they did a mistake for sure.
And, um, and, uh, for me, it was. Yeah. Very sure it wouldn't be flyable around 3000 meter because the forecast, as you say, was 60, 70 kilometer per hour. And the situation for forecasting was not really comfortable because we had two, uh, fronts, you know, passing, you know, the first days it was very unstable. All the models, they were saying something different and we were, uh, spending our time to find a good model for. Yeah. You know, the day X day, you know, have the good model and I had to use three different models during the race. I didn't use the same model, you know, for the wind and the same model for the instability, because, you know, one model was better for instability, another one, and it changed, you know, during the race.
So that was really a hard work to be on the good model to make the forecast that day. I was pretty sure, um, taking the route, uh, trigger took, he wouldn't fly. And I was pretty sure going to. Yeah. We would fly and I had absolutely no doubt about it because the day before the wind was stronger and one guy of the X-Pyr, he passed by, which was really late, you know, he passed by Castellon and he flew. And I had also report, you know, from the schools in Castellon that the conditions were quite strong, but flyable, I would, I would say not flyable for students of the school, but flyable for athletes, you know, and this is basically one guy. I think I don't remember his name. Maybe a Spanish guy or, but he took off, you know, in Castellon and he flew a bit, you know, in direction of South guard, you know, to come back to France at the moment, you know, um, the leading, the lead of the comps was going the other way, you know, I, he was trying to go to, I would say, um, our bus and the guys that were coming, you know, from back, you know, from, uh, peak to midi.
So basically I was pretty sure it would be flyable, but there is a little, very special phenomenon that happens in Castellon. Is that when you have Southwest wind in Castellon is Southeast, not for long, you know, as soon as you fly a little bit, then you are again in the Southwest flow, but in the lower layer, it was super clear in the air grams that below 2000 meter, the wind was not too strong. And we have also, I would say a wind, wind, uh, central, you know, a wind weather station, uh, at 2400 meter, you know, on top of Castellon. And I had the, you know, the history of that station, I was looking at the history and I know this, um, weather station is a venturi.
So when we have South wind, it always, you know, uh, over rate, you know, the wind and I knew it, it, it, it was flyable for Pierre, you know, the day before. And so that day, even, even more flyable because the wind was, uh, was, uh, forecasted weaker, uh, but at 3000 meter, it was super strong for sure. And when I saw Krigel go. Going in direction of Gourblanc, then I said, wow, that's our chance, you know? And at that moment, you're, it's always so complicated to take the decision because you have Krigel going one way, you have Maxime following another route, but finally the same strategy. And you say to the guys, okay, we'll do something totally different. And then the guys are like, Hey, are you sure?
But yeah, we did it. It worked. And at the end of the day, we had, uh, 30, three kilometers. We were, um, I would say in the morning, we were probably five hours or six, you know, behind Krigel. And at the end of the day, we were 33 kilometer in front of him. And, and he walked crazy. Um, I, I measured what he walked. That was like from hell, you know, I think he made more than 4,000 meter, you know, uh, positive and maybe 4,500 meter, you know, uh, going down. And. Um, and we walked just 2,000 meter. So, and the number of kilometers, not, not even mentioning the numbers of kilometers. And at the end of the day, when Maxime was more or less catching up with him, I watch, and he was still climbing at 1,000 meter per hour.
You know, after that long walk, I was just like, what a machine, you know, and Pierre was so happy to do all that route, you know, flying and he validated, you know, the stuff. And we were so happy to have 33 kilometer to be 33 kilometer in the front, but I was pretty sure he wouldn't last much because, um, they were sleeping high. The Southwest wind was quite strong. I really believe they could take off early and, and fly in our direction kind of far away, but I never imagined they would get to Torre del Ori that high, you know, I really believe maybe. They land, you know, at the foot of Torre del Ori, and maybe they have to walk up 1,700 meter or, you know, to get to the takeoff.
But actually that was crazy because, um, Krigel and Maxime, they manage, you know, to soar the mountain, then there is a big valley to pass. They arrived on the mountain, they managed to climb a little bit. And then if you look with a glide ratio of 12, you know, from that mountain, you arrive at the foot. And. They arrived almost at the top, you know, and when they arrive at the place, Pierre was finally, they couldn't climb. They had to land and walk. So it was impossible for Pierre to take off early. If he would have taken off early, he would have bombed out and then you lose everything, you know? So basically I was kind of happy, uh, that he landed at the bottom of that mountain the day before.
So he had to walk up the mountain because if he landed at the top, um, he would have say, okay. I go, I go, I couldn't have kept him here. So that was good to have him, you know, walk a while, not to arrive too early on the top. And when he arrived there, he looked at the condition. He said to me, yeah, you know, um, it's not too good for the moment. And we knew the guys already took off. They were arriving. I said, okay, let's wait and let's fly with them. Anyways, if we, if we go alone, uh, we just take the risk to bomb out. And anyways, they, we catch up with us, you know, later. And. And it was also the problem of the CTR, the airspace of, uh, you know, which, um, makes you need to go in the back. So if you don't have a minimum of instability and, uh, you cannot go.
My forecast was the instability was, would be good around, uh, 10, 30, 11. And in fact, they managed to escape at 10, but it was like 30 minutes before, but they managed, you know, to climb just a little bit. Playing the game, the tree together, they managed to do it one, one pilot alone on my opinion, even at, uh, 10 would have been super complicated to reach, you know, the mountain range in the back and keep on going. Pass by, you know, on door and finally they nailed the turn point super early. It was, I don't remember 1230 or something like this. And that was, uh, really, uh, amazing. You know, how they managed to, uh,
Manu, what was the, uh, what were the different roles on your team? It sounds like you were in charge of the weather, but you said there's three supporters. Is that right? And how, how did you, because the, it sounds like the team came together kind of late and was improvised. Um, you know, I know how much goes in, you know, there's a lot to do when you're supporting an athlete. Um, how did you divvy it up? Who was doing what? And, and what would you maybe change if you had the opportunity? To do it again?
Um, what I would, well, the, the team was, uh, four people in total with Pierre and three people, two guys, they were on the field with him. Okay. Um, the two guys on the field, they were quite strong, you know, in running and, uh, and, uh, working in the mountains or on the flat. Also, one was more specialist of, uh, flat and the other one, uh, is really comfortable. You know, in the mountains, climbing mountains, you know, he's, uh, quite strong. Um, and so basically they would switch, you know, all the time, but Pierre barely got alone, you know, um, to walk.
They were, you know, all the time, you know, supporting him on the field. And that was good for the mantle of Pierre to have one guy, you know, running with him almost all the time. Um, my job, uh, initially was. To provide a weather forecast in the morning and another one at night. But finally I was in front of my computer from 5 AM to midnight because, um, uh, the situation was so complicated. So unstable that it was, um, really important sometimes to update information during the day. And, um, finally it happened that I was giving also that was also in the deal at the beginning. I had to give, uh, my. My opinion on the strategy.
Uh, so, um, at the beginning I was just, you know, giving an overlook and at the end I was a little bit more, uh, I mean, uh, present, you know, on the strategy. Um, but, um, what we would change, I think in terms of team, we would just change nothing because that was, uh, excellent team. Uh, Pierre was, uh, super ready physically. Um, the two guys on the. They did an incredible job. Um, that's, uh, Nicola and, uh, Matthew. And, uh, finally I didn't do too bad, you know, on the strategy and the weather forecasting. So we did quite a good job together. Um, maybe we could. Just, you know, like there was some communication problem, you know, localization problem, uh, we should, uh, work on.
And also I just realized, um, talking. We. Um, some friends of mine, like Antoine Girard, that they have developed a full set of tools, you know, to figure out what is the best way to take, if it's flyable, just glide down, or if it's not flyable, you need to walk all the way, you know, blah, blah, blah. And so this would have eased clearly my working load. And I, I really believe, you know, like we were absolutely not ready. You know, on this, uh, type of, uh, uh, model, and we have a huge, um, progression, uh, on this, on this field.
Uh, but, you know, basically at the end, you just realize that everything finally, um, comes sometimes just on, uh, luck, good luck, bad luck, you know, maybe I don't think when we went to, uh, Castellon, we had luck. I don't. I don't believe this, but probably when on day three, we decided to choose the east face and the fact that Pierre managed to climb again, you know, on the Koyerada, this was probably luck, you know, when, uh, Krigel and Pierre together, they crossed the Cerdagne and they make a low save 80 meter for Pierre. So this is sometimes, you know, luck and, you know, talent, of course.
You know, but, uh, sometimes you're grounded and decision, you're a little bit too much on the right, on the left hand, you're grounded. And so basically this is it. The fact that, you know, at the end, you know, this epic, uh, conclusion we had, you know, uh, with, um, you know, the three guys, you know, and what happened on the Kenny guru and everything. So sometimes, you know, you put a lot of things, you know, together and, uh, it relies more on being at the right place at the right moment. And sometimes. It's just a question of luck. You know, sometimes you're late and you arrive somewhere and poof, it works. And so, and you know, that's, uh, but in terms of, um, improvement, we have a large room improvement on the tools. I believe the team itself was, uh, naturally ready and, uh, it works super well, you know, in the field and they had a super good time together.
They enjoy it. And me behind my computer, I had also, you know, uh, kind of fun. So we enjoy it, you know? Yeah. Adventure. There is also the point you mentioned before. Yeah. You, you asked me, uh, how important is it to know, you know, the mountain range. In fact, Pierre doesn't know very well, the whole mountain range when he flies, he always flies from our Valley. Of course, you know, um, a few weeks before the expir, he flew 200 kilometers, you know, um, I say a triangle, you know, 200 kilometers in the North face of the Pyrenees, which was never done before, but he didn't do it with, um, the, um, he, he did it with the X one, you know, and with these heavy harness, with this comp gear, you know, so basically, um, the place he knows very well is something like from our place, 50 kilometers to the West.
And, uh, let's say 100 kilometer to 80 kilometer to the, um, well, 50 to the West. and I would say something like 100 to the east. But he hardly flies in Spain. Maybe he had a comp, you know, sometimes in Castellon, but that was not really a place he knows. But something he, maybe a room of improvement, I don't know, I should discuss this with him, is fly more maybe with the specific gear he use. I don't know, maybe this could help also, but he had very little flying time, airtime with the specific gear he use, you know, for this comp.
He flew the climber, I understand. And then what harness did he fly?
It was a specific harness from Cortel, a pro harness for this type of comp.
Yeah, that's what I used in the last race as well, the Glebe Pro. And then, well, do you think he'll, does he have his eyes on the X-Alps? Will that be something he'll do in the future?
We have a meeting Monday to, to make kind of a debrief of the adventure and discuss a little bit all those topics and see, you know, what else. I know he loves the Pyrenees. Discussing at the end of the race with the other guys, many of them, they said, the X-Alps is less demanding, you know, like what we did in this X-Pyr, you know. And so, I don't know. We'll see. I think everything is open, but that's, that was tough, you know. The two first days, they were super tough and it impacted a lot, you know, the rest of the race, starting with two days where you barely fly.
I mean, the second day, I mean, they just made maybe one glide. That's, that's kind of tough and it's very specific training you must do on, on the flat, on the, on, on the, you know, on the road, which I'm not sure Pierre, actually did, you know. And so, basically, that was kind of tough, but many guys said, okay, you know, X-Alps, you have, you have to start, you know, one hour earlier. You have to end, you know, one hour later, but finally, you always manage to fly somehow and, and it's less hard, you know, like this one, I don't know, but we'll discuss that for sure, Monday.
Did
you have, you know, on our first show, you and I talked a lot about all the guiding you do and teaching and you've been at this game an awfully long time. Did you find it personally stressful to see what these guys are, are flying in and what they're, you know, in, in the weather conditions they're flying in and did you find it, I don't know, did, is it, is it nerve wracking to see because it's a totally different kind of, you know, like you said, they're flying days that normally you'd go play pool. You're not, you wouldn't be in the air and they're doing it over and over and over again. I mean, it's, it's, it's quite intense. That
was extremely stressful for several reasons. The first reason is that you give advices and you don't pay yourself the mistakes and you have in front of you a guy that has been training for three or four years and, and he's ready for that and if you make a mistake he's not too good. So this was one first part. The second reason is stressful is that you need to make a mix between decision you would take for the best flying and decision you take to keep a strategic position in, in the race. When you have, I would say, Maxime, you are playing the game, you know, with Kruger, Galland, Maxime, you don't want to make a move where you will see them, you know, fly away and from the third place maybe you end up 10 or whatever.
So you can, as we did, you know, start at the rank, you know, six or seven and end up first but you can also start at the place of second and end up 10, you know, so basically this is a big stress about that and then the third point that was really stressful for me, but it's very personal is that a month before I was helping a friend to fly an incredible BV flight adventure in Peru and unfortunately he had an accident and he died and so I was kind of nervous to, I have, I am very, very confident in Pierre's skills, abilities.
It's incredible pilot but I know that in a race, you know, people can take risks that are, you know, different than what they would do, you know, normally because the pressure, because the team, because they want, you know, to achieve something and all my briefings, they were ending the quiz, okay, keep it safe. So that was like my primary concern, you know, have fun and keep safe and of course, you know, the flying day at Pic du Midi was a little bit borderline on my mind and my opinion, you know, for everybody, you know, that flew but that's my vision, my vision of, with my level of pilot and of course, I'm not in their place. It's difficult, you know, to judge this but that was actually giving me, of course, you know, a certain level of pressure also.
So three, three reasons why I was kind of nervous on this, on this race and, and I want to say a big hello to Henry that had, you know, this accident in the, in Peru and yeah, that's like that. He didn't make any mistake, just gotten lucky and so that's also the bad side of paragliding.
Yeah, of course and of course, we're, you know, we're, we're talking about Antoine's partner in Peru and, and then, you know, another very famous X-Alps pilot, Nick Neynens, very recently had a, had a terrible accident and he was supposed to be in the X-Pyr and, you know, it is something a part of this sport that just keeps raining down on us, doesn't it? It's not something you can really escape but, Manu, I'd love to talk to you. We're going to talk about the dramatic end while we still have a hopefully decent connection here but, I also wanted to ask you about philosophy of kind of Pierre and what it was like, you know, in seven days you experienced as an athlete a lot of ups and downs and the physical hardship and everything else and, you know, we have, I've spent quite a bit of time with Chrigel and with Maxime and they're very different.
Their approach is, Kriegel's is famously very Swiss. He doesn't get too distraught. He stays pretty positive. He always really looks like he's having a lot of fun. You know, Kriegel's just always looks like he's having a good time whereas Maxime can be and he would be the first to admit this that he's, he can be pretty pretty emotional and, you know, he gets pretty upset and, you know, just a little bit more maybe goes to the extremes more and I'd love to just hear what's Pierre like? What is the kind of the philosophy of the team? Is it very much, is it really serious? Is it really fun? And what do you think in the end works and what worked for your team? Because you did incredibly well.
On Pierre, I think, with Pierre, you know, Pierre works that way. You know, at the beginning of a project, he just, you know, tried to set up where he wants to arrive, you know, and he will just do what he can do, you know, to arrive there. But it's, don't forget that it was a first, a first try. You know, it was the very first try. We never trained before. We never went, you know, one weekend, you know, together, you know, to, to train or do something. The first day they really did something together was the first day of the comp. So basically, we were kind of relaxed. And, as you, you were talking about philosophy and this is exactly what I was asking regularly to Pierre, you know, like, what is your philosophy?
Because basically in every decision you take, you can either say, okay, I am a gambler and I like to try something and maybe, maybe become first or I am, I want to secure my position. So basically, in terms of strategy, it's really like, what, what is your mood? What do you have in mind? And, and during the race, the mood of Pierre could have changed, you know, a couple of times, you know, in this matter. And so I was always asking him before to propose him some options, you know, in what, what was his, his, his mood, you know, like, do you want to try something or do you want to secure your position? Therefore, as it was a first comp like this, I don't think,
Pierre, he had a goal to arrive, you know, in the, I would say, the five, 10 first guys, you know. So basically, when he realized he was able to play, you know, in this, in this group, you know, of the 10 first guys, he was, he was kind of happy. And then when we made, you know, like a couple of interesting move and finally, we, we were really, you know, in the lead, then came the questions, you know, about, you know, what do you want to do with that? You know, do we want to secure your position and, or do you want to try something? And this is exactly, finally, what, what happened at the end, you know, at one moment when we arrived close to Kanigu, I had the strong feeling that we had to let
Chrigel go alone and walk six, seven kilometers, eight hundred meters, you know, up to take off on the south side of the mountain. And this was at Col de Mante and Col de Mante a little bit before, you know, Kanigu. And actually by chance, you know, it happens that Pierre landed at this call. And I was like, at that moment, I was really focused on, I should tell him to land here and go past this mountain on foot. And take off on the other side. I was not sure it was very takeoffable. I was not sure, you know, he would get, you know,
super good conditions. However, my soundings were telling me they had, you know, like 500 meters more ceiling and more, you know, instability on the other side of that mountain than going on the north side of, of the Kanigu. And at that time, you're second, you have Chrigel just a little bit in front. You have, you have Maxim in the back and it's so hard, you know, to take a decision that would be totally different. And so that was once again, the question, you know, what do you want to do? And at that time, I think you must be super strong to take this type of decision, believe a lot in, in your, in, in yourself, you know, to try that. And that's, that's the whole difficulty of this type of phrase, you know, and you're convinced of something.
It's not the same situation. For instance, when Pierre is in Val Louron in front, you have Chrigel and Maxim, the guys in the back, they are fairly far away and you take another option. You know that if it works, you beat everybody, but if you lose, you don't lose that much. And in this situation, you are in second, you know, that, you know, maybe you're lucky and you finish first and would you take a specific option? You know, when you have Chrigel in front of you and the terrain is not the terrain of Chrigel. It's not like if he's flying in his garden, but you're not flying in your garden either. Meaning, um, so then we hardly go fly there. I mean, I flew there, you know, a long time ago, but, um, this is all the memories I have. Pierre doesn't have a tough knowledge, a strong knowledge of this area.
And specifically, you know, arriving on the Canigou and like this, usually when you go flying in Sarda and you fly your own former, you don't go, you know, that direction too much. So basically this was, an unknown terrain, the excellent cross country pilot of former they regularly go to Sarah and to the sea. Um, it's not, not so often either, but we didn't have the knowledge. And so at that moment we decided, you know, to, to follow, to follow Chrigel. And then Maxime arrived, he got a little bit better thermal. He arrived a little bit higher, you know, on that reach of the Canigou and he managed to climb, you know, on this reach, which ends up in a circus that is totally close with the summits at 2,700 meter.
And that was like, so oddly he could pass. And then we saw him climb and pass. And we are just like, what?
And at that moment, um, Kriegeli had such an incredible decision to land in the such a nasty place. Uh, climb like a goat, you know, super fast and pier did the same, but he landed a little bit lower. It was a little bit more complicated to escape from the place he was and the, and yeah, that was the move of Chrigel was like, uh, he's ready to anything, you know, he has the mirrors on, he knows was what's going on in his back, you know? And as soon as, uh, um, Maxime, uh, picked up altitude, then, uh, Kriegeli knew what he had to do, you know, and, uh, what he had to do was pretty wide and pier did the same and, but, um, he did it and, and, and that's it.
And then at that moment, probably I would say, um, um, Maxime got lucky. And then a little bit later, he got lucky and Chrigel got lucky. But finally, you know, um, what you need is to be a little bit in the front at the moment you cross the finish line. And that's what, uh, Chrigel managed to do. I would say as usual, but this time maybe had a little bit more entertainment than, than other times because, um, Maxime was really hot and Pierre was hot too, you know? So,
yeah, that last day was, was just, it was a roller coaster, right? You know, Pierre started the day off ahead and then Maxime and Chrigel flew together and they, they caught him up, like you said, and, and, uh, and then it just looked like Maxime had it, you know, it was, it was, the race was over. Maxime won. And then, and, and suddenly Chrigel flies over his head and flies within three kilometers of the final turn point and wins the race. And the first thing I said to my friend, Ben, who supported me in all my races was, ah, he's so it's incredible. He did it again. It's so lucky. And he said, it's not luck. It's Chrigel. He does this every time. And, and, uh, you know, I,
as I understood it, he and Maxime were basically flying together and, and he, like you said, he, he stuffed it into this really tough place and climbed up higher into better air and then, and then jumped him in the air. And, but how do you know to do that? How did he, how did he have that in his mind to, I mean, were the, were the signs obvious or was this just Chrigel being an Eagle?
No, he didn't really had better air. Um, what happened is that when they arrived on that reach of the Kenny goo, we all knew that would be cool, you know, to get on the little South face and climb there and pass, you know, like Maxim did Chrigel and pierce, they were in the front, but they never managed. They worked a while, you know, on this reach to try to, uh, get on the South face and they knew they need, they, they want to do this, you know, as the other option was to fly around, the North face of Kenny goo. And we know it's possible, but it's long and it's oddly because you, you get low, you know, all the time. It's a little bit complicated, tricky, but that was, you know, the, the option, if you cannot climb there.
So they arrived there, says, try to climb. It doesn't work. So they say, okay, we start to go on the North face. At this moment, Maxim arrived just a little bit higher because he had the chance to have a terminal that climbed a little bit higher before arrive on this reach. And he climbs directly boom. And so at that moment, it was quite obvious that if you go on the top of the mountain and you take off on that South face, you will climb also. Okay. So this is, uh, for, uh, trigger that was crystal clear. So this is what he did. He learned, you know, in this nasty place, climbed the mountain 400 meter take off in another nasty place and get, you know, to 2,700 meters, 650, like did the, uh, exactly.
Like did Maxim and pretty much takes the same route. Like Maxim, he follows Maxim. Then they had to cross a big Valley. So this is the Valley of, uh, Emily labor, which the flank site of Sarah and Maximi got to Sarah probably, I would say 20 minutes before a trigger or maybe half an hour. I don't, I cannot be, uh, you know, exact on this. And when Maxim arrived on Sarah, he will climb. He climbed on the mountain, rich one five, and he has the goal at 30 kilometer with a light, uh, South wind, you know, against if it's flying into the wind to get to the goal. And so he's a one five and he knows it's not enough. Definitely. So he wait, he walked the place. He gets to one, five, one, four, one, five, one, four, one, three,
one, three 50. And at this moment he says, okay, if I wait more, I will end up at 1,000 meter, you know, on the mountain. And he goes, Chrigel arrive later on in the very same place. Okay. He gets a little bit more altitude when, when Maxim went, you know, um, finally finds nothing. Well, he'd find a little bubble, you know, and it just pass, you know, the highway and he's on the ground and Chrigel strategically, he knows that he's behind. So strategically, there is no hurry. Pierre is far in the back. He has a Maxim in front of him. If he goes for glide, maybe for sure, he gets to Maxim, you know, a little bit behind him.
And then he has to race like crazy, maybe beat him, you know, uh, on the running. But, uh, Maxim is quite good in running too, you know? So basically it's not sure I will get him. So he wait, he wait, he wait. And then at one moment he goes, he has a little bit more altitude than Maxim. Maybe he has like a 200 meter more. And I, my opinion series, uh, North wind, passing the little call where you have the highway that is entering, you know, the South face. And when Maxim, he went a little bit lower, then he got pretty much caught in this, uh, North, uh, airflow and, um, and, and, and, and Chrigel basically he flew above that too.
This is my understanding. And I discuss this with, uh, um, some, some guys that are still in the air, specialists of the area. And they quite believe this is what happened is that, you know, Chrigel for some luck understanding. I don't know of the situation look, because finally he got it managed, you know, to, to, to leave the mountain higher than, uh, than, uh, Maxim, what could have done Maxim? I could have waited there, you know, he could have waited there, you know, and say, okay, I wait, I wait. But the risk is that finally, you know, um, he doesn't find the terminal anymore. You know, it was not a super active, you know, at that moment. And then he's also landed there. So, uh, he's his decision and my opinion was not bad.
It's difficult to take another decision when you are half an hour in front of, uh, the followers and you don't make it again to your ceiling and you spend already a while, you know, trying to make it and you're just like, okay, he's not going to come again. I go, you know, before, before it's too late. So this is the decision in took obviously was wrong because when a critical arrived, he managed to climb a higher and, and finally passed above the highway and then he found another one. And that was the game was over at that moment. Maxim was on the ground. Uh, trigger was stumbling right above his head.
Uh, the life tracking was pretty much fucked at that time. And so, it was not so clear. I was looking at the life tracking and I reported to Pierre, Hey, Maxim and the trigger are landed, you know, on the other side of the highway. And then I looked a little bit more carefully and, and trigger was, um, 600 meter above the head of a maximum. And I said, I reported to Pierre, okay, no, no, no, it's not like that, you know? And unfortunately, um, Pierre did the same move. Finally, he climbed to the mountain. He took off on the south face. He managed to climb to, to two, six 50, you know, like the two other guys, but a little bit later when he got to Sarah, he couldn't at all climb. So probably, you know, like trigger arrive at the perfect moment where the conditions, they were just perfect.
So he could climb a little bit higher than Maxim did. And Pierre never managed to climb at all, you know? So it was just a window and, um, and, and that's it, you know? I mean, he, he got there. So, and he, he managed to climb higher. And then, um, when he passed in the flat, he got another thermal and then he landed, you know, close to the finish line. But, um, yeah, for Pierre, there was, we, we had big projects. I have, I had seen, you know, this movement of air, uh, turning around, um, um, you know, like the, the little cities they have in the flat. And so I say to Pierre, okay, we will go along the mountain along the, I'll bear, you know, uh, following the mountain before to go to the finish line.
So we had, we still had some plan, you know, not to finish first, but maybe to finish second, but it was not possible for Pierre to climb again, the conditions they were dead at the time he arrived. But that was just, I would say maybe 40 minutes after Chrigel, something like this. And it was for him just impossible to climb. So that's, um,
well, as I always say to the guys, you know, they fly, that fly in my, my cross country class. Um, when a guy got lucky, no, all the time, maybe it's not luck, you know, so maybe in our mind, you know, he's luck, but, um, maybe for him, it's not luck, you know, I mean, he, that's what, what your, your supporters say is it's true, you know, at the end Chrigel won, you know, so basically we can analyze the stuff and say, okay, um, they went to the same place. My team got little bit lower. Pierre, couldn't climb and Chrigel arrive at the moment between them. And he was able to climb higher and then it happened super good for him. But you know, that's, uh,
that's, um, I don't know. Yeah. I, I have a doubt, you know, about the luck and stuff like this. Maxime would have been even a little bit more late doing the same move. Pierre and Chrigel would have been further, you know, in the North face. And then there would have been probably no way they catch with him. You know? So it's some time the point of being timing at the right place at the right moment. When Maxime arrived on the Canigou, he arrived exactly at the right moment at the right altitude to climb. And the two other guys, they were not exactly at the good altitude and not certainly at the right moment. So, well, moment, maybe not, but altitude. And then for me, I still have this question in my mind.
If we had landed at called the Monte, and if we had walked, you know, one hour to take off, you know, on the other side, what would have happened, you know? And so that's always, you know, a question we want, we will never have, you know, the answer because it will be impossible virtually to repeat the situation.
Yeah. Those, those questions live with you forever. There's always the, what ifs of all the races I've done in the X ops, there's always a 2015. If I'd only done that in 2017, 17, I'd only done that. And yeah, it's a, it's just part of the, part of the fun and part of the adventure. Well, menu, thanks for sharing your story. You guys rocked it. It was very impressive. And, and you're even out in the lead there for a while. I thought you guys had it, but nice work and a big hug to Pierre and looking forward to racing with them here soon. And congratulations, but thanks for sharing this, this cool adventure you guys had with us. Thank
you, Gavin, for having me on the show. And that was a pleasure. To show this and yeah, we are quite happy to have put, you know, some fun in the, in the race. And the fact that finally the last day Simon arrived later and, you know, flew, you know, midday, you know, while Pierre was working, put us enough pressure to be super happy to be served because the same thing could, well, I'm not sure, you know, because the south wind was stronger, but we never know, you know, man, Simon, could have, you know, passed above the head of Pierre while he was working on the flat. So we were definitely all the team, super happy to be served, you know, on the podium because that was kind of hot, you know, behind.
Yeah, that was that in Simon can never be counted out either. He also had a great race, but yeah, for rookies going into such a hard event, you guys really crushed it. Very impressive. Thank you so much. Thanks buddy. If you find the cloud-based mayhem valuable, you can support it in a lot of different ways. You can give us a rating on iTunes or stitcher. However, you get your podcast that goes a long ways and help spread the word. You can blog about it on your own website or share it on social media. You can talk about it on the way out to launch with your pilot friends. I know a lot of interesting conversations have happened that way. And of course you can support us financially. This show does take a lot of time, a lot of editing, a lot of storage and music and all kinds of behind the scenes cost. So if you can support us financially, all we've ever asked for is a buck a show.
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