Hi there, everybody. Welcome to another episode of Cloudbase Mayhem. Got another special walk and fly down memory lane with Aaron Durogati for you today. There's some incredible storytelling here. You're going to love it. Aaron and I just wrapped up the Superfinal down in Mexico and sat down before the awards and before his flight home to talk X-Alps. We wind it back to his first in 2013, where he had Chrigel in the sights for a little while. And then we go up through all of his campaigns through the last one in 2021 and talk about his preparation and what's going on for his next one in 2023. As you can hear the bells in the background, we recorded this sitting next to one another in his apartment last night.
And there is, we're in Mexico, there's music, so a little bit of background noise, but I think it's pretty good. It won't be too bad. Miles always does this wonderful job of cleaning things up, so yeah, enjoy these crazy stories. There's a lot of them, pretty, pretty entertaining stuff, and uh, yeah, don't try this at home. Cheers, Aaron.
Uh, neither one of us really crushed the Superfinal, but it's nice to see you here in Mexico, yeah.
Nice to see you too, uh, as I told you before, uh, this Superfinal, and it was not so good for me.
And after today's bomb out, I was really, really sad. And then I went for a hike and fly. And then during the hiking, I was pushing. And then when I was flying, I realized, okay, you don't have to be sad. Because you can't be like middle or so, so good. You are either good or really, really bad. And this time I was really, really bad. Well, no
one else can say they've won it twice. Twice win and then a fourth. Yeah, it was
twice first, one second, two times twice fourth, one time six, and then one hundred. And this time I think about 80 or 60. I don't know.
It's all or nothing with you, man.
Kind of. But anyway, it's sad. when when it comes to the low it's it's ugly it's
Ugly, yeah. There's always a point in these competitions where I think, "What the fuck am I doing? Why am I even here? Why am I wasting my time?" Then you win and you're like, "Yes, this is the best thing ever. I want, I want to do nothing but this." Exactly like this, yeah. It's, uh, it's like life; it has its ups and downs, yeah. So, uh, I got to see you maybe, at least that we talked about this, but we haven't talked about the podcast, I got to see you at the X Red Rocks coming off Pakistan and the Dolomiti and some phenomenal results this year. In my view, you're stronger than you've ever been. Um, I don't know physically, but you just seem like you're, you're really, uh, at a prime point, maybe not at the Superfinal, but, uh, you're going into, uh, your sixth X-Alps.
I think I have that right. And And you've talked before that the X-Ops has always been the one that you really haven't totally cracked the code. Now, in our perspective, you've done really well. But, you know, for sure, you're the kind of guy that wants to win. And we're going to kind of rewind the clock. And as we've done with a few others now, I'm calling it a walk and fly down memory lane in the X-Ops. So take us back to 2013, your first. How long had you been with Red Bull at that point?
It was just a year I entered in Red Bull. Okay, okay. And it was the year I won the first Superfinal in Rodanillo. In Rodanillo, yeah. And so I went into the race without having much experience in hike and fly race, but I was already physically quite strong. Yeah.
Flying-wise, I was for sure good, but definitely the hike and fly competition was something new for me. In a way, I feel a little bit the pressure of doing good because, you know, you come from being the World Cup winner and you go on the X-Alps.
Yeah, in the end I didn't do bad because I managed to reach Monaco and be, I think, seven in seven position. But I learned super a lot in that X-Alps. At the time was Renata, yeah, my supporter, which is basically my wife, and a very good friend of my Andra, which is now racing, yeah.
That's gonna be great.
and yeah we was completely lost we was really lost and it was at the time still, uh, uh, the time with no really, uh, good phones, smartphone. So the navigation was totally different. It was still on, on maps. So we navigate on maps and, uh, yeah, it was, it was probably the most adventure X-Alps I did since the 2013, it becomes for me more professional, more knowing knowing what's going on, what you can do better. And actually, I had really up and down in this race as I'm usually having on the X-Alps.
You know, I remember, not to butt in, but I watched that one. I was glued to it. So I was starting to think maybe 2015. And the first day, you and Chrigel flew so fast. I mean, that was where I think the whole world went, this guy can get him. And then he had that move off the Zugspitze. No,
it was before Zugspitze. So basically, he took off a little bit in front of my and we fly the Pinskau Valley, which is kind of highway. And I was flying good. I was flying quite fast. But then when it came to cross the Innsbruck Valley, going to the Karwendel, basically Chrigel managed to be like, I guess it was like 20, 30 minutes in front of my. And that just make the race because, uh, I had to land. I mean, I remember really, like, it was one minute ago, I had a blitz from a thunderstorm, maybe a couple of hundred meter next to me while flying, yeah.
And then, okay, I say, "Okay, fuck it, now I have to land." And Chrigel just went through this mortar before me, so probably wasn't that ugly, but for sure it was not also pretty, yeah. And yeah, and then basically he was again one day in front of us and was doing another race. He
Made that Zugspitz move the next morning, remember? He did that 30k, wasn't it? Off, uh, no, basically...
He was on the Zugspitz that evening. Did he take
off the morning, though I
Don't remember if he took off of in the morning or in the night, but anyway, we was in Innsbruck because then I was there as first but stuck, and the other came, and from there on you can go. So the pack get closer, then I remember I was, uh, yeah, it was super cool. I, I did a Zugspitze by, by hiking with Tommy with Coconair, yeah, and we arrive on top and we was, I mean, we was walking in the snow till the hips, and it was, we was totally destroyed, and we arrived up and we eat like french fries and wiener schnitzel and all these things, and till it was raining as well. And then I say, "Okay, fuck it, I will not walking down the Zugspitze, so I'm gonna fly whatever the weather is." And it was at least not a thunderstorm, but it was heavily raining, and so I say, at the time I was flying boomerang, and I tested, I was the test pilot of that glider.
I know it's flying also by wet and rain, so I took off and I remember While flying, I was totally wet, totally wet. It was like to be down a shower, and then I point like one ski slope on the direction I want to fly and I say myself, "Okay, don't touch the brake, don't touch nothing, just go on the full bar till one meter on the ground, and then you release yours, you're done." And like this it went. So I land safe on a like one third of a ski slope, and next by was a hut. So I was totally wet, the glider was wet, everything was wet, and I went into this hut which was closed, but the owner was there and he opened me. And, uh, and and I say, "Yeah, can I please try my stuff?" And he said, "What?
The why you are flying? What you are doing?" And I remember he helped me to, uh, upside down the glider and take out the water. I had liters of water in the glider, and yeah. And then when I walk up and then stop rain, and I did one more glide. And and then the next day, I did a super move. Uh, yeah, I was the only one making hortler, yep, by flying, and I was in second position again and like feeling good. I did really good, good flight and a strong day. And then again, the down, the day after I broke my glider and I was, yeah, I was second in the morning and in the evening I was 12 and like kind of 80, 90 kilometer behind the second.
So like really, really bad. And then took my my first night pass and remind us of the weather
Because the, that was the year Chrigel did it in like six days. It was, he kind of got out in front of you guys, got douched, yeah.
It was like, uh, like so so excited. It was not super good, not super bad for, yeah, for the back. Yeah, and then basically I remember I also took the night pass in Swiss and, uh, this, I, I walked the all night, really the all night. And the funny story of it, it was that I was, uh, hiking on the Alpenpass above Disentis. And, uh, it was like two, three in the morning and I was doing everything by my own. I was walking alone because, uh, the time I didn't have someone walking with me. So I was walking and I was super tired. And, and then I start to see down in the valley, some, I don't know, Some guys was there with some fire, and then in my brain like, this fire to walk, I don't know how it calls in English, and then basically in my brain, I don't know why I was so tired, I start to think those guys should be some satanic clip, and then I was super scared.
I was super tired. I start to run.
like at 2 or 3 in the morning, but what the fuck doing Swiss people around with fire in the night? That was super scary.
and then it goes on and on, and then I think two days after I did the biggest flight on of the of my X-Alps, I think I did a 240 kilometer flight. Yeah, and and that flight was really amazing because I was super tired, and I remember very well that by crossing
Verbier, I was falling asleep like the the old time, and like I really tried to kick myself and shout to to be awake and the old transition, but I managed to keep awake. And once I managed to get on a face, it was like I don't know any name, but it was a big mountain rocky face, so I was expecting strong thermal. I enter in the thermal and I was quite close to the to the cliff, like maximum a hundred meter next to it, then I fell asleep as you do.
So yeah, and then it goes on and on. I was completely lost in South of France, and then another funny thing happened. Was the the day before I managed to get in the goal, I was in the Isola Valley and it came a thunderstorm. So I managed somehow to land backwards, high up on 2000 meters on a mountain. And I'm thinking, okay, good. I'm going to wait here and we'll see. And I find a little hut, uh, of, uh, you're on the
French side of the French side
of, uh, shepherds. And, uh, I enter in this hut just to cover, I mean, to don't be down the rain and the thunderstorm, and I'm there chilling out, and and then I start to hear like dogs, and I think, "What the fuck?" And then it came like three, four dogs, like these uh sheep dogs, super angry on me, and I was thinking, "Okay, they're gonna eat me, they're gonna for sure eat me." And I was like basically on the inside the little hut, but it didn't have a door, and the dogs stay basically where the door should be, and they are barking on me, and I'm inside, and I'm just shaking, and there's nobody there. It's not no no one's house, yeah, yeah, it's like not even a house, yeah, okay.
And so I'm thinking, "Okay, they're gonna eat me for sure, they're gonna eat me, oh fuck." And and then like for sure this was like a couple of minutes situation, and then someone, I mean the shepherd, came and take out out the dogs, and it was not a shepherd man, but it was an old woman, like 70 plus, maybe even 80 years old, and she take out the dogs, and then we tried to communicate me in Italian and she in French, and and I was trying to explain that I came with a paraglider from Austria and
So yeah, that was 2013. How did you break your glider? Basically, I, I did my first flight and it was like a fun, fun day and, uh, it wasn't going so good, so I decided to land, but I was still high. Uh, I land, uh, two-thirds of the mountain, but it was really windy and gusty. I put down my glider, landed safe, but then I was close to a, a vent and then it comes a gas really strong and I wasn't able to, to, to put down my glider, so it dragged me a little bit. It went over the vent and it was this vent with the iron spine.
Oh, and, and it just an avalanche.
vent no
no the one for for the cows Oh man. Yeah. Barbed wires. Yeah. And then basically I had a huge hole and many little holes. And then what I did, I think, yeah, I fly down in the fern with this broken glider down the valley. And then with my supporter, we kind of stick it together. I didn't change the glider. I finished the X-Alps with that glider. Well, I think we use meters of ripstop and then I fly with it. Oh,
my gosh. Yeah, okay. So that's some good highs and lows. And that was the – no, what year did they start? You started at the – you didn't start at the Dachstein. No, no. I started always from Salzburg. Yeah, okay, okay. But you made it that year. And it's seventh.
Yeah, yeah,
yeah. Okay.
Yeah, yeah. The first six Alps, I made it to the Gorgia.
Okay. Okay. 2015.
Yeah, 2015. My first with you. Yeah. It was this super shitty day where we was together. Yeah. Yeah. That was the low. Super hot. Yeah. Oh, my God. Terrible. I
got to remind people. So Aaron and I, we walked off the Kimsey. Yeah. And remember, Gaspar flew a couple hours later and flew over all our heads. You had a pretty good day still, but I had a wicked bad day that day. Holy smokes. But you and I, we—we got to our—we did that little flight across the river, and we got with my supporters because yours weren't around. And, uh, you—you peeled the bottom of your feet off. It wasn't that day, it was later, later in the race. I saw some video where you—yeah, yeah, you literally peeled the bottom, but it was that day that screwed up our feet. Mine were completely toasted from that day. Remember you lost your—your Garmin thing? Yeah, yeah, that's the Garmin.
and it was no water They're super hot. Really hot. Yeah, really hot. That was terrible.
Okay, so was that the low of that race?
Yeah, that was the low. And about 2.15, I think it was the X-Alps with a lot of wind. A lot of wind. And I remember a kind of a high was like my flight from Chamonix. Basically, the day before, I pulled the night pass because I want to be in Chamonix the day after. But I managed to get on Chamonix by flying, basically. And so I decided to not use my night pass and I rest. So in the morning, I hike up like the classical... The Brenta. Yeah, the Brevant. Yeah, Brevant. And I took off there and it was the next term part.
It was Annecy. And that was straightforward. forward, like, I really like this area and I fly good. Make it to the to the turning point, ansi, and then I took off again. And I remember the forecast was really wind, but they say, "Yeah, maybe on the big, big mountain it will be kind of okay." But it was not really okay. I mean, it was, we was me, uh, Antoine and Gaspar flying together. Yeah, and I remember we always like, um, turn before for every phase and wait, like, flying backwards to get like the wave, flying backwards over the peak, and then turn again with the wind and go on. And we did this a couple of times.
And I remember I was on radio with my supporter, which was on the Galibier. And I asked how strong is the wind? And they told me, well, it's so strong that you don't have even to think about landing. landing, just keep on flying till midnight because it's no way to land nuking. So anyway, I passed the Galibier and at least you know when you are in the shit, if you are with someone else, it's you feel better. And anyway, we keep on going, keep on going, just the ugliest thing I had maybe overall, overall, it was that, uh, on one of those big phase, I did like I was doing before. So I turned myself, um, facing the wind flying backwards and waiting to climb on the phase, but I didn't climb basically.
So I came closer and closer and closer, and I was still not climbing and thinking, what the fuck I'm gonna crash into the phase. And so I'm there waiting and thinking, "What to do? What to do? What to do?" And when I get really close to it, then I get the lift, but it was just enough to pull me over the the peak and then down to the other side. And then I was in the lee side of this monster wind, facing towards Brianne zone and basically Italy, Italy. And I remember I was just saying myself, I want to go in Italy. I want to go in Italy.
Please, please, please. I want to survive.
And then after that, I called again my supporter, which by the way, they drive down towards Brianzone. And I say, please tell me, tell me how much is the wind I want to land. And they told me, No, no, no way! Forget it. You, you're gonna die. You want to kill yourself if you try to land here. Stay in the air. And I say, "But I don't want anymore, I really don't want."
Were you still with Antoine and Gaspard? No, there
We split out, and actually, it was Ondra as well, because at the time, yeah, the sporter could fly, and it was basically we was four of us. It was Andra, I don't know where he took off, I this, I can't remember, but anyway, he was also in that shit, and he got like a super ugly collapse, not really close to me. I saw him kind of behind me, I don't remember well, and I was thinking, I remember that I was praying for him to survive it, because it looks really, really ugly. I
Remember that story in Monaco? He was really scared too. Yeah, yeah, so he's a wicked acro pilot. Yeah, yeah, you guys were battling so
Yeah, 215 was also tough. I
Remember, one of my best memories from all the races was that year when we got to Monaco, and we were all at the campground that night, and my my feet were so mangled that I had a bunch of beers, and then I took a whole bunch of oxycodone, so I was really off my head just and and listening. We we were all sitting in that circle and just listen. And every single person had stories of, I had this really, I really thought I was going to die in Vars. I, I, I was, I didn't realize I was in, I didn't realize the position I was in and the Valley winds were just nuking. And, and so I, I land, I top landed just to try to figure out what was going on. And I relaunched and it was kind of the time of the day where I didn't know if I should be the East or the West. and I went on the west side, and I didn't, I was just completely hidden from the valley winds where I was.
It was nice and calm, and as soon as I got in the air, and I kept, and I would get up a little bit and get in the wind and just smack down and then push and smack down and push, and finally I got to the cold, and I thought, if I could just sweep through the cold to the to the windward side, I can get out of here. And I didn't make it through, and my instrument later showed a 20 meter down, and and I, you know, when it's when it's that strong down, you don't, you can't really. The glider wasn't collapsing, yeah, I couldn't really steer, but the only thing I was trying to do was just point for one of those little snow making lakes, so I could land in the lake and just survive. I thought my only chance is to land in the water, and when I landed, it was just, oh I couldn't believe I was alive. It was, and we were, so we were all telling these stories of of these near-death experiences.
And I thought, Jesus, this is really hardcore. Yeah, it is.
It is,
yeah. Was that the year you got washed out of the air by the helicopter too?
Let me think. Or maybe that was 2013. It was 13, yeah. It was 13. The Red Bull helicopter. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, that was also really ugly because I got this collapse. I mean, they was in front of my, on the wind side, not super close, but it has to be like the turbulence of the helicopter because basically I was close to the, close to the reach. And from nothing, it was even quite calm air, like the glider completely disappear. And I make 100, one 360 and on the second one, I managed to stop. And with the second one, I will crash into the mountain. So that was, yeah, that was sketchy.
Okay. And I think that was your year. I was also on the gin, on the boomerang. Yeah. Okay. Which one? The white and green. The first, we call it just boomerang. I mean, I think it was just calling boomerang.
Okay. It
was a white and green. And then in 250. No, no, it was a three-liner. Okay. At the time, it was the LM5 already, no, LM4. That's the Ozone. Yeah, yeah. Okay, yeah, yeah. The older guys were trying.
Didn't you have quite a good race at the end with those two guys? And then you made some mistake. In 2015. Were you quite close to Gaspard and Antoine at the end?
Yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly. Exactly, now I remember. Basically, we say, okay, we don't race till close to Monaco because we just want to survive, basically, the Isola Valley, which doesn't have landing and whatever. Because we took off together and we say, okay, let's agree. We try to bring ourselves in a safe place and then we keep on racing. But I think quite soon, it was a good day. And I wasn't pushing. I tried to stay with the other, but somehow I, I get in front and, yeah. And then, and then I was quite in front, so I say, "Okay, well, now I'm pushing." And then I push, push, push, and, yeah, I landed 18 kilometer from the finish from Monaco, and I was thinking, "Okay, I'm, I'm done." I'm going to be third because it was Chrigel and Sebastian Huber.
And then it was the year that they make it by flying.
Antoine and Gaspar and Paul, they all make it by flying. Okay. And I get there by walking. Yeah. Okay. Terrible. Yeah.
That's brutal. Yeah. And 18K 18K down there is longer than 18K. Yeah, yeah. It's a
nightmare. It's at least times four. Yeah, it's a long ways. And also with the navigation we had at the time, we was not so precise. So for sure, I did more than what it was necessary to do. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay.
2017, your knee. Yeah, 17, it
start okay with the prologue. And then already on the first day, I get problems on the knee. Was that where
the problems initiated? Or were you having problems with your knee before that?
No, I never had problems till that first day of the X-Alps. On the prologue, I didn't have nothing. I was running 1,000 vertical meters down, not feeling nothing. Ah, that's
right. That was the prologue. We didn't fly. And you ran down. And it got you and Benoit, a few others got pretty
hurt. Yeah, yeah, but well, the point was that I start to race with the legs quite tired. Yeah, that's for sure. And then on the first day, I was doing, I think, a 90 case of, yeah, running and walking, running and walking, and then it start this crazy pain and and till that day I never had knee problems, but it's also not that that day it was, I broke something. It was basically my life till that day, and that That was the drop too much. And then basically I was not able to walk anymore. So it was really interesting because I keep on race another four days, I think. And by know that I can't walk at all.
I mean, even just hiking up the mountain takes me like three, four hours, 4,000 vertical meter. I was really in pain. But then in the air, I was flying really good. And I was still like on the top five till, uh, till then I had to quit the race and I had to quit the race because, um, I did everything good, but then I had to walk. I really had, because it was this turn point in, um, uh, Kimse and I had to walk up one mountain and then I I fly down from that mountain, and by this hike, I get more inflamed. And then it came also the physiotherapist, which is working on the training center from Red Bull,
and he looked at a bit of me and said, look, it doesn't make sense you follow the race because somehow you have also to walk even just a little bit, but a little bit you will have to walk, and it's now too much. And so I quit the race. Yeah.
And then those knee problems stuck with you for a while.
Yeah, yeah. That was exactly the drop, a little bit too much. But as I say, it was not that I broke myself on the X-Alps. I mean, I'm a skier and I live my life fully. And even at the time I was 30, I had a knee already like 70 years old, the man. and since that, I was trying many, many things, actually everything, uh, to get better. I had to change a lot in my life. I have to change, uh, the training. I had to change many things I like to do. I didn't do it for a while, like of course running, but even like on skiing, I had to be really careful full.
I couldn't jump any cliff anymore. I stopped going with the longboard, which I like a lot downhill, of course, yeah. But then through the years, I kind of figured it out, and of course a lot of help of good people, specialists, and now I kind of find my balance. So I don't have a perfect knee that I know now, but with exercise and physiotherapy and stretching and exercise and things, now I can make it work. And so, yeah, I'm happy now, yeah.
Yeah, amazing that it came together, because I remember there was at one point we had a talk and either they were, they had said, "You know, this, this is, you're done with this." Yeah, that's
that's a very um interesting story because basically Basically, that year from Red Bull, they organized one of the most famous doctors in Austria for the knees, which surgery and they care about many workups here and I got an appointment to him and basically he watched my MRI and he watched not even five minutes on me, on my knee a little bit, and he asked me, "What I'm doing?" I say, "I'm a professional athlete and exhalts and I can fly and skiing and stuff," and he say, "Well, I think that was it."
Uh, he did, yeah. He said, "Whoa, really straight." Like, he told me, like, "That was it. Look for, uh, look for another job." Really, yeah, yeah. Whoa, I was the best one, and he was one of the best, yeah. Yeah. So, yeah, at the time I had a really big low. Yeah. It was really hard to get up again from this. Also because everything I like to do, it was getting not possible to do anymore. Like I wasn't able even to compete on normal paragliding competition because I was not able to push the speed bar anymore. More in the, in the very bad period of this story, I was really in pain.
I was like, from a zero to ten, I was constantly on five to six, so it was all the time. Like, I couldn't walk, uh, stairs, and I mean, I could walk, but with pain, and and I was in this loop of pain. I was tough, it was really tough, and and I was actually thinking that, I mean, it was a very realistic option that I'm going to make a prosthesis on the knee, which will mean, okay, it's over for being an athlete.
Yeah, right.
And then it was interesting because one of the doctors of the training center, which which is not a specialist of knees, he just said, okay, now let's give it one more try. We tried to do strength training and build up muscle. Even when you are in pain, you go through the pain. They gave me also some strong or middle strong painkiller to train. And I did that for three months. And really, I kind of, my pain becomes the half. Really? And then, and then it was step by step, like, I was still being between three, from zero to 10, about a three.
And then it takes one more year to be on two, one to two. And now, yeah, now I'm mostly basically since that, or after one year, I start to write every day. I really write every day what I do and how much pain I feel, so I can look back and and see, okay, this week I did so and so and so, this kind of stuff, and and the pain increase increase, so I know, okay, be careful, you have to take out these things or do less, and anyway, now Now in the last year, and that's for sure one of the reasons why the last hike and fly season was for me amazing, first of all, from the result, but also from the feeling, I was mostly between zero to one.
So it means I feel my knee, but it's not a handicap. Right.
It's just totally tolerable. Yeah. I've seen a lot of the videos you posted training in your garage, I think it's your garage. Yeah. And it's, it's the same stuff that Ben, I mean, I, I had knee pain for 20 something years. I've had nine knee surgeries and I have no cartilage in either knee. And, and he, when I decided I wanted to do the 2015 race, that was the biggest thing I could, I could barely walk off a curb. Sometimes I would walk off and it'd be fine. And sometimes I'd walk off and it would do this weird thing and it'd seize up and it was really painful. And he trained all the pain. I haven't had any pain since the first race because it was all the same stuff you're doing. It's all the strength training and mobility and stretching and rolling all the time. I just spend so much time doing that. And it was the strength training seemed to just solve it.
Yeah, yeah. It can compensate for all the joints. Everything I did, it helps a little bit. But because I have been also in the US, I get the injection there. I have been doing probably something like 50 plasma infiltration in my knee. where normal people does three in them life. Okay. I did about 50 probably. What is that? They take your blood. Okay. Oh, centrifugal. Yeah. Centrifugal. Yeah, that's, and then it, this blood split between plasma and something else, which I don't know. And then they take this plasma and they put it in the knee. Wow. This I did, I started doing it in Verona Corona, because after this famous doctor in Austria, I find the equivalent in Italy and I went to him and I say, well, these doctors say that, um, what do you think about?
And he say, no, you will raise. And so that's an easy choice. So I did a surgery as well, and and then he start with this plasma stuff, and then I keep on doing this plasma. I was in the in Australia on the training center of Red Bull, and yeah, what else? Um, yeah, I was thinking to go to Lord, uh, you know, Lord, no, it's where the mother of Jesus
Please, God, save my knee. Uh, that's great. Well, okay, so let's let's go to 2019 because in in many ways, uh, you know, from an outside perspective, 2019 was the race that I I was just blown away with what you did because we had that walk together, as we often do early in the race, and and you were telling telling me that, you know, your, your whole, you had a, an Alpinist supporter that year, you changed your team and you said, I'm not walking. I'm going to do the whole thing as an Alpinist. I'm going to camp high and I'm going to fly this whole damn thing. And you basically did. It was really a cool approach. And you told me at the end, you got to Monaco and you told me at the end, you walked 19 K or something on the road.
No, 40, 40. That's just unbelievable. I had I had a lot of days where I did more than that, just in a day on the road.
No, I did a really good X-Alps.
You know, the point was, I didn't know if I would be in the race one day, two days, three days. Every day was a gift because I didn't know what my knee will do. And definitely, I know that I can't push on him. I can do vertical meters. That I did a lot. Yeah. But even just walking, not running, running was not an option at all. Yeah. But even walking on the flat on asphalt was as well, not an option. And the only time I had to do it, it was to Santee there. And it was like a 21 kilometer push. And that was it. And then I did a couple of two kilometer here and three there and whatever. Right. There's
that great footage of you You're walking out of the Geisberg, you know, dead last. And then you were still one of the top to the top. I mean, as soon as you get to the hill, you're just a lightning bolt. But you
walked out
of the Geisberg.
Yeah, but more funny is like the prologue. Do you know the story of the prologue? I start the prologue and everyone is running away and I'm walking. So after one minute, I'm alone. Yeah. So I'm walking alone and I don't know where the path to go on the prologue start is. So I'm a little bit lost. And then some guys of the organization, so I mean, not he saw me, I asked him, where do I have to go? And he sent me basically to the cable car because he was thinking I'm not racing. I'm just like a tourist there, you know? So I'm getting to the cable car station and I say to another guys, where should I go now? Where is the path? And he said, "But are you an athlete?" I said, "Yeah, I'm yes." And he said, "But you are wrong, you can't take the cable car, you have to go the other way." I said, "What the fuck?
The other guys told me I have to go here." So I did. Like another kilometer more, and then I keep on walking all the asphalt street, and then we get finally on the ski slope, quite steep, and there I start to push, and I was, I think, six, seven, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
you beat me into the top I did that day
You fucker, yeah. Like, up here I'm strong, yeah. Just I couldn't walk on the flat, but um, I mean, I think I was really lucky because the weather of 219, it was the best weather weather we could have in the matter that it was never wind, and if it's gonna was raining, it was just some light rain. It was not thunderstorm.
anywhere anywhere
That year, anywhere you were, you could take off. I think that was the biggest luck I had to be in this situation with my need that I had to do this approach of not walking, but from the other side, having the weather, which give me the chance to do the race like I want to, yeah? And actually, till the very end, again, I was like fighting for, I think, second, third, third, or fourth place, something like this. And in the very end, I fuck it up like I'm normally doing, because I decided to take a route which didn't work, and and then, yeah, and then I had to walk you
told the story before actually.
Yeah, now I have a funny story about that night because, again, I didn't want to walk on the asphalt. Yeah, so Ellie, which was my supporter and she will be on the X-Alps next year as an athlete, I told her, "Yeah, make me a route where the shortest and it can be up, down, whatever." Anyway, I have like a strategy for the down because walking down was as well not an option for me. Really not even a hundred vertical meter. It was not an option. So I basically walk everything up and on the way down, I have crutches.
What? Yeah, we had in the camper, we had crutches.
That is awesome. I told it to my supporter, be careful with this. No one has to see them.
Okay, well, that was the year. You've already told the story of you were flying through Le Grave, which is one of the most beautiful places in the world. I also had an amazing flight through there. It was ODing and stuff, but at that point I didn't care anymore. But you were watching YouTube videos to stay awake. But do you have any more? Do you have a high from 2019 that you remember like that, that was really special?
I think that 2019, it was all in all like a good time. Like we often stopped early. One of the best place ever I stopped, it was on the Aravis. After the Mont Blanc, we stopped just below the Aravis. I mean, just below the cliffs on the plateau. And we slept there on the camper with the view of the Mont Blanc, like amazing. And basically, I was already on the takeoff, means I wake up like at 8.30. I wake up at 8.30. I had a massage from Tazio and I walk like 20 minutes and I was on the takeoff. Downside, that day was super stable.
So super stable. So normally, the arab is you don't do one turn, not not even one, you just stick on the on the face and you just fly straight to something there. And that day was like a sauna, yeah. It was like up and down and doing hike and fly like to get to something there. And in the very end, I had to walk this 20, 21 kilometer. I
had an experience there. I was a day behind you guys here. We, we Ben, Ben and I walked up to a perfect launch. I had three or four flights getting out of Chamonix and getting down to this place. And we were packing snow onto our balls and onto the back of our neck. It was so hot. And it was the same. It was 100 degrees in the valley and it was 100 degrees at the top of the mountain. It was incredible. I've never seen anything like that in the haze.
It was, I think, in the Saint-Hilaire Valley was about 40 degrees. And I remember that night I slept so bad. That's why it was the flight after was the one I was again falling asleep and I started to watch YouTube videos to stay awake because it was really super hot. It
was incredible. For me, that was the worst weather of all the X-Alps because it was just – we got to this launch at 3 p.m. It was perfect and I didn't get a single blip all the way to the valley floor and then I walked 40K to St. Hilaire. It was just torture. I landed and went, I can't believe I just did all that work. Yeah, yeah. It was a sauna. Oh, it was a sauna. Yeah, that was brutal. Okay, so 2021, the first time we don't go to Monaco. It's the out and back, and you were having one. You were really in there.
Yeah, in 2021, I was already good on my knee. Yeah. So, again, the strategy changed a bit because I could walk.
Who's your team?
Bruno, so this mountain guide, which would be my supporter. So on the next X-Alps, it was Eli, which would be an athlete on the X-Alps. That's pretty cool
that two of your supporters are going to be in it this year.
That's really cool. And then it was Daniele, which is a photographer, and it was Tazio. And it was the year of the Lamborghini. So my supporter was driving quite a fancy car.
I don't know if
You know this, but Tazio supported me in 2015 for a few days; it was great.
It was awesome, and yeah, the 2021, it started okay, like actually the very first day I was the beginning, very good, then kind of average. I spent the first night in a tent again, to be up, yeah, high, and then and keep on going, quite good towards Zugspitze. I think I was third, fourth, something like this. Then I had the first super ugly flight from the Zugspitze. I mean, not the Zugspitze, but Lermos. Yeah, there I was flying. I think it was the record of my speed. I had 110 kilometers an hour.
Jeez. And not in the stratosphere. No, no, it was not storm. It was just wind. Um, I was like 150 meter over the ground and I was flying 100 k's an hour, so that was quite sketchy um in the
Inn Valley. Yeah, yeah, okay.
And but there, I, I basically, it's this pass, Fern Pass, going down to the Inn Valley, and I fly this valley out, and this wind just pushed me out. But on the, the other side, you had a mountain. So again, I turned myself before the mountain, facing the wind, flying backwards, getting before the mountain, I was catapulted in this, in the stratosphere, and I remember that was also quite funny because at the beginning I was super low and I was scary, and then I was getting too high, I was scary as well.
And at the same time, when I'm there and climbing with four or five meter and not seeing an end of climbing, I'm seeing towards my home place, Merano, and I'm thinking, "What the fuck? Now I turn and I go home, I don't want anymore." But then, yeah, probably you see this video in the end, then when I landed in the valley flying backwards, it was quite a viral video of my flying backwards and blah, blah, blah. But I survived it. When I landed, I take like a 10 snooze and I say, what the fuck? Now I don't fly today for sure anymore. And I chill a bit and then I'm going to walk. Then the day after was one of the best day for me at the Static Salves.
I took off with the idea I'm going to do a hike and fly towards St. St. Anton, and it turns out that I land in Sweden.
You're trying to get to Santis? Yeah. Okay, yeah. Yeah, I was the
first to get in Santis, and I was the only one doing by flying. But when I took off, actually, it was funny. I really took off with nothing because I was thinking I'm going to just glide down. And I take off, and I had a thermal, so I, okay, let's make this thermal up a little bit. Then I go forward and another thermal. I'm thinking, okay, it's starting to be cold, but okay. I make that one too. So you've got no jacket. You've got nothing. Nothing. Just get your speech leaves. And then I'm going to St. Anton where I was supposed to walk there and taking off from there. And I'm passing St. Anton. I'm thinking, what the fuck? So I'm calling my supporter.
And I say, if I top land now here, can you bring me the stuff? Yeah, it's going to take two hours. And I say, oh, fuck. The day is too good.
So you just kept going. I keep on going. Actually, no. I have to say the truth. I top land because I had to shit.
And I took off. And then I keep on going, keep on going, keep on going. And I make it to the Santis. And I make it to the Santis. So
you thermaled all the way across the valley? Yeah, yeah, yeah. what early in the morning uh
yeah, it took off, I don't know, at nine in the morning, unbelievable. Yeah, yeah, and Krieger, Krieger, and Patrick was way in front of my, and they bombed going, I think, quite close to the centers and just make it by flying, and I'm thinking, okay, cool, and then exactly like Like I felt, okay, this is some bad karma now came because it was too good. So I'm making the sentence by air and I have a convergence line in the direction I have to go. So I'm thinking, wow, I just keep on going, keep on going. And I see like literally disappearing this convergence just in front of mine. So I'm going and bam, disappear.
I'm going to the next one, disappear. And the next one disappear and I'm on the ground. and then I'm starting to walk and Chrigel and Patrick take off and fly just above my hand and I'm thinking, "What the fuck?" And then, well, I, yeah, I keep on doing hike and fly because it was still early. And then I had the first very sketchy, sketchy in a way, sketchy situation that day with I basically miss an airspace, uh, I don't know how it calls this valley in Swiss by three meters. And I remember when I landed, I took off, I take a screenshot of the x-ray track just for me to double check because then, like, it was the same when I was 18 years old and I was in the school.
I was really bad at school, school. And when I did this to finish the school, you know, on the end of the high school, you have this big exam. Yeah. And in Italy, it's from zero to 160. You are you pass, you pass and 59. You don't pass 100. It's maximum. And I did this exam. And I managed to get at 60, like 60, not 61 and not 59, and I remember that it was still like three weeks after I was still asking to my friend, "Are you sure I make it? Are you sure I make it?" And so they took, like, they at the time it was not smartphone, so they take a copy of this, of this paper which was, was hanging on the school to show me, "Yeah, you take 60, you made it." The same team was with this airspace, basically I took off it.
was coming a thunderstorm, and it was starting to be late, and I say, "No, no, I will make it. I will make it. I don't want to sleep up here, you know." And so, uh, Ellie told me, "Don't take off, sleep up there. We come there, you will fly for sure into the airspace." And I say, "No, no, no, I will make it." So I'm taking off, being of course way too optimistic, and I get splashed down, and basically the the airspace, it's on the valley and touching a little bit the mountain, and I'm really splashed down, splash down, go down, go down, and in the very end, and I'm basically on the tree and the airspace, it's 100 meter, 90 meter, 50 meter, 10 meter.
And on the last corner where the airspace ends, I managed by two meters to get out of it. And landed? And landed in the valley in a field. So it was scary. But
you did hit airspace,
right? Later? That's later. Okay, so keep going.
Let's get to that. yeah
basically, then the day after start really bad. I was sick, super sick. I don't know what I got, but I basically vomit and I had diarrhea. I was really bad, and I had a long hike in front of my to a pass, uh, so I went super slow. Maxim overpass me, Patrick Krieger was already in front, um, got to this pass and there are you now. I don't know how it calls this pass, it's before Andermatt, okay.
So you're still, you're still going, you're still going, yeah?
Yeah, basically where Teo and Nicola crash, okay?
Okay, in that valley with all the cables, yeah, yeah, yeah, and
Now, I have the story of the cable, okay? So, basically, first of all, I have to say I was lucky, because because then it came like a storm and started to rain really hard. And so no one can do nothing. And so I was in the camper and taking some tea and tried to get better my stomach and then stopped rain. And I think I was with Benoit. Yeah, I was with Benoit. And we hiked like 50 meters over the pass. And basically in front of us, it was some little rain. And in front of us was totally cloud cover. over. And I had some turning point where to fly, basically where Patrick and Chrigel was a side valley. And I say, I would make it.
Maybe the thickness, it's not so big. I'm always quite optimistic. So I took off. And then with Benoit, and then we fly, fly, fly into this valley. And then it's one little hole between all the clouds and Benoit start start to spiral down and I think that's smart, but I'm not gonna do it
That's what I should do, but I'm not gonna do it, so
I keep on going, and then I realize, okay, I'm now in the shit. I'm totally in the fog. I don't see nothing, literally nothing, and I know that I'm in a narrow valley in the Swiss full of cable, and I'm thinking, okay, what can I do? So I start to look at my phone, and luckily I had internet connection, so I'm putting the no, actually not on my phone, but on my, well, on my phone, on the naviter application, the cu, yeah, and I'm starting, starting to put the satellite picture and looking for fields and press on it and see which glide ratio I need to get there. So I press one and it was too much, like 15 or 20.
So I press another one, I press another one, till I find one to glide ratio 9. I say, okay, this should be my one. And I'm flying totally blind, just looking at the Google Maps.
Okay, these nine should be good. So I'm following the arrow and I'm going, going, going, going, going, going, going, okay, I should be almost here. I landed what you
couldn't see the whole way to the ground.
And then, even worse, is that basically I land, I start to pack, I send my position, my guys make it super quickly there to me because there was a street going up, and we start to walk up, and little by little the sky, it's clearing up, and I see, I basically pass below one cable, next to another, and above another, so just poor luck. Good thing you didn't
see him
and then And then it was also funny because it was Benoit, Maxime, and me. And basically, I think I was in the front of them. Yeah, I was, I think, in the front. Yeah, because, of course, Benoit did the spiral, the intelligent thing. So I'm actually going easy because before I was so sick. But then we see, okay, the weather, it's really ugly. It's going to be a shit flight. And I said to Bruno, yeah, I think we should take off first because if I will see them flying, I will get scared. So we get up. In the end, it was like racing to get up as first, but not because you have some advantage, just because you will not see what the other will have as a shit flight.
And so like this, we race, race, race. We arrive up. I open the glider. Bruno helped me with a few things and basically me and Benoit took off together and Maxime was still not ready and we took off and it was like super hardcore like going up, collapse, down collapse, up, down, up, down and Bruno told me after that, yeah Maxime change a little bit the face after
but yeah then we keep on going going, it was Andermatt, still rain, then I did some… Were you able to
fly… So the Cable Valley, I can't remember what, the pass is really flat there. So that's where you're talking, you flew on the other side where there's still all the cables. Yeah, but
We fly in a side valley and get quite close to
Andermatt. You went up into the Rhine from there? I don't know. The Rhine is the Descentis one?
No, no, no, no. Oh, okay. No, no, we went, basically I arrived to Andermatt from a highway in the end. And we did this shitty flight, which was really shit. The first 500 meter or maybe a thousand and down in the valley was okay. Oh, interesting wise. Yeah. And yeah, then I landed. I landed. I landed next to the highway kind of on a street anyway, and then walk to Andermatt. Then I did a hike and fly. Basically, I hike and on the mountain and Benoit was walking on the street. And in the end, I took off and land exactly again to him. But I was happy because I didn't walk on the asphalt. So, yeah, it was good. Then went to the Furka, had this shit flight from the Furka down with this ugly, super ugly cloud coming down from the snake.
Yeah, terrible. Yeah. But yeah, down the rain for sure. It was raining as well, uh, then and get the next day to fish was going so, so not really good, but I was always in, in the, in the leaders, um, and then I had a very the worst day in the, the day crossing the Mont Blanc, basically. And actually, in these examples, I did everything quite good; I was quite happy with my performance, and I'm still happy. And I think I did just one real mistake, but I pay so much for it because I was the only one from the leaders which didn't make it over the Mont Blanc.
Yeah. And this cost me one and a half day. Yeah. So what was that?
What, what happened there?
Basically I, I took off, uh, on the turn point, uh, uh, this turn point close to the lake of Yeah. And then it was stable. I was with Simon Oberhauner. It was stable, but we were fighting and somehow I didn't fly bad. Getting to Samoa, there I had to do a little hike again, took off again. And then basically I didn't, now I know, now since I did the Mont Blanc Air Tour, if I I will have done the Mont Blanc air tour before this last X-Alps. I will not do the same mistake I did, but basically for me, there was everything new. Eli tried to give me the direction, but sometimes me in the air,
I, I, I can't understand what she mean exactly. And, and in a way what is not in my brain, I can't figure it out in the air. So I ended, ended up doing that what I know, and I fly called de la jolie, which is the only thing in this era I know because on the past X-Alps I always fly there, yeah. And it didn't work, okay? So basically, it was a left or right decision. I took a right and it didn't work, but even worse was that I, I went to this mountain and I get really big sink become before getting into it, and then I had like a, a soaring session and
thinking, okay, I'm going to make it. I'm going to make it. I'm going to make it. And then, bam, landed. And a half an hour later, like 10 or 15 beginners with like a glider took off and they go in stratosphere. So I was thinking, okay, that's really too much.
That's really too much.
But that's my life. It's up and down.
I had an experience in the 2015 race. When you three took off from the Brevont, I was back at the Cole, just about 20K back from you guys. And like you said, it was perfect. I mean, it was so easy to fly to Annecy. And Annecy is a place I know really well. And I flew really fast to the Brevont. And I saw you guys. And I flew to the Erevee. And there's clouds. And I bomb on the backside of Plan Faye. and then I get eaten by two rottweilers, okay? And do you remember that day? There were three, four hundred people in the sky, everyone is flying around on a gliders, and I'm, and I'm an ex-alps pilot, and I'm getting eaten by dogs on the back side, just cussing at myself. It's amazing, it's amazing, okay?
So then you had to walk around Mont Blanc, yeah, over the past where everybody else, but But I have
to say, OK, that day I was really sad, almost sad in a way, sad like today, for example, when I bombed, really sad. But then somehow, you know, you think, OK, life, it's going on and the race, it's going on. And so I tried to enjoy and actually enjoy because I did basically part of the ultra trail of the course of the race. It was beautiful, yeah. And then I came to the Italian side. I was looking for a good pizza, so I find lead by lead my motivation and and I keep on going and actually I was again racing hard and I was, I was happy. Yeah, I know that I will for sure not win anymore.
I know that I will not get the first three, four guys because they are way too in front. I lose one and a half half day, but I find my motivation to keep on racing and I'm racing, racing, racing. And then, and then I hit the airspace and, uh, and there, well, it was quite, I don't know. That's the Locarno airspace. In Locarno. Yeah. Um, I don't know anything about airspace. Ellie just make everything for me. And on the takeoff, she explained me and she say that I have to fly like this and this. But in the end, end up that either I fly into this airspace or I land into the trees.
Because normally this airspace, it's like if you stay 50 meter next to the mountain, you can fly AGL 50 meter or something like this. You can fly it. Yep, so like this, it's tinked already. The airspace, but actually on X-Alps file was all the way down, and so basically I see this, the the instrument tell me you can't go there, but on this side I had on the tree, I either go in or land in the tree, and I went in, and again for just a couple of meters, yeah. But in the end, she has somehow karma, like I missed one for two meters and I hit the other for two meters, but it was really no other way.
I mean, when I landed I say, "Okay, you want to be in the tree? No, you don't want to be in the tree, yeah, you are safe." It's good, all good. So then we keep on going because it wasn't unsure if they give me penalty or not, so I keep on racing, um, till in the end they told me, "Okay, if you take the night pass, then you will get it the day after, whatever." So basically I know it that my race will end up one day before the others, yeah. And so I keep on racing, and then finally I managed to get to my home place, and that was fantastic because I did a hardcore flight towards my home place. Then I arrived in my home place, it was terrible weather, and I did a flight which probably I will never do in my life with this shit wind and whatever it was that day, but it was cool because I see my place in the race, and with the weather I will never go to fly otherwise, you know?
So that day I fly super good and I end up my race. I think I was fifth or sixth, but then yeah, then I had to stop. I basically ended, yeah. And that's also like again karma shit. Like, okay, I'm racing and going, going, going as fast as I can and take the best thermal, and then I'm looking at the clock, it's 5:30, and my race was stopping at 5:30, yeah. And and then I'm in this valley just behind Chrome plots and I say, okay, it's 5:30, I have to go to land, and I'm going in the middle of the valley and it's just climbing everywhere, like everywhere, like two meter constant everywhere, and I had to spiral a half an hour to go land.
And again, a school of German, full the sky of a glider, just cruising everywhere. And they're spiraling down to land, you know. Oh, it just crushes your heart. Oh, my God. You could have just top landed
Kronplatz and kept going.
I was thinking to just turn off the life tracker and do it by myself. Just keep going. But I was also tired. In a way, when you finish this adrenaline of the race, I say, what the fuck? You go tomorrow in the swimming pool. I was half an hour from, one hour from my home place. So in the end, that night I sleep still there with the team. We took a hotel. And the day after I went to my home and I even didn't went to the prize ceremony because I didn't have any days to drive four hours. If I'm already home, you know.
Yeah, you're home. It's kind of neat to finish at home. I've got to ask, so five of these, we talked about this a bit at the X Red Rocks when you came out for there, but I think when people listen to this, they think, God, the risk that these guys are taking, the flying in the cloud and all that. Does that change for you over the years? I remember you and I did some training together in the 2015 race and you launched that place where we were just training and I thought, geez, that's a risky, you know, I don't know if you remember that. that we were, uh, up near where Toma got. Yeah, yeah, it was really pretty wild air and stuff, and you know, but, uh, you seem to really thrive on that side of it. The 21, I, I had that in, but in the 21 race, the weather was so brutal.
There were so many times where it was just, you know, you're in the for me in the air, it's okay. It's, it's not okay. It's not a recreational day by any means. It's, you know, there's lightning and all the stuff going on, and you know, I would land in two minutes later, it would just be, if I'd been in the sky, it would have been a serious problem, just incredible rain or thunder and brutal.
Well, after the last race and by the last days of the race, I was thinking, I
think we are getting, or me at least, just me. I don't speak for the other, but I'm getting a little bit too much on the edge. Like I calculate with my team's mate, uh, that I had like 12 or 13, I don't remember 12 or 13 situation where I could badly hurt myself during a 12 days race. Yeah. So it's too much. I mean, not even formula one or MotoGP pilot and they got million of euros, uh, risk so much. Yeah. Yeah. So I think personally that when I'm out of the race, I try to think that it's stupid sometimes to risk so much.
But the problem is that when you are in the race, you think different. And what I think and what I hope is that somehow this kind of a race like X-Alps, we can try to make it a little bit more safe by, for example, making a little bit longer rest period, yeah? Because, for example, on the Dolomiti Superfly I did this year, it was also brutal weather. In the end, I was three days racing, because we fly with every weather nowadays. A bit thanks to the glider, a bit thanks to the pilot skill, it doesn't exist. The weather, you don't fly anymore. Yeah, you... You fly everything. And so we had a first day, really nice, safe and everything.
And a second and a third day, like super hardcore, like really, really hardcore, like 60 k's of wind on 3000 meter for a paraglider, it's too much. But we fly and we were super efficient and we closed the race. It was a 400 kilometer. It was not that short. And we make it in three days, not even, basically two and a half days. But on the Dolomiti Superfly, we had a way longer rest period. And at least I felt when I'm going flying, I'm fresh.
It's
something Chrigel's been pushing the organization every year, but they never do it. It's never changed. I
think we as an athlete has to do something because otherwise, I don't know, it's because you can't forbid the fly, this is impossible. It's against every concept of this adventure race, but otherwise, Another option would be just in my eyes to don't give any time, just make it 24 hours, yeah. And then every athlete will find his, uh, best, um, resting period, yeah. But, uh, I think, yeah, excels, it's tough.
I mean, it's 10:30 in the night and five in the morning, and for sure, like, if it's like, and that's when you're starting
It's not, you're not going to bed at 10:30, you're not starting waking up at five for
me was because I have always in the last x helps a doctor with me, which treat my knee and also sometimes back or whatever. And so it was very rare that it was since I stopped at least one hour, oh
yeah that
was like Yeah, I do the
rollout and the whole thing and the stretching and a little bit of talking with the team and then you go to bed and then in the morning you're up at four.
So, yeah, it becomes like four hours of sleeping for 12 days. It's very little. I've often
thought is, is that part of the, there's a lot of things that are addictive about the race that are just so compelling. And part of it for me has, has been that headspace. I can't fly like that rec just normally I would land, but just be, this is ridiculous. I'm not going to fly in 60 K an hour training. You know, that would be stupid, but in the race you do it every day over and over and over and it's fun and you got it, you've got those moves and you're going to pull it off. It's weird. It's just strange. It's an incredible headspace that you get in. And then the race is over and the headspace is gone. Yeah. That's really amazing.
Yeah. In a way, during the race, you are a different person. You're a different person. Yeah.
So I want to finish on looking forward to this one. You and I had a good talk about this after you won the X Red Rocks this year. You're going to go into it with a bit different approach.
Yeah. Like this time, I'm gonna have two supporters, like Bruno and another Alpine guide, which is a good friend of Bruno and becomes a good friend of mine as well, which is Federico, and they are both flying, but they are not like competition pilot, they are not cross country pilot, they are flying. Yeah, so the approach is basically that I will have to take all the decision by myself with the idea behind of, uh, yeah, like I'm flying 20 years and I have a lot of experience and in every competition so far, I want, I want to win.
I managed to win. Uh, but, uh, I never do normally team competition competition, where I have a team and I have someone which can actually help me a lot. But maybe this, it brings me also a bit away from what I am and from my ideas. And it's when I had Andra and Eli, they give me like the perfect support you can wish. But maybe I don't need this, but I'm not sure. So on the Dolomiti Superfly, we tried. So basically, they support me on the ground, and once Bruno gave me, I asked him, give me a takeoff somewhere there, and he find something.
But otherwise, I was taking my decision by myself. Everything, actually. But the difference is, the Dolomite Superfly was shorter, and let's say a half of it, I know it, because it's close to my home place. the X-Alps, uh, three fourth of it, I don't know. Yeah, so it's gonna be different, uh, but I want to try. So I mean, the other ways I already try, and this way it's something new, so give me motivation to try different, because otherwise I will also run out of motivation, you know, if I don't change changed something. Yeah. So yeah, that's, that's it. We'll see.
What a pleasure. Thanks, Aaron. That was a lot of fun. Let's go, let's go to the awards and show our respects there. And thanks for sharing these stories, man. That was awesome. Thank you, Kevin.
Always a pleasure. All right, bud. Thanks. If
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