The Kandahar - Verte Piste, Les Houches, Chamonix Valley
The Kandahar at the French alpine resort of Les Houches is one of the
classic races of the world cup skiing season. The race has been held on
the Verte piste at Les Houches since 1924 when Arnold Lunn founded the Ski
Club of Kandahar. In the same year the first winter Olympic games were
held and the downhill event was held on the Verte piste. In 2006 the
Kandahar race had to be cancelled. The snow conditions were perfect -
better than they'd been for years - but thick fog on the lower 200 metres
of the course meant that 150 km/hour racing would have been dangerous.
When there's no racing on, the piste is open to anyone to free ski. Whilst
you and I might ski the Kandahar quite differently to Anja Paerson it's a
great opportunity to ski a totally classic (and steep) piste.
From the bottom lift station of Bellevue a series of three chairlifts
take you up the mountain to 1900m. On the way up you can see the line of
the Verte piste over to your left. From the top of the chairlift there are
great views of Mont Blanc, Auiguille de Bionnassay and Dome de Miage
across the valley. A number of different pistes go off in different
directions from the top but remember what you came for. The Kandahar
begins at a small wooden hut just a little way down the mountainside. The
sort that the pros launch themselves out of on Ski Sunday. If there's a
lot of snow the top section of the Verte Piste is often a gently-angled
mogul field. The pros get it groomed smooth for them but you're unlikely
to get that kind of treatment. The angle's not too steep and this bit is a
good warm up for the fun and games further down the mountain. The piste
narrows and heads between some trees where the angle steepens quite
alarmingly to about 30 degrees. Whilst this might not sound very steep
this section's often icy and it's easy to pick up unwanted speed. There's
an obvious lip at the start of this section and for the pros this is the
first of the two famous Kandahar jumps. A fast right hand bend at the
bottom sweeps you down a wider section with your skis chattering beneath
you. Even now, after maybe ten minutes of skiing, you can feel that your
legs are taking a hammering but the good news is that you're entering the
fastest part of the run down. The piste swings back to the left and you
can set your skis straight for a couple of hundred metres or so before
reaching the second jump. At this point there will probably be a fairly
large mass of people standing on the edge nervously looking down. The
second jump is the steepest part of the course, often icy and in icy
conditions is very hard to ski. The angle of the piste doesn't really
worry the pros as they fly off the top and land somewhere near the bottom
- bypassing the steep bit. This is one of the most popular spectator areas
during the downhill and it's easy to see why. It's a good idea to join the
crowd at the top and watch a few other people go down this bit before
launching off yourself. In general, the softest snow seems to be on the
right side near the top and then when you're half way down you can start
to ski the whole piste. There's a sting in the tail as the bottom bends
round to the right and it's here that some of the pros damage themselves
by carrying too much speed over the jump. From here the angle eases off
slightly and a series of sweeping turns take you down the mountain headed
towards the bottom of the Verte piste. This is a good opportunity to set
the skis downhill and really fly over a couple of rolling jumps and some
fine bends. By the time you've finished you've descended almost three
kilometres of piste and dropped 900 metres from the top. After that,
another run down or explore some of the brilliant off-piste skiing under
the chairlifts.
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