 Poster: A snowHead
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Hi there - I guess it depends upon the conditions but this is something I have been wondering about for a while and I would be really interested in the views on here as to what the toughest piste is
The pistes (not itineraries) I've heard mentioned are:
Grand Couloir (Courchevel)
The Tunnel (Alpe D'Huez)
The Wall (Avoriaz)
I've only tried the Grand Couloir out of these (the traverse was the worst bit) so can't compare really....
Cheers! 
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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Grand Couloir (Courchevel) isnt too bad, just a little trundle across the ridgy bit for about 20m and you are down into a fairly average black couloir that runs out onto the main piste (reasonably safe even if you stack it), don't know about the rest though...
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Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
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The Wall is only really bad at the very top and you can take a simpler route down it after that it you want. I wouldn't call it "fun" though.
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Anything at 4.30 with a club med at the bottom of it and 3 separate, 50 child-strong snakes of infants on it, with their crash helmets over their eyes and doing the racing snowplough with no apparent control over speed or direction. La Plagne in particular has one of these; scares the bejesus out of me.
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Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
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None of the above.
It *so* depends on conditions of both the piste and the skier that the question is meaningless. I could claim that Gowabunga is the hardest piste I've skied, since it was out of condition and so was I. Equally Kamakaze is intimidating due to its exposure, but isn't really that technically difficult. And World Cup downhill's are normally on red runs - and they are normally very *tough*.
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Got to be Corbets Couloir in jackson Hole for the fact that you have to jump between 15ft and 25ft just to get into the thing depending on conditions ! It's an offical piste so I reckon that wins hands down. I've done it a few times and all the above are easy by comparison. 45 degrees once in and then mellows out to a nice 40 angle...great run after soft snow. Scary at the top though as people watching !!
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Fly Paper, Glencoe!
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You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
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Fly Paper, Glencoe!
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The run down into St Anton from the Mooserwirt at about 8:30pm.
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snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
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Banff Avenue at close on any Saturday.
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And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
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The Grand Couloir in Les Deux Alpes is quite exposed, with a rock band in the middle half way down, and steep enough that if you fall you're going to slide for a while.
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Bode Swiller, ditto .. you beat me to it. It is only a blue run, but the only time I did it, it was the most difficult 'skiing' I'd ever done.
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You know it makes sense.
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I once skied the run back into tignes Le Lac from the Toviere cafe in a torchlight descent. Many beers on board, bottle of wine in one hand, torch in the other, now that was tricky, the schuss at the bottom was great fun! How I survived I'll never know!
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Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
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masmith, and it has claimed a few lives!
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Poster: A snowHead
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Agree with Bode Swiller, or even the walk from the Griabli to the Moos after several pints of kaiser 
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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....also agree with bode swiller...that run is treacherous!
On a more serious note though....it definitely depends on the conditions...some v steep blacks are a lot easier when there is some surface snow to grip on, and some less steep ones can turn into huge icey mogul fields so it depends on weather, number of skiiers, etc etc. Impossible to say which is the most difficult. Grand couloir in courchevel is the most difficult i've skiied on.
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Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
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The flat green that runs through Val Thorens. Lots of folks trying to cross it from the town to get to lifts, lots of ski schools meeting, learner pistes leading in from the town side, and lots of skiers coming in from 2 seperate pistes with a fair amount of cruising speed in an attempt to pass over the flat bits quickly.
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I remember in 2004 I was in Serre Chevalier, and only a week 3 newbie then. I skied a blue across the top of the Luc Alphand that runs down into Chantemerle and thanked god I wasn't having to ski it 
I'm guessing now I'd be able to get down it no problems, but it's a bit of a view from the top I can tell you. Straight down steep to the bottom, which is a small stopping area, then a bridge over a roaring river, then a main road. Who knows what happens to someone who stacks it on the lower section, what would you choose to help you stop, a bridge rail, a rocky river, a passing bus? Crikey...
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Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
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The Ptarmigan Bowl on CairnGorm Mountain today!
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stevomcd, Agreed and the Fly Paper is the most underacknowledged run, rarely talked about on this forum. Although quite short, it is as thrilling as any 'black run' or piste map dotted line marked couloir I have skied anywhere in Euroland (and I do seek them out), the rocky outcrops intimidate with the kind of exposure that you never see in Euroland except off-piste or itinaire, it's too steep to bump up with the deceleration-assisting moguls found on most busy steep slopes and cannot be accessed by a pisteing machine. It really compares with the steepest of snow-holding off-piste slopes anywhere.
Re. Luc Alphand, I skied it several times last week with my children, at the start of the week in soft snow at +10 degrees and at the end of the week on a scraped and icy base at -12C. It contains a few mediocre steep pitches but it certainly isn't a tough piste although we did see a couple of people sliding face first on the final pitch while we ourselves were enjoying a drink on the sunny side terraces at the back of the commercial centre. I can't recollect any exposure to the road / river at the bottom either and there is a 100 metre upwards incline at the finish before the road is reached.
Last edited by Then you can post your own questions or snow reports... on Tue 30-12-08 20:27; edited 3 times in total
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| tommy10pages wrote: |
I remember in 2004 I was in Serre Chevalier, and only a week 3 newbie then. I skied a blue across the top of the Luc Alphand that runs down into Chantemerle and thanked god I wasn't having to ski it
I'm guessing now I'd be able to get down it no problems, but it's a bit of a view from the top I can tell you. Straight down steep to the bottom, which is a small stopping area, then a bridge over a roaring river, then a main road. Who knows what happens to someone who stacks it on the lower section, what would you choose to help you stop, a bridge rail, a rocky river, a passing bus? Crikey... |
I think that section is called The Wall and it is certainly steep. My favourite black run as it happens, but I wouldn't call it overly difficult (well not now anyway  ) unless it's at 4.30 in spring conditions after its been chopped up all day long A bit more demanding then. You're right about the view, but the run that intersects it at various points on the way down is officially a green IIRC.
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I did Luc Alphand last week, if I got down it in one piece without bricking it, then it is definitly not the toughest piste in the world. It was steep and icy though. It wasn't worth repeating in my opinion in such conditions.
I was more intimidated by the closed piste I was suggested to go down in Monetier, called the Tabuc. It is normally a piste, but had rather large moguls down a long piste. Much 'tougher' and much more fun than Luc Alphand.
Cibouit Noir in Monetier is also a harder piste. Steeper with large moguls.
So I wouldn't say that Luc Alphand is the toughest piste in Serre Chevalier, let alone the world.
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Yeah it was scary from the view of a week 3 newbie taking the green either side of it!
I've since seen the GC in Courchevel and I reckon that's the scariest I've seen. The scariest I've skiied, I'm not sure...
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snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
snowHeads are a friendly bunch.
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The Luc Alphand is like many other runs to resort; bliss in the morning when freshly pisted and quiet and a different proposition at 4pm when covered with anxious skiers barely in control and the surface scraped back to the compressed man made 'snow'.
You would have to be taking it at world cup speed though to reach any road at the top which I think is closed anyway. All pistes difficulty depend on conditions, Isolee is about the toughest in Serre Che in normal conditions IMO.
Corbetts always sounds like it's the toughest and I have not tried it as I have neither the skill nor the balls.. Describing it as a piste rather than a marked run might be pushing the definition of piste slightly though. Most European pistes in ordinary conditions are not particularly tough though there are a few that I have not skied which sound a bit scary.
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And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
And love to help out and answer questions and of course, read each other's snow reports.
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The Swiss Wall (Avoriaz) is not a piste either, itinerary I do believe, but non the less tricky unless you bottle it and head out to the sides for an easy option
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rayscoops, The Swiss wall is a black run as far as I am aware though probably not pisted.
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You know it makes sense.
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Christopher, I'd agree Tabuc is more challenging in so far that it demands a wider variety of skills to ski down it.....But, at around 10.30 in the morning after a slight warming, practically no other skiers in sight, and a mostly grooomed piste, canning down the Luc Alpand is unmatched (in SC) for pure exhilaration, especially in the tuck for the last 200m IMHO.... 
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Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:
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Chasseur, cripes!
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Poster: A snowHead
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The one you just fell down on?
I'll get my coat...
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Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
Obviously A snowHead isn't a real person
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| in garbure we trust wrote: |
| Grand Couloir (Courchevel) isnt too bad, just a little trundle across the ridgy bit for about 20m and you are down into a fairly average black couloir that runs out onto the main piste (reasonably safe even if you stack it), don't know about the rest though... |
I believe there have been some very serious accidents in the Grand Couloir in the past.
It's fine in good snow conditions, but is not a place to fall when it's hard and/or icy. People have fallen there a very long way.
I feel that it's only on the piste map as overall Courchevel has little in the way of genuine black runs. Really I think it should be left as an off piste couloir, as similar couloirs are in all the other resorts I am familiar with.
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Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?
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You need to Login to know who's really who.
You need to Login to know who's really who.
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| snowball wrote: |
Yes, I agree that Corbets must be the toughest marked run, but surely couldn't be called a piste.
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what's the difference?
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Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.
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Anybody remember Ski Survey's list of the hardest runs in the world?
Must be about 10 years ago, but I remember it because they measured difficulty in brown trousers.
Corbet's Couloir and the Swiss Wall both figured up there.
CW 
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| T Bar wrote: |
| rayscoops, The Swiss wall is a black run as far as I am aware though probably not pisted. |
Not any more, it was a red dotted line last season, deffo not a black
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Corbets is a piste. There is now dispute on that. It just happens to be a couloir with a 20ft drop to get in !
Easiest way in to go to the left hand side as you are looking down and you can snow plough down this little wedge that gets created by people trying to limit the drop. You then do a jump turn to the right and then control yourself and do a left hand turn as soon as you can to avoid going into the rocks. The key is snow conditions. Soft snow makes it less scary.
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You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
You'll get to see more forums and be part of the best ski club on the net.
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I went down Le Tunnel in ADH 2 days ago and wow that thing is serious stuff. Moguls bigger than the mountain itself and wicked narrow at the top!! I have heard it called the 2nd hardest run in the Alps..... didnt hear what the hardest one is.
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It depends how you define a piste, though the fact you can get a groomer up it pretty much invalidates it from the "hard" definition anyway. I can pick some lines in Fernie that are ridiculous and it's technically inbounds...
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