Marcelo Gutierrez's Race Report & POV Video from Red Bull Monserrate Cerro Abajo 2022

After my last DH race back on November 20th of 2019, I rode my DH bike twice until mid-December 2021, when I received a call from Red Bull Colombia who invited me again to race the most important urban DH race of my country, a race which is known for being the longest urban race of the world. I won this race in 2019: the Red Bull Monserrate Cerro Abajo.


It was amazing to be back on the scene, to feel that uncertainty, the nervousness, and the butterflies in my stomach, a long time without those sensations. The race went well in general, I actually did not know what to expect from having spent such a long time out of the races, and after qualification, I was quite surprised to have ended up in 1st place. From 25 riders, 6 Colombians, and the rest from all over the place, 10 riders went to finals.

As we know, in races we gamble all the time in many different ways. In this case, we had quite bad luck after a really sunny and dry week, and the night before the event, we had rain. This made the track feel extremely sketchy. Simply imagine riding a bike over wet stones, wet woods and mossy sections. I had a pretty bad crash on the first run that for a second I thought my chance of being back was over. During practice, the sun was trying to come out and in a way, my bet of trying hard on qualy was to aim to be one of the last riders down so the track was going to have enough time to get a little bit grippier and dryer.

Well... sometimes when we bet, we win or sometimes we lose. How unlucky it is to be the last rider down and exactly a minute before my start I heard on one of the radios from one of the organizers: "rain in X part of the track". I could not believe it and somehow I just had to go for it and wait until I was going to find out where the rain was. Around the 1st minute I started to see the rain drops and started to feel my bike struggling to stay on track... Not much to do in that situation than to hold and pray for the rest of 3 and a half minutes. I am happy with my 3rd place that tasted like victory after 2 years away from racing.



Monserrate is a pretty unique race, starting from its length, 2.4 km, over 1000 stairs. The start is at 3.167 meters over the sea level and the terrain technically falls into a gray zone, it is not a normal DH race because it is not over dirt, roots or rocks, nor is a proper urban race since it is not over concrete or asphalt. Monserrate is a sacred path that thousands of people use to exercise or for religious purposes in the capital of Colombia, Bogotá. This trail is made of flat rocks that with all the years have been polished by the shoes of all the pedestrians. This means a huge lack of grip, the amount of stairs translates to an extremely physical track and crazy demanding for the bikes and lastly the altitude makes you have a rough time trying to don't pass out while trying to attack this race.

Posted In:
Videos DH Racing Race Reports Marcelo Gutierrez