Graubunden, Switzerland Looks Epic

VIVA LA GRISCHA: A different way to discover Graubünden

Words & photos by Sarah Maguire

After a summer of images and videos of the amazing trails that can be found in the Graubünden (Grisons) region of Switzerland, people might feel a bit bombarded with content from the newly on-the-map resort. The latest video from Danny and Claudio was so good, I’ve already watched it at least five times.

The Swiss Alps have been an international biking destination for well over 10 years now, starting when the ski resorts built the first bike parks to capitalise on their existing infrastructure during summer. The more intrepid would venture into the “backcountry”, pouring over topo and hiking maps, figuring out the best way to stitch all the squiggly lines together into an epic descent.

In the past few years, given the frankly astounding quality of bikes these days, and with the growing popularity of the sport, the ski resorts and tourist boards have cottoned on to the desire for more than just bike park runs. Classic backcountry routes are better sign-posted, GPS tracks are easy to find, indeed whole marketing websites are dedicated to providing biking visitors a plethora of tour options. The mountains are not full, but they’re getting busier.


That’s not to say I’m over biking in the Swiss Alps, far from it. I’m one of those lucky people living less than an hour from the closest ski resort / bike park, with even more options only slightly further afield. Nevertheless, at the start of the season, I found myself craving something new. The problem is, in the intervening years since I started biking, I’ve gone from being a fairly fit and active amateur athlete to perfectly fulfilling the definition of a weekend warrior. I love maps, and I’ve always loved planning weekend adventures for myself and my friends, but times have changed. I don’t have the time, or the fitness, to go out scouting new all-day epics.


So when my mate Luke Fitzpatrick told me about his new business venture, starting a bike school and shuttle service, I got pretty excited! I’d met Luke years ago when he guided myself and a group of friends on a backcountry ski weekend in Lenzerheide. As a fellow Aussie import to the land of cheese and chocolate, we already had a lot in common. A Canberra native, he met his Swiss wife, Sarah, while working as a ski instructor in the Australian ski fields. He followed her back to her hometown in the Swiss mountains and together they founded the first dedicated English-speaking ski school in Lenzerheide. When my brother visited a few years ago, Luke, a keen a biker, took us out for a day of riding on his local trails, showing us secret gems I still return to more than five years later.


Luke and Sarah have spent almost a decade building up a successful ski tourism business, organising everything from private two-hour lessons, to fully customised package trips. But like many others making a living with winter tourism, once the skis and boots have been packed away, it’s time to put on a new professional hat for the summer. For Luke that was a 5am start at the local golf course six days a week. In the evenings, he’d often pick up a shift behind the bar as well. The desire to change things up had been there a long time, and in 2017 Luke decided the time was finally right.



Martin and Luke have known each other for around a decade, and have been tossing tourism ideas around for almost as long. In 2015, Martin was running a local hotel in the region but had been thinking about his own bike-based business venture.


To kick off the season, Epic Bike threw a shuttle party, basically guided single uplifts on a selection of their trails. My fiancé and I towed our little caravan up to campground in Lenzerheide for the weekend to check out the goods. Over two days we discovered new and classic trails in the region, always with a guide and a bunch of new riding buddies. Our favourite was Joch Alp, which I’m sure I’d seen on the trail maps before, but never bothered to ride as getting up there required a lot of pedalling. Tellingly, in the shuttle everyone was comparing notes on their Finale Ligure holidays, discussing their favourite way to combine shuttling and pedalling. Shuttling is not new, but it’s still pretty unusual in the Alps.




A few weeks later, my mate Dan and I headed back to Lenzerheide to join a group and our guides Matthias and Luki for an all-day shuttle. Luki lead us down Joch Alp for the first descent of the day, and I relished the chance to ride the trail a second time, this time hopefully a little faster. The full trail takes over an hour to ride, starting with alpine rock and finishing with dusty forest switchbacks, dropping 1400 height metres in the process. By the time we met Matthias and the shuttle near Chur everyone was fully awake and pretty stoked. The brake pads in Dan’s bike were also toast, but a quick swap out and he was ready to go.




On the way back towards Lenzerheide, Matthias took us up a small fire road to ride a short, loamy, and fun descent, before we jumped back into the shuttle to head over to our second riding zone of the day, the trails around Tiefencastel. I asked Luke about the different areas where they’re able to take guests.



Once back in Lenzerheide, we rode a flowy connecting trail down to Tiefencastel, then shuttled up for the first of two big descents. Just the drive up alone was worth the trip, the shuttle winding its way through historic alpine villages, glorious views in the background. Dan and I looked at each other several times during the course of the afternoon and just repeated the obvious “I love Graubünden”.






The first afternoon descent started just below the tree line, straight-lining across the winding shuttle road. After a few minutes, it turned into the forest for a mostly fast descent with some tricky sections thrown in the middle. At one point Matthias stopped us to warn about some “off-camber roots”. They were indeed off-camber, as well as large and awkward, with no lower chicken line to aim for - true alpine trail riding. I went for it but didn’t quite have the float and momentum to clear the whole section. Straight afterwards were some tight switchbacks which required hopping the rear wheel to clear, followed by a steep dusty chute. Matthias is a big tall guy, but you wouldn’t think it when you follow him down a trail. He floated over obstacles, dancing down the trail with such easy style and speed. It was a lot of fun trying to stay on his wheel.




Back in Tiefencastel, Luki was waiting for us with a cool-box full of cold drinks and chocolate bars. Lunch had been a BYO, eat-between-runs affair, to leave more time for riding, but Epic also organises restaurant lunch stops for groups that prefer to take a longer mid-day break. After the sugar-hit and our final uplift, Luki guided us down a fast and flowy forest trail to finish the day. We met up with Matthias at the bottom of a small fire road outside of Tiefencastel, exchanged fist-bumps and high-fives, then loaded up the bikes for the final drive back to Lenzerheide.