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DATE CHANGE FOR MERIBEL ENDURO2 

NEW DATES: 8-10 JULY 2023

If you already booked the Enduro2 Hotel and race registration, you now have two options:

1) Take no action (do nothing!) – We will automatically transfer your race registration to the new dates, also re-book your hotel dates for the following weekend.

OR:

2) Cancel your hotel reservation and race entry before 31 January 2022 – We will issue a full refund of both, directly to your credit card.

To cancel your registration, please follow the instructions at the bottom of this newsletter.

WHY HAVE WE CHANGED THE DATES FOR 2023?

We agreed the 2023 event dates with Meribel Tourist Office many months ago.  However, the situation in France at the moment, is quite fragile, and has changed a lot since August when we first fixed the dates for 2023. The extreme rise in electricity prices in France has a very large impact on operating costs of the ski lifts.  The ski lift companies are now forced to find ways to save costs, and this includes reducing the operating period of their ski lifts in summer.

For the Enduro2, we must negotiate the “special” operation of more ski lifts than usual, to allow us to access the very best trails across the entire region.  In fact, there are 3 different ski lift companies with whom we must negotiate, in order to deliver the best possible event.  (Enduro2 is based in Meribel but we also visit the Les Menuires and Brides Les Bains areas during the race.  Each area has its own Tourist Office, Lift Company, and independent arrangements for Ski Lift opening hours and lift passes.

We appreciate that it’s probably hard for you to imagine this situation, but in fact, the ski lift companies are private businesses that operate independently from the Tourist Office – even the tourist office and local town council cannot directly decide when the lifts will open (Yes, that’s pretty crazy, we know!)

Unfortunately one of these three companies informed us only last week that they will change their schedule for 2023, even though they are aware that we already planned Enduro2 on this date.    Of course, we tried hard to negotiate another solution with them, without success.  (There are many safety requirements that must be in place to open a ski lift, including specially trained lift-rescue teams and other essential technical staff on-standby in the resort, in case of an emergency – these staff are simply not available any any cost, if the rest of the resort is closed at that same time).

In summary then, we were forced to either change the date of the event, or try to deliver an event with fewer ski lifts in operation than we really need to access the perfect choice of trails. On balance, we have decided that a change of dates is the best, and only solution.  

Of course, we understand this can be very inconvenient for any of you who already made plans for this summer. We sincerely apologise for that!