Ever wonder why the world’s best mountain bikers are either from North America or, at the very least, train in North America?
It’s because of rides like this one called the Mieders Alpine Coaster. Here’s the description: “The Alpine coaster in Mieders, Austria is a jaw-dropping, high-speed journey down one of the largest mountains in the area.” It’s easy: take a cable car to the top of the mountain, get into one of the tiny coasters that would look at home on a Hot Wheels Mega Loop Mayhem race track, and then ride the single tram line down the hill. Oh, and don’t bother reaching for the brakes. There aren’t any.
The video below makes this ride seem really fun but it begs the question: why bother building such a long infrastructure when you can just ride a mountain bike downhill? At least a bike will have brakes and you can stray off the beaten track if you want to.
Yeah. The Alpine Coaster may seem impressive judging from this footage, but we here at MTBVT would rather ride a bike any day.
There are brakes.. Just the person riding/ filming is not go to use them. There is a rail brake in the center where you push forward to go and pull back to stop, if you just let go it goes to its default, which is a slight break. Have you really never seen or been on an Alpine Slide or Coaster? They have them here in the states. In my Opinion Alpine Coasters don’t not have any relative impact on the quality or quantity of European Mtn Biker’s. They have this sport which involves cycling that they are pretty dominate over that does take place up and down mountains, just on paved roads.
Haha. Thanks Blair. We were only taking the piss. We know some of the best downhillers in the world are from Europe (Florent Payet and Damien Spangolo for example) and there are some amazing bike resorts on the continent (Morzine and Les Gets in France come to mind). What we didn’t know is there are alpine coasters in the US and that they have brakes. Thanks for the head’s up. Maybe we can get one at Trapps in Stowe? haha