A few years ago, I was lucky enough to be given the opportunity to ride in a bobsled down the famous Celerina run. It’s the only bob run in the world that is made exclusively of natural ice.
It’s often confused with the Cresta Run, but that’s reserved for skeleton (effectively head first down the ice on a tray) racing, we’ll come back to that later.
My wife Julie organised the trip, so fortunately I have no idea what it costs, simply that it can be done. Don’t expect it to be cheap though. In fact, don’t expect anything in St Moritz to be cheap!
The bob run is only open for the first part of the winter - when March comes and the ice starts melting, there are certain safety factors coming into play.
Basically you get to ride in one of the two passenger positions in the bob, the guy at the front steers and the one at the back brakes.
You don’t have to do the running bit at the start though, you just have to sit in and the brake man does the pushing. I was a bit concerned that this would mean we wouldn’t be experiencing the full speed, but any worries on that count evaporated after the first corner.
I’d walked most of the course beforehand, and I’d advise anyone to do the same.
But after the first big hairpin bend, any orientation was lost.
After that it was just a never ending sequence of violent direction changes, until you come to rest after the finish line.
I won’t tell you what my first words to Julie were, other than it was a single expletive, repeated three times!
To experience it for yourself, call +41 (0)81 830 02 00
Share This
