Alex Rudeau: from trials to enduro world champion
Chapters (29)
- Teaser
- Introducing the guest
- Summary
- No regrets about clipless pedals?
- First contact with the bike
- First competition at six and a half
- Understanding trials bikes and trials MTB
- Trials, an under-publicised sport
- Go ride trials!
- His trials career
- Female trials riders
- The urge for change
- Why enduro?
- Flat vs clipless pedals
- The Commençal Enduro Project
- Where he has progressed the most
- His 2024 world champion title
- Setting up his team
- His 2025 season
- What he would do differently
- His advice to riders who are struggling to cope
- His 2026 goals
- His experience of the Réunion Mégavalanche
- His goal for the Méga
- What we can wish him for the future
- A next guest?
- Thanks to La Case Bambou in St Gilles les Bains
- Thanks to the UCC
- Thanks to Florent Payet and the Enduro Marinès team
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Episode in French.
Alex Rudeau (not Alexandre 😅) is a professional enduro mountain bike racer and the discipline’s world champion in 2024.
Nothing destined Alex for a career in enduro, let alone becoming world champion,
because his first competitions were on a trials bike and a trials MTB, from the age of six and a half.
But after 16 years spent in the sections, the rider from the Ardèche was looking for something new, fell in love with enduro, and his competitive spirit quickly pushed him to set himself some rather ambitious goals.
Alex’s journey is that of an elite athlete who, like many others, has reached the summit but also the depths,
and in this conversation he reminds us that champions are human above all, and that to perform at the highest level you first have to listen to and respect yourself.
In this episode, recorded on the sidelines of the Réunion Mégavalanche, expect to discover:
– Why, in his view, trials struggles to attract new riders even though it produces some of the most technical riders in the field.
– Why he persisted in enduro racing despite a difficult start.
– His boundless love for flat pedals, and why you won’t see him on clipless pedals any time soon.
– The behind-the-scenes of setting up his own team, and the sacrifices he had to make to run it alongside his season.
– His journey and the preparation that allowed him to win the first world champion title in the history of enduro in 2024, and how he experienced losing his title in 2025.
– His advice for athletes, elite or not, to avoid depression or burnout.
– His race strategy to try to dethrone Hugo Pigeon on the Réunion Mégavalanche podium.
– And plenty of other things.
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Thanks to @uccsportevent6676, organiser of the Réunion @MEGAVALANCHEofficial, and to Florent Payet and the Enduro Marinès team for making this episode possible.
