In a year that saw life explorer Sami Sauri swap city living in Girona for a new home in the French Alps, we once again sat down to chat over the thrills—and some spills—of snow buried bikes, baking bread in Arabia and a wild ride by ambulance through Kenya’s Maasai Mara.
Honest, heartfelt and never shying away from life’s complexities, Sami weighs up the uncertainties of her profession, how she sought solitude but then needed to embrace the silence, and why there’s always time to stop and smell the flowers.
cyclespeak
Your hair looks very long, Sami. Though, to be fair, it’s quite often hidden under your bike helmet.
Sami
I’m trying to grow the fringe out after I cut it. I was very disappointed [laughs].
cyclespeak
You cut it yourself?
Sami
Why spend the money to go to a hairdresser?
cyclespeak
When you can do it yourself and then be disappointed.
Sami
Exactly [laughs].
cyclespeak
You’re calling from Morzine?
Sami
My new home in the French Alps.
cyclespeak
I picture you halfway up a mountain in a wooden chalet.
Sami
It’s a typical little village towards the top of a col. So every time I finish my training I have this steep, steep climb back home.
cyclespeak
How’s your French?
Sami
I knew French before so that was a big advantage.
cyclespeak
So that’s Spanish, obviously, and Catalan?
Sami
Yes.
cyclespeak
And also French and English.
Sami
And Italian [laughs].
cyclespeak
Is there no end to your talents?
Sami
I’m also trying to learn some Arabic. I feel it will open doors and allow me to speak to the women I meet in their own language.
cyclespeak
I’m really looking forward to hearing all about your new home but can we start with your recent adventures in Turkey? Judging by your posts and stories, it looked like some kind of Hollywood screenplay.
Sami
The plan was to ride in the northeast of Turkey where few people speak English and there’s very little information available about cycling or hiking.
cyclespeak
It sounds relatively unexplored in bike packing terms?
Sami
Every time I was working on the route, I just kept on finding more and more epic stuff. It’s such a big country and I just wanted to go and discover it for myself.
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cyclespeak
So what happened on that fateful day?
Sami
I woke up with my partner Nick to a lovely sunny sunrise. We’d pitched our tent at about 2,000 m and the wind had been a little gusty during the night but nothing that would give rise to concerns. So we had no idea that it was all going to go shitfaced [laughs].
cyclespeak
So it was a beautiful day…
Sami
And we started hiking up, carrying our bikes, all our gear and enough food for two days. My hip was starting to hurt so Nick was going back and forth to carry the two bikes towards the pass that would take us over into the next valley.
cyclespeak
He’s an ultra runner so I’m guessing feels super comfortable in the mountains.
Sami
The higher we climbed, the more snow was on the ground and it was getting quite foggy. And then as we reached 3000 m, the wind was getting really strong and drifting snow over our bikes. It was at this point that I knew we had to quickly make a decision.
cyclespeak
At altitude, the weather can change so suddenly.
Sami
Nick couldn’t feel his feet, I was wearing everything I had and visibility was down to a few metres. So we decided to abandon the bikes and get down to where we could pitch our tent and wait out the storm.
cyclespeak
With snow on the ground, that must make navigation difficult?
Sami
Earlier in the day we’d passed a shepherd’s barn. The path was covered but we eventually reached this shelter—feeling pretty panicky—and pitched our tent inside. We got a fire going and heated up some noodles and then I managed to get phone reception through the SIM card I’d left at home. So I sent a message to my friends Ben and Gaby in France with the Instagram profile name of this guy we’d met earlier in the day before the weather went crazy. He’d invited us for a cup of chai at the house he was renovating and we’d noticed he was driving a 4×4.
cyclespeak
That sounds very fortuitous.
Sami
So Ben and Gaby reached out with our coordinates and asked if he could possibly pick us up in the morning at the barn where we were sheltering. But a couple of hours later—Nick was asleep in the tent—I heard a car pull up outside. I was shaking Nick to wake him and he was like, “Stop dreaming. Nobody is going to drive up a mountain in a snowstorm.” But the headlights were shining through the cracks in the barn door and I jumped up, still inside my sleeping bag, and started shouting. The guy had brought us hot soup and tea and then took us down to this pension hotel.
cyclespeak
That’s so kind.
Sami
They wouldn’t even let us pay for our stay. Amazing.
cyclespeak
And your bikes? Because they were still buried under a snow drift at 3000 m.
Sami
We took a couple of days to recuperate before renting a car—another adventure because everything was in Turkish—and driving to the other side of the pass where we could trek up to collect our bikes.
cyclespeak
You make this all sound very simple but they were covered in snow on the side of a mountain.
Sami
First, we live in a technological world where we can record everything. And we had our Suunto watches so we had the coordinates and we’d left them by a quite distinctive rock.
cyclespeak
I enjoyed your Instagram story where you scrape away at the snow to reveal a wheel which you then bend over and kiss.
Sami
We’d abandoned everything in such a hurry that it was a relief to find our bikes as we’d left them.
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cyclespeak
It’s good that it all ended well. And taking our conversation to warmer climes, late last year you took a trip to Socotra where you spent some time with a group of teenage girls?
Sami
I was invited to visit them at home. They smiled and I smiled back and then I watched as they prepared some flatbreads. One of them was wearing curcuma on her face—this yellow henna made from turmeric—and I was trying to communicate how pretty it looked. Well, five minutes later they came out with a bowl and started pouring curcuma all over my body.
cyclespeak
I’m guessing there’s not much you can do as a guest in their house?
Sami
Exactly. I didn’t want to be disrespectful and it was nice that the girls wanted to share a little of their culture with me. But I was so yellow I looked like a character from the Simpsons.
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cyclespeak
We live and learn.
Sami
I actually went back to the same family the next time I visited Socotra and took them some notebooks and crayons for school but also some black henna and asked if they would paint designs on my hands and feet.
cyclespeak
A little after your time in Socotra you had another adventure but this time in the high mountains on a ski / bike trip.
Sami
That was amazing. The fact that you’re travelling under your own power and able to reach places that you couldn’t get to by car. Physically tough as we had eight back-to-back days.
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cyclespeak
I’m guessing you burn lots of calories and I saw an Instagram story where you were enjoying a fondue. Is there a forfeit if your chunk of bread falls off into the melted cheese?
Sami
Yes [laughs]!
cyclespeak
There is?
Sami
I always say, if you drop the bread, you pay for the fondue.
cyclespeak
The start of the year also saw you launch your W Collective and I was wondering what inspiration lay behind the original idea?
Sami
It all started from a conversation I had with a friend from Dubai. One day she asked me how I went cycling with a period. And I was like, well, I just use a tampon and that’s it. And when she explained that she couldn’t do that, it left me feeling like I didn’t have any answers. So that got me thinking about all the other women out there who may have questions on a whole range of subjects and maybe we need to create a safe space where ideas, advice and experiences can be shared.
cyclespeak
You led a W ride out from La Comuna in Girona in the days leading up to the Traka. What did it feel like to see all those women coming together under a banner that you’d created?
Sami
I honestly couldn’t believe it. I’d advertised the ride but you sometimes have this fear of failure? Where the only ones who show up will be your usual four friends. So when 40 women turned up it was amazing and a little scary because I was the only one leading [laughs]. Luckily my friend Maya—she’s the community manager in Spain for Komoot—was able to help out.
cyclespeak
So after coffee, off you all went?
Sami
I’d chosen quite a hilly route and when we re-grouped after this longer climb everyone was chatting away—cheep, cheep, cheep—and when I said, “Okay, let’s roll,” no one followed me. They were all too busy getting to know each other [laughs].
cyclespeak
It sounds like a proper social ride. And I saw one of your W Collective stickers on the coffee counter at La Comuna. Am I right in thinking Sarah Sturm did the design for you?
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Sami
Sarah was super generous and referenced the ride in her Traka film. So cool!
cyclespeak
You rode your YT-Industries gravel bike in the Traka. How’s it working out for you?
Sami
I really love that bike.
cyclespeak
It’s fitted with a short travel suspension fork. Does that make a big difference?
Sami
It does for me because I love going downhill fast. Shredding properly and seeking out gnarly trails and rocky paths. But even on smoother gravel it will make a difference over a long day. On the Traka 360, everyone was knackered. Hands and arms on fire. Me? Zero, nothing. And on the downhill sections I was able to pass people with ease.
cyclespeak
In the summer, you took a blue and white colourway of the YT bike to Kenya for the Safari Gravel and Migration Gravel races. It looked like you enjoyed a very warm welcome?
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Sami
I didn’t want to feel rushed so arrived a week and a half before the first race was due to start. I visited the Team AMANI House and the new pump track—a wonderful project that will soon be finished—and then I led another woman’s ride.
cyclespeak
I saw lots of zebras in your posts.
Sami
And giraffes and elephants [laughs].
cyclespeak
Very unfortunately you crashed out during the Migration Gravel race?
Sami
My first big injury from racing and I was in the middle of the Maasai Mara in Kenya. I don’t remember the crash but immediately afterwards I thought I’d broken my back. It turns out it was my sacrum which is connected to your pelvis.
cyclespeak
That sounds super painful.
Sami
It was also my first time in an ambulance. Five hours on a very bumpy road and when we were nearly back at the camp we were stuck in a traffic jam because the riders were coming through. A complete shit show with the truck carrying all the race baggage stuck in the mud and my ambulance the only vehicle with a winch. It was 30°C, I’d just had an injection of Tramadol because the pain was so bad and when the winch cable took the strain, I was close to being catapulted out of the rear doors.
cyclespeak
What happened when you finally got to camp?
Sami
The doctor checked me over and asked if I wanted to fly by helicopter to Nairobi? But I really wanted to do the safari we had planned so decided to stay in the camp, get some sleep and cope as best as I could with the pain. And then I spent three days travelling all over Kenya with a cushion under my ass.
cyclespeak
Did you get checked out when you got home?
Sami
They just confirmed it was broken and told me to rest for six weeks. No speedy recovery.
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cyclespeak
Speaking of this setback, earlier in the year you posted—in your typical unfiltered fashion—about how you define yourself professionally and whether people sometimes have assumptions that life is easy for you. Are these difficult thoughts to navigate?
Sami
100%. I’m constantly struggling to make sense of it all. Because you need to plan each year in advance and sell ideas and projects to brands and sponsors so that you can continue to be a full-time cyclist. And this time of the year—September and October—can be a little uncertain because you don’t always know who’s in and who’s out.
cyclespeak
I guess it’s the not knowing that can be stressful?
Sami
I put a calendar up and marked next year’s racing but everything costs so much money. You need to pay the entry fee, your hotel and travel. My last race of the year is Across Andes in Chile and that’s a super expensive trip. I get a sponsor salary but that doesn’t always cover all this extra stuff that I’m choosing to do. So sometimes I’m a little conflicted. Do I focus on my bike packing trips and creating routes like I did in Turkey? Or do I keep racing for a few more years whilst my body is still strong?
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cyclespeak
It sounds like there’s an inherent amount of uncertainty in this model of making a living. But could you ever see yourself doing a regular job?
Sami
For the security, maybe. And sometimes I do think it would be nice going back to when I made coffee, got a monthly paycheck and still had time to ride my bike. But that would mean working for somebody, instead of being my own boss. And there’s also the fact that I have zero family back-up, so if I have a problem I better have some savings which means managing things really carefully between submitting invoices and paying my taxes.
cyclespeak
I’ll admit to being very biased—in the hope that you carry on being you and having these amazing adventures. Because what you do is super inspirational and that encourages people to get out on their own bikes. But I don’t for one second think it’s easy. So that being said, let’s come full circle back to the mountains and your move from Girona. What prompted you to relocate in the first place?
Sami
Girona is amazing but it’s also a bubble with the same things happening and I’d lived there for four years. So I just needed a change both personally and professionally.
cyclespeak
And does Morzine live up to your expectations?
Sami
When I open my front door in the morning the view takes your breath away. The only problem is it helps to have a car and I don’t have a car licence. But the guys at Cake Bike very kindly loaned me one for a year and basically saved my ass. But most days, now that I can ride again, I’m out training.
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cyclespeak
Looking back to when we talked this time last year, are you the same Sami or have you changed in some ways?
Sami
That’s a very good question.
[pause]
I guess I’ve had to learn how to be alone. Because when I lived in Girona, I’d just go for a coffee and there was always someone I knew to talk to. But here, there’s solitude and silence. Which I’ve grown to love but at the start was a little more challenging.
cyclespeak
So what’s exciting you, motivating you at the moment?
Sami
I want to pivot more into longer distance events. Gravel races now are going the way of road and it’s just full gas from the off. And I’m more of a one pace and go forever which is what appeals about the Across Andes event. It’s my first ever ultra that is more than 500 km. Because I did a 450 km race before but you can do that in a day.
cyclespeak
I remember you did that race with no specific training and you were still first woman home.
Sami
Yes. But it was only 450.
cyclespeak
Only [laughs].
Sami
In Chile it’s 1000 km. And that’s no joke. Or one day [laughs].
cyclespeak
It sounds like the perfect event to see out your year.
Sami
I’m going to give it a try to see if I like it. I’ve always been somebody who prefers long distances because I love stopping to chat with people, to try nice food, to look at flowers. And I want to see what my mind can cope with. Not my body. My body is whatever. But my brain? That’s the hardest part [laughs].
Thanks to Sami for the stories and smiles
Feature image by Nick Cusseneers / ‘Eat pasta, ride fasta’ film by Jean-Baptiste Delorme / All other photography credited individually
cyclespeak 