Thorong Pass and Tough Mountain Bike Race

By Deepan Pokhrel

An 18-year-old from Dharan with no formal training, no professional equipment and no grand plan finished second last week in Yak Attack 2026, the world’s highest mountain bike race. Dipsagar Tamang’s improbable ride across 5,416-metre Thorong Pass lit up an event that saw all 28 starters complete a grueling eight-day journey through the Annapurna Circuit — a race that, its organisers say, remains one of Nepal’s best-kept secrets and most underfunded treasures.

The adventure began quietly in Kathmandu, inside the Thamel International Guest House. Riders gathered for registration while a maintenance team checked every cycle. Duffel bags and race tags were distributed, and 28 names were entered into the books. Noticeably absent was defending champion Khusiman Gharti. A soldier in the Indian Army, India’s national champion and originally from Kaski, he had travelled directly to the start at Besisahar. With him came a six-rider team, prepared and purposeful.

The next morning, a bus ferried the racers to Besisahar; their bicycles bounced along behind in a jeep. From that first evening, a 6:30 race briefing became sacred ritual — organisers laying out the next day’s terrain, altitude profiles and distances.

The race proper ignited at 9 a.m. with a loop stage out of Besisahar (760 m). A marking crew had set out early, painting the route with arrows and ribbons. Riders climbed hard towards the Ghandruk area before a fast, technical downhill delivered them back to town. It was a sharp opening chapter.

Then came the longest, most gruelling stage: Besisahar to Chame. The valley tightened, the trail grew relentless, and the racers’ faces told the story. I caught up with a group at a feed point. One rider stared ahead and said simply, “Why am I here?” Another, slumped over his bars, added, “I feel violated.” They remounted and kept moving.

The ride to Manang (3,519 m) offered a kind of reward. The Octopus waterfall cascaded beside the trail; Blue Lake sat like a jewel under the peaks. The Annapurna massif filled every horizon. Manang itself felt like a held breath — a valley ringed completely by mountains, tranquil and restorative. The riders were given a rest day there. Rafelle, a 70-year-old Italian, sat in a courtyard soaking in the stillness. He would later say: “The pain is temporary; the glory of these mountains lasts forever. Age doesn’t matter when you’re riding among these mountains.”

From Manang, the road vanishes. Support vehicles can go no further; everything essential — food, medical kits, tents — shifts to horseback, swaying along trails that have carried supplies to Mustang from Pokhara for generations. For two days, the support crew walked. We walked. Riders pushed their bikes, we pushed our lungs, and we could hardly catch up. It was an excruciating uphill grind through raw mountain terrain. When we finally reached Base Camp at dusk, all 28 riders had already arrived — quiet, hollowed out, and somehow whole.

The next morning arrived with a bitter cold: Thorong Pass day. At 5,416 metres, you do not ride — you carry. Riders strapped bicycles onto their shoulders and left before dawn, a thin line of figures inching over snow and scree. From the summit, the reward was a sweeping downhill to Muktinath (3,710 m), and then the final race stage from Muktinath to Kalopani (2,530 m). That last stretch rolled through the hidden Mustang — the ancient Lubra Valley, clattering suspension bridges over turquoise rivers, pine forests smelling of resin and early winter.

When the wheels stopped and timing chips were tallied, Khusiman Gharti had won as expected. But the story of the day was Dipsagar Tamang in second, with Nepal’s cross-country national champion Achyut placing third. Every single racer finished — including 70-year-old Rafelle and Dr. Bikash Parajuli of Dhulikhel Hospital, who doubled as the event’s medical support and a finisher in his own right.

Standing at the finish, Khusiman took a long look at the mountains he had just ridden through. “This race is never just about winning,” he said. “The beauty up there — the passes, the lakes, the silence — it’s overwhelming. The challenge is not the other riders. The challenge is the mountain itself. That is what brings me back.”

Dipsagar Tamang, still dusty and dazed, kept his words simple. “I didn’t have a strategy, I didn’t have a proper training programme, I just kept pedalling. When they told me I was second, I thought it was a mistake. Now I know what I’m capable of — if I get a chance.”

Achyut, the national champion, heard that “if” and winced. “I’m a national champion,” he said, “but I still struggle to buy good nutrition and maintain my bike. We are losing talents like Dipsagar because there is no pathway. Yak Attack could be a global brand — instead our riders are barely surviving.”

Race organiser Ajay Pandit, who has steered Yak Attack through years of logistical and financial thin air, watched the celebrations with a complicated expression. “This race is a window to Nepal’s soul on two wheels. It should be one of the world’s iconic endurance events. But we fight for basic funding every single year. We are not just an exotic curiosity — we are a story Nepal needs to tell much louder. Instead, we’re holding on by sheer will.”

A free ride was later held up to Maldhunga, and prizes were distributed in Pokhara. There were embraces and quiet pride, but also a lingering weight. Cycling remains a marginal sport in Nepal. There is no proper funding pipeline, no infrastructure, and no clear route from raw potential to professional career. Riders like Dipsagar Tamang, whose second-place finish should be making national headlines and attracting sponsors, face an uncertain future. Yak Attack, a race that could carry Nepal’s image across the globe on two wheels, barely survives — an escape for cycle dreamers rather than the world-class brand it ought to be.

For a handful of days in the high Himalayas, a 70-year-old Italian, a boy from Dharan and a doctor from Dhulikhel shared the same thin air and the same impossible trail. All of them finished. The race deserves to continue and make Nepal known to the world.