A scorcher!!

Today was planned to be an easy day - with a short 50km ride out to the feed zone to watch the race go by.  After a little sleep in, and a chat with home we set off  at around 11:00 in the morning.  Unfortunately though, the temperature was already high, and by the time we got to the top of the first climb it was over 40 degrees.  One of our groups cycle computers registered a max temperature of 46 with an average of 36 for the ride.   When I looked down into the valley that we were going to ride into all I could see was more time in the sun and given our huge day tomorrow I bailed out and rolled back down the hill past the hotel and into town. 

l'Isle sur la Sorgue is a market town - famous for antiques and second hand stuff.  I cruised around the small lanes on my bike soaking up a bit of French culture.  I found a shady spot for lunch (with the obligatory ice cream) before cruising back to the hotel for air-conditioning, Internet and eurosport.  Lunch was a ham and cheese baguette next to a pretty waterway just outside of town.

  

After the race was over on TV a few of us headed back into town for the obligatory Pizza entree.  We wandered through the pretty little streets and found a place to have my first almost decent coffee in France as well as some bruschetta to take the edge off the appetite.

 

For dinner we were bussed back into town and left to our own devices for a couple of hours.  Not surprisingly most seemed to stop at one of the first restaurants that we came to that served steak!.  There was some conversation about having pizza at the place next door - but I think that had more to do with the attractive waitress.  I had the all steak meal boef carpaccio for entree and steak and chips for main. Dessert was a no brainer - creme brulee followed up of course with the obligatory ice cream - this time it was lemon meringue ice cream. 

A quick walk through the town to source some more cash before heading back to the bus very satisfied with ourselves.

All in all a pretty lazy day - resting, re-hydrating and recharging before Ventoux tomorrow!

Behind the scenes at the Finish

Today was an easy 50 km ride on the course to the race finish in Nimes.  Riding on the course is great - we had a bunch of around 20 riders, the French line the roads and clap and cheer as you go past - it really makes the km fly by.  All of the race kites and sprint markers are up and it is a blast to ride through them.  We were able to ride all but the last 100 m of the course.  Our busses have parking special Tour parking permits - meaning that we were able to leave our bikes and change in the busses quite close to the tour. 

I was determined to breach security again and managed to enter the media area and made a new friend...

 

It was a scorching hot day - beautiful clear skies with barely a touch of breeze.  The technical area at the tour is amazing with press from all over the world -there is a spaghetti of cables running all over the place.

The race finish is big business - with lots of VIPs and corporates being treated to a day at the race in style.  They are fully catered as well as having a hostess (a pretty hostess) to give them a tour around the finish area.

I managed to find a spot close to the finish line where I settled down to wait for the race to come through.

The race finished in a bunch sprint with my old mate ...

taking the honours.  Once he turns on the rockets it seems that nobody can stay with him.  The French love their funny hats and uniforms.  Going by the number of police we see along the route most days, I'm pretty sure that most of the criminals in France would be pretty safe.

 

After the race I was behind the stage for the presentations.  Lots of podium girls and assembled media...

All of the presentation and media is done within 30 mins of the stage finish and the riders are quickly in the team cars or bus and on the way to the hotel.

We were an hour or so in the bus to our next hotel in L'isle sur la Sorgue - as we got closer to the hotel our next challenge - Mt Ventoux - stands imposingly over the surrounding countryside - it looks big.  Arrived at the hotel at around 8:00 - just in time for dinner and then it was an early night for all of us.

2 or 3 seasons in one day

A windy, grey and overcast start to the day. On the menu today was the Pic de Nore an allegedly beautiful climb featured in the January edition of Procycling magazine. We had a full block headwind on the way out to the climb meaning that the selections were made fairly early in the day. Here's today's profile ....

Not really anywhere to hide there. Unfortunately the weather closed in and it while we didn't get rain it was a cool misty ride to the base of the climb in Mazamet. Dave Mackenzie was riding with us today and I decided to follow him down the first descent to see if I could learn anything. What I did learn was that ex-pros can put a jacket on while riding a fairly twisty descent. I put mine on at the top. The roads on the descent were wet and one of our group had what must have been a low speed (in the end) fall and was bussed back to the hotel.

After riding around Mazamet for what seemed quite a while we found a cafe for morning tea/lunch. Needless to say that the wait for a decent coffee in France continues. After spending what seemed like too long waiting to regroup we got lost again in Mazamet before finally finding our way out to the climb. It was a surreal experience. Visibility was quite low...

...so it was hard to know how far there was to climb.

I saw wild pigs crossing the road in front of me as we got higher into the trees. Luckily the view from the top was worth all the effort of the climb.

To make matters worse it was cold and windy - so I rugged up and headed straight down - which really is the best part about all of this climbing. Again wet roads on the descent meant a fairly conservative approach but as I had hoped about half way down the mountain the skies cleared and we were once more in sunshine.

It was a flatter descent as we got towards the bottom - meaning that some pedaling was required. A quick stop at the bottom to regroup and remove some clothing layers before we made short work of the last 15 km into town. Total ride time of over 5 hours and in the end another pleasant day.

We arrived back to the hotel at around 4:00 - enough time to fuel up, shower and watch the end of the stage on the tele. A walk up to the old city in Carcassonne before dinner of the regional specialty - le Castelet - essentially what seemed like white beans, duck and oil served in a casserole dish. Pizza for entree and the obligatory double scoop of ice cream on the way home. The diet is getting a bit of a work out at the moment.

Recovery ride to race start

Today was supposed to be an easy 40 km over a few lumps to the race start. The profile looked like this ....

It turns out that the first lump was a category 3 climb that the race went over to get out of Lourdes yesterday!! I got stuck behind some slower riders on the descents which meant that I was slower than I would have liked - the guys on the front were up around 75 - 80 for most of the descent. Today we passed through the 350 Km barrier for the trip and my legs felt empty. Lots of food was going to be required today!!

The race start a great experience. I managed to get into the official area (don't ask how) and was able to get up close to lots of the riders and a whole pile of sexy bikes. Here's a just a few of the gazillion photos I snapped from behind the barriers ....

Cadel even though he was not showing it, was sore today. He is pretty smashed up from his fall and needed help to get his jersey on. The riders are great - circulating among the crowd - signing autographs, giving interviews and taking photos. Cadel especially came back to a group of aussies on the fence after he had signed on and had a brief chat and signed autographs.

This guy looked as fresh as a daisy today after burying himself on the Tourmalet and Hautacam for Frank Schleck.

I also had an opportunity to tick off the SBS "bonehead" from my must do tour list today but chickened out at the last minute.

Next time I will not be afraid...

After the start rolled out of town we piled onto the bus and drive for around three hours to Carcassonne. Our hotel is well located in the new town - right next to the Canal du Midi and a short walk to all amenities. Our room is sensational - huge with a spectacular view over to the town to the old city.

Lots of food consumed this afternoon - fruit, sandwiches, pizza, cake, biscuits and a huge pasta meal - topped of with a McFlurry from the Maccas across the street from the hotel.

Another great day. More climbing on offer tomorrow but lots of people are thinking about taking a shorter/flatter option or even having a day off the bike altogether. I'll probably climb tomorrow but if it is really hot I might reconsider.

A sensational day - Soulor and Aubisque

Anybody who has watched the tour on TV has seen the vision of the tour racing along a road which seems to be stuck precariously onto the side of a mountain.  It turns out that that road links the Col d' Soulor and the Aubisque.  We rode that today and it was sensational.

It was a perfect day in the Pyrenees - blue skies, warm sun and beautiful surroundings.  It was not a super tough climb today but the scenery was sensational.

 

 

It was absolutely beautiful, and at the top we got to see this ....

A fast smooth descent towards the bottom for a total ride time of a very leisurely 4:30 for 88 km and only 1565m of vertical climbing. 

A day I'll never forget.

The Mt Nebo Goat Track vs Tourmalet

We don't really have mountains at home as the pictures below illustrate.  Here's the goat track at Mt Nebo _ I used to think that was hard ....

 

Here's the Tourmalet - with the same vertical scale for altitude note that the distances (horizontal axis) are not aligned.

Over here, they only count the last 17 km as a climb!!

Tourmalet/Hautacam/Gendarmes 1 Coolie 0

An amazingly hard day.  We rolled out from the hotel at around 8:00.  Alan Davis had decided to ride up the Tourmalet with us today - so some of the younger guys - all A graders went with him.  The guides led the rest of us out to the at what was supposed to be a relaxed tempo.  Unfortunately , what is a relaxed tempo for a three time tour stage winner had me working harder than I would have liked before we even got to the Tourmalet - lesson learned. 

The Tourmalet is 17 km of pain, climbing around 1300 m in absolutely beautiful surroundings. 

I settled in to my usual grinding pace (I need even more gears than I had planned for) and toughed it out.  I stopped a few times on the way to  meet new friends ....

... and to take a few pictures of the view.  By the time I got close to the top I was totally cooked and cramp was beginning to set in.  I actually had to climb off the bike and walk the last 30m  as the cramps were so bad.  I really did not drink enough on the climb - at home you don't spend almost 2 hours climbing in the hot sun!! Another lesson learned.  One guy in our group sheared the bolt on his saddle clamp and despite some noble attempts at repairs - he had to ride the last 5 km out of the saddle - an amazing effort.

It was freezing at the top and I ate and drank as much as I could before starting the descent.

 

The road at the top of the descent was amazingly bad - the surface was rutted and a patchwork of pothole repairs.  The bike was really shaking - both from the road and from me shivering with cold.  I rode the descent pretty conservatively and was truly amazed to see the speed that the pros came down that road later in the day. 

Towards the bottom of the descent the roads straightened out as well smoothed out and it was a fast run into the village at the base of the climb.  It was here that we had our first encounter with the Gendarmerie who insisted that we dismount and walk through the village.  For some reason, they had decided to close the course almost over an hour ahead of schedule and we quickly fell into the pattern of stopping dismounting, walking, remounting, stopping, dismounting walking etc. etc....

I'm not sure if the Mayor was determined to trap as many people as possible in the village but after about 3/4 of an hour and 50 gendarmes we had finally cleared the village and as a group of 4 were back riding on the course proper. 

The plan for the day had us riding the final climb of the day - the Hautacam and watching the finish at the top.  I wasn't sure that I would make it up the final climb, but knowing that the hotel was only around 20 km away down hill I knew would be able to roll home if I needed to.  There were people everywhere at the base of the climb and I was able to ride about 3 km up before I was stopped by the Gendarmes.  Given that I was totally buggered at this stage I just turned around and started the slow ride back to the hotel where I was able to rehydrate, eat, shower, do some laundry and watch the race on TV.  Total ride time of just a touch under 6 hours. 

Not many from our group made it up to the summit of the Hautacam as the roads closed much earlier than was planned.  Over dinner last night a hare brained scheme was hatched to just add the Hautacam onto the back end of tomorrow's ride!!  I'd love to do the climb so I'll tackle the Soulor and Aubisque first and see how I feel.

I've managed to post a few photos from the last couple of days - take a look here.

Coolie 1 Col d'Aspin 0 or Smiling in the Pain

 

A big but happy day.  An hour and a half on the bus to the starting point of today's ride.  The plan was to get on to the course and climb the last last 1st category climb of the day - the Col d'Aspin.  The first km was probably the hardest of the day - as they took us through some back streets which were some of the steepest roads that we climbed all day.  My theory was that they used that first little bi to shake the group down and sort the bunch into order - it worked.

 

We then rolled out through the country-side to the base of the climb - where we joined the course proper.  The road was closed - but there were people everywhere walking and riding up the climb to find a vantage point to watch the race come by in around 4-5 hours time.  I quickly fell into a rhythm the plan being to ride conservatively with a view to tomorrow's monster climbs.  When we got to the bottom we could  see the road snaking up the hill - behind and up - far up, from where we were.  It was like nothing we have at home. 

An hour or climbing later and I was at the summit - along with thousands of other riders and spectators taking photos and generally being amazed at the view and crowds.  I spotted Phil Anderson riding his new Malvern Star at the summit.  I didn't stay at the summit for long as it looked like it might rain.

 

 

 

The descent was not as bad as I thought.  There were far fewer people on that side of the mountain and it was a nice easy ride with some headwinds along the course until we were marshaled off with around 200m to go to the finish line.  We then found the busses, changed at headed back into town - waiting an for a couple of hours for the race to arrive.

After the finish it was back to the bus and on to Lourdes - a city where the Roman Catholic church meets the Shopping Channel.  I have never seen more tourist shops in one place in my life before.  A four course dinner in the hotel with a brief talk from one current and one former pro in Alan Davis and Dave Mackenzie.  Straight to bed after dinner but still a late night at around 10:30.  Tired but very pleased with myself.

Cool and wet - but at least I'm in Toulouse

It's around 7:00 pm and I've just had my first taste of the tour up close.  The TGV rather than the bus proved to be a master stroke as our hotel was right on the finish line of today's stage in Toulouse.  When I arrived at 1:30 the roads were already closed and as I sit here in the foyer more than 12 hours after the bus left they are still out there on the road somewhere. 

Even in the rain, the crowds came out today.  I have started what I suspect will be a non-sustainable habit of collecting freebies.  From around 3:00 onwards people paraded up and down the finishing straight handing out all kinds of schwag.  I think the rain dampened their enthusiasm somewhat as most of the schwag givers seemed pretty keen to hand out their quota of stuff and find somewhere dry to hide.  I managed to pick up a couple of big green hands, and around 4 or 5 hats.  I also picked up numerous squishy containers of pulped fruit, heaps of little cheeses, half a dozen bottles of water and a couple of packets of chips.  So much for the diet!!

Like a little squirrel I was able to duck back up to the hotel room and add to my little stash before venturing out again in search of more schwag. Eventually I found a spot on the barriers at the 150 m mark and waited for the peleton to arrive.  When they did, it was all over in a flash  Mark Cavendish won the sprint, while the rest of the peleton rolled by looking cold and wet and wanting to be somewhere warm and dry.

After the finish I had a bit of an explore around the finish line looking to do a Chaser style bonehead for the SBS cameras.  No success today - but I might make that my personal challenge for the rest of the trip.

Tomorrow we ride at long last - the forecast is for showers clearing (I think) so when we ride this .....

.... the Col d'Aspin hopefully the roads will be dry on the descent.  The Col d'Aspin is the last climb in tomorrow's stage and I think the plan is that we'll head ride the course over the climb then head down to our hotel and after that back to the finish line.  They tell us that this is an easy start to our trip and given that the next day is a monster I'll be riding as conservatively as I can.

Given that the bus hasn't arrived yet it looks like I'm eating alone tonight  .......

From Home to Eternity

I'm writing this from the comfort of the TGV on my way to Toulouse.  It's 8:30 in the morning and the French countryside is rocketing by the window at over 300 km/hr.  Since last I wrote, I've completed around 30 hours of non-stop travel - finally arriving in Paris at around 11:30 local time.  A brief moment of panic as we were told that the bicycles would come out at about three different locations but after a brief wait - I was reunited with all of my luggage - time to relax!!  A quick transfer to our hotel where the bike was assembled in record time before we set off at 2:00 for a gentle 40km shake down ride. 

I think it's fair to say that the whole travelling caper is tough.  I probably slept for three hours all of the way over and by the time I arrived I was ready to find a mattress and pilow for a little bit of quality nap time.  I toughed it out though, and stayed awake until after dinner.  Dinner was at a local restaurant about 5 minutes walk from the hotel.  The meal was typically French - a meal the "healthy heart" people would definitely not endorse. Chicken with creamy mushroom sauce, potatoes with a beautiful creamy sauce followed by a beautiful mini dark chocolate and banana tart.  Topped off with a glass of local petty poor red, I am happy to report that once desert was finished there was an almost immediate parade of tired travellers heading straight back to the hotel and bed. 

Riding on the "wrong" side of the road is going to take some getting used to - the cars come at you from all of the wrong directions.  The rules seem to be chain set to the curb and look for cars like in Sesame street.  Already the French motorists have demonstrated a far greater respect for cyclists than I've ever experienced.  Truck, yes that right, trucks wait patiently to pass and give you a wide berth.  Our ride was a very easy spin - which was just what I needed to get the legs going again.  Even though we are staying close to the airport, it wasn't long before we were on quiet country roads and rolling through quaint little villages.  It was amazing to see rolling wheat fields and have the strong smell of "the country" to deal with so close to Paris.  We had a little shower of rain on the ride - just enough to get the bikes dirty and us a little wet but by the time we got back we were mostly dry.  With that first ride out of the way I was very happy.

Today is a transfer day for us.  Most people are on the bus to Toulouse, while three of us opted for the TGV.  Our hotel in Toulouse is on the finishing line today and by taking the the train - I will definitely be there to see the finish of the race.  There is no guarantee that the bus will make the finish on time and frankly, I couldn't face the prospect of another 8 or 9 hours cooped up on another form of transport.  My TGV companions are heading off to the Airbus factory straight from the TGV -so I'll be flying solo today.  I knew I should have listened to those learn French tapes!!!!