Day Three: 29th June 2015very bright start to Day 3 which refers not to the weather, but to the latest sartorial
offering from Maxwell House. Ahead of us that day was Alpe d’Huez, legendary in
the Tour de France for its swarming orange clad supporters at ‘Dutch Corner’.
In homage to the Nederlanders, Max was adorned in his Boldmere Bullets shirt
and matching orange trimmed shorts. Maintaining the theme of not quite matching
ensembles from the previous day, he wore some socks that we suspect
he’d borrowed from his grandfather. The designer in Keelan was most perturbed
by the clashing Pantone colours and dug in his day bag for a colour wheel to
provide some elementary instruction to Max in how best to avoid catastrophic couture
faux pas.
It was
notable too that, despite offending the entire United Nations the evening
before, Lord T had succeeded in delivering an elementary lesson in the
mechanics of thermos dynamics; his warm milk was dutifully presented to him by
the charming Irish waitress who so patiently looked after our breakfast needs.
A quick
glance at our day cards for Day 3 reveals a rather vertiginous start to the
day. Just 500 metres from the door of the hotel was the base of Alpe d’Huez, a
climb I believe we were all looking forward to tackling. The Alpe has 21
hairpin bends, numbered in descending numerical order from the bottom and each
of them carries the name of a former conqueror of the mountain from Tour de
France history.
Unlike
most other roads up which we traverse, the Alpe is not a col; it leads instead
to an alpine village which plays host to some of Europe’s finest ski fields. In
the winter, those that reach its lofty heights do so in a coach, the engine
whining as it crawls its way up the steep gradient, often for prolonged
stretches of 10% to 12%, particularly near the bottom. It is little wonder when
one considers the terrain that it is a mountain up which the Tour de France has
often been won and lost.
The 15km
from the base at 715m to its final elevation of 1,815m leads to an average
climb of 7.3%. Blessedly, we began early in the day, before the blistering heat
of the afternoon would have an opportunity to affect our ride, but the climb
was no less challenging for the cooler temperature.
I
settled in to my customary spot at the back of the pack and allowed my
breakfast of eggs, croissant, baguette, ham and cheese, with an added bowl of
muesli and yoghurt to remind me that I am an idiot, and lumbered up the hill.
The
countdown of the corners was a tortuous affair, 21 slowly eked into 20, 20 to
19. At each corner my speed, or lack thereof, was sufficiently sluggish to
grant me enough time to read each sign, noting that in some instances, more
than one rider’s name appeared; mine is never likely to join theirs, unless
perchance a namesake should astound the Tour with his exploits in the future.
As the
corner numbers whittled down, I whittled up, ever conscious of the fatigue I
was feeling. My preparations for this year’s trip left a little to be desired
and it was beginning to tell on me in the early part of Day 3.
Passing through
the sprawling lower reaches of the ski resort, I spotted the rest of our party
already tucking into coffee and cake, their morning’s effort complete. Gentle
encouragement from the touring party was offered, I satisfied myself that I was
near the last of the hairpins, although to my annoyance I discovered that the
numbering began at 0 rather than 1; I momentarily joined Turton in a spot of
French bashing.
Caroline
very kindly escorted me to the ‘summit’ of Alpe d’Huez, a somewhat innocuous
sign proclaiming ‘Arrivée’. Notably, the road continues up for another few
hundred metres to a higher plane but not the finish point for this ride, a fact
that was lost on Max and Keelan who, in taking a slightly different route
through the town, managed to scale to a loftier height but, alas, did not reach
the ‘Summit’. It is a sad fact which must be recorded, that despite cycling 90
minutes up an iconic mountain, that they failed to complete the ride, a
circumstance that they will vigorously deny, but which equally, Lord Turton of
Teddington, will remind them of for the rest of the trip, and I am quite
certain, in future years. I too shall remind them that, although it took me 2
hours, I did finish the route, which is rather more than can be said for the
rest of the day.
From
Alpe d’Huez we descended towards Allemond and a lunch stop. Our route saw us
clinging to the mountainside as we meandered gently down the valley through yet
more inspiring topography. Man’s contribution to nature was again on display
with yet another lake formed from damming of the river by EDF. We paused
beneath the road bridge that ran on one side of the dam for lunch in one of the
few places offering respite from the sun.
people argue that cycling is as much a state of mind as it is of physical
fitness. I’m inclined to agree, because what lay before us was a 27km ascent of
the Col de la Croix de Fer and, at 2,067m, the highest point we would reach
this year. For much of lunch I was telling myself that I probably wouldn’t be
able to make it. The heat of the day, the weariness from the preceding two and
a half days’ riding and a stomach that couldn’t decide whether it wanted to contain
its lunch, were all weighing heavily on my thoughts.
As lunch
concluded I decided that I would keep going for as long as I could, doing my
level best to reach the summit, but knowing in my heart that I wouldn’t make
it. Wearily I set off, the first three kilometres from our lunch break
providing a steady, yet gentle climb. We passed the power generation plant at
the end of the lake and as the road curled around it, the steady incline
dramatically pitched, to an extent that my Garmin responded with an ‘autopause’
moment – seemingly it believed I had stopped. Normally at this juncture, for it
has occurred on more than one occasion, I utter a string of profanity aimed at
the inanimate object on my handle bars, imploring it to recognise that, whilst
I might be proceeding at an unutterably slow pace, I am still nevertheless moving;
there is momentum, it is forward and not, as Garmin would lead me to believe,
sideways, falling into the road.
In this
instance, however, no such outburst occurred, instead I thought to myself, “You
know what Garmin, you have a point.” I decided then, just one ninth into the
afternoon’s journey, that I need not do any more. I quickly reasoned that it
was unlikely I would finish and that I would therefore not have a Croix de la
Fer shaped notch in the bedpost. If I wasn’t going to be able to bag the mountain,
what was the need to prolong the agony? In the time I had to think this
through, I drew nearer to the van and the waiting Caroline. I drew a hand across
my neck. “I’m done”, I said, and with that my day got infinitely better.
Further
proving my point that a lot of cycling is in the mind, my fatigue lifted, my
stomach ailment vanished and my spirits soared – not so much that I
contemplated, even for a moment, getting back on the bike, but I was a
considerably happier chap. Departing from the ranks of a cyclist, I joined
those of the support crew and took to my duties with aplomb.
I’ve been in the van before, this was the first occasion on which I had done so
on a calculated, voluntary basis. Last year the cold on the Iseran and the
lateness of the hour on Izoard conspired against me, and my misery that first
time left me incapable of feeling supportive to my fellow riders. This time was
altogether different and I bounded about the van filling water buckets, dousing
riders, providing sustenance and enthusiastic encouragement. My joy may have
given Richard pause to think a day spent in the comfort of the van, rather than
on the saddle of a bike, was an alternative worth considering. To his great
credit, his resolve and stoicism shone through and he ploughed on up the
mountain.
from the van provided me with a curious insight into this sport of ours. Universally,
the party looked weary, all seemingly tired, pained and suffering. Yet still
they powered on, grinding up mountains, fiercely determined to complete the
day’s challenge. People have often asked me why I do it; I’ve often enough
asked myself the same question, and never been able to satisfactorily answer
it, but as I witnessed one rider after another inching ever higher up the
mountain, I realised why I do it. Standing at the top of each col, having
photos taken beneath summit markers, looking back down the mountain at the
wending road up which one has just ridden; powered only by the legs, the lungs
and the mind. I recognise that for me at least, it’s the sense of
achievement. What we do is hard, we may
all go at different paces, but as Greg Lemond said, “It never gets easier, you
just go faster.” For each of us it’s painful, but at the end of the day, when
one looks back at what has been accomplished, it is deeply satisfying – or it
would have been if I wasn’t sponging down seven blokes from the back of the
van.
Prior to
our trip, Max had circulated a YouTube clip of a wiry young cyclist making an
ascent up the Col de la Croix de Fer with barely a pause to draw breath. He narrated
the climb as though sitting in an armchair rather than on the back of a bike up
a brutal 27km long incline. He made it look ridiculously easy, a lesson in
cycling that I could only marvel at. He was as fresh at the top as he’d been at
the bottom, showing no notable fatigue at what he’d just done. By contrast, our
party looked a little jaded and indeed, possibly addled; no one more so than
Stuart who, ever keen to evidence his prowess in descending, set off to enjoy
the spoils of his labour. Happily for Stuart, due to my somewhat more relaxed
afternoon, I was a little sharper than I might otherwise have been as I noticed
him head off in the wrong direction.
I spent considerable
time as an errant youth mastering the art of whistling and as I watched him
disappear, I put my fingers to my mouth and blew. The ear piercing screech that
followed registered with Stuart and he turned back to see me waving violently
in his direction. Cue taken, he returned to us, to his undeniable shame. Stuart
is a master when heading downhill and had he gone, even though we’d spied him,
there would have been no way of catching him until the bottom of the mountain.
Suffice to say, Stuart topped the points table that evening for his near miss
and tales of an unscheduled visit to Andorra once more prevailed.
It had
been a tough day and having ridden two massive mountains, it was determined
that the day, if not the overall journey, be foreshortened. Our hotel, the fabulously sited Hôtel Le
Beauséjour, was a further 600 metres up the Col de la Madeleine, the first of
tomorrow’s climbs. Had the group climbed
that 600 metres, the following day’s ride would have begun halfway up the col. It was agreed that by beginning at elevation,
the climb would not be completed in a single attempt and we would therefore be
‘cheating’. Instead of making the final
climb of the day as planned, the group dismounted and bikes were put into the
van for a drive to the hotel, a prudent enough decision, but one that Max and Keelan thought was a bit soft. After all,
they were still fresh from not having completed Alpe d’Huez.
Cycling
aside, the day was made by the team at the hotel. The welcome from Isabelle,
our maître d’, was generous and the service superb, all delivered with a
healthy bon viveur, flowing beer and delicious food. The dog on reception, as
Lord T declared in what we thought was yet another of his slurs, proved to be
just that; a terrier whose preferred resting spot was on the top of the
reception desk, adding to a very quirky air, and the setting, on the side of a
mountain with majestic views, was unparalleled and for once I wasn’t too
knackered to enjoy it.