La Grande Boucle Féminine Internationale is the womens Tour de France, and stage 2 is finishing just down the road at the Lacs de Haute Charante. My chance to go and see the worlds best women road racers in action.

The normally deserted causeway across the lake has been transformed into a 500m finishing straight complete with banners, podium, sound system, souvenir stall, and hundreds of people. The commentator tells us that the girls are around 30km away. Nicole Cooke and Priska Doppmann are off the front working hard together with a gap of 35seconds. There’s heavy showers, and as Celine Deone’s double entertains the crowd with songs I wonder if Nicole is enjoying the almost Welsh weather.

Current cycling champions of the Charente are presented for the crowds appreciation. Raymond Poulidor is there, along with a host of other cycling stars. Hey, and dont forget the mayor and the other dignified guests. All there to add weight and authenticity to the event.

Lead cars and motorbikes start to arrive, the atmoshere becomes electric. The head of the race drops onto the causeway. You can hardly see the two escapees for all the vehicules. They race toward the line. Cooke allows the higher placed overall Doppmann to take the win. No fuss, no bother, it’s teamwork, job done!

It’s over a minute before Alona Andruk brings home the bunch. OK, now it’s chaos. Riders everywhere with at least five languages going on at the same time, amonst photographers, motorbikes, helpers, coaches, and idiots like me! Oh, and a group of young French lads chasing after the girls asking if they can have their bidons.

I spot Nicole Cooke coming back along the road. Every few feet she pauses for photographers. She looks clean, fresh, and very happy. You’d never guess that shed just completed over 100km in heavy showers along rural French roads. The worlds number 1 ranked woman cyclist, what a star.

A while back I entered the London to Paris 3 day cycling event. When you enter you have to specify which of three groups you want to ride in. Group one being the fastest, containing all the ex-pros, group three being the slowest. I put myself down for group two.

Now as the months have gone by the organisers of the event have held training rides, and have used these as a guide to form. Because I haven’t been able to attend any of these rides I was worried that I might get misplaced groupwise. So, I sent a copy of my “Gold” certificate from the La Limousine as proof of my form. A couple of days later I got an email back saying that I had been put in group 1. 🙂 Better than a birthday!!!
So I’ll be riding with two of the toughest men that ever rode a bike, namely Sean Kelly, and Johan Museeuw, not to mention a host of other pros and ex pros. At last, I made it into the professional peleton! I’m chuffed to bits 🙂

It’s the day after La Limousin, and I’m doing the rando at Bonnac La Cote. While I’m signing on I see that there is also a “chrono” option. It’s an off-road climb of the ‘Col de la Sablonnade’ against the clock. I just can’t stop myself, I sign up for it.

Here’s how it works. Riding the 40km option at “allure libre” (your own speed), you follow the red arrows. After 11km there will be a split, and those who have signed up for the chrono race up the col.

The grand depart is a fairly steady affair, so I use the first 11km to spin my legs. Suprisingly, although they have 155km of road in them from yesterday they don’t feel too bad. It’s the brain that is having trouble. I’ve forgotten my bottle, my mitts are still in the van, i’ve gone for long sleeves, and I’m far too hot. I bounce off a few rocks, that seems to bring me around a little.

Arriving at the start of the chrono section I find a short queue of riders waiting to start. I take a pee while I try to work out where I want to be. I don’t want to be behind riders who look slow ‘cos I might get held up, and I don’t want fast looking riders behind me as it’ll be demoralising. After a few minutes I just get in the queue anyway.

It’s a simple start. One foot on the ground, the timekeeper counts you down, and away you go for a few kilometres of pain. The faster you go, the sooner the pain ends, and if you don’t feel sick, you aint tryin hard enough, I tell myself. “3 – 2 – 1 – partez”, with only thirty second intervals between riders I can see the rider ahead as we race around the edge of a lake.

There’s some “whoopy doopy” stuff before we get onto the climb, I’m gaining on the rider in front so I’m able to use him to see which way we go. Onto the climb, he’s not far ahead. Now I’m caught by a rider who storms past, climbing like a man posessed. I can’t match that!

The ascent of the Col de la Sablonnade is agony, steep rocky sections with false flats to sap your will. I’m goin’ OK, and although I got caught my my 30second man I go on to catch 9 riders! The line comes into sight. I sprint for an imaginary one beyond it. That hurt.

There’s a feed station just a wobble away, I gulp down some juice and water. All of a sudden I feel absolutely exhausted. On the remainder of the ride I find it hard to make any pace at all, no matter because the scenery is fabulous. I stop to admire the view a few times.

Back at the start I check the results. 18th, but 3rd in >50s category!!! Not bad for a tired bloke. I’m happy with that.

A 155 kilometre French cyclo-sportive, not for the faint-hearted or those of a nervous disposition. 1200 cyclists are sent 4km back from the official start line to a staged “Grand Depart” in the centre of Limoges, 15 minutes is set aside for the riders to cover the 4km back to the real start. This is done by taking 15mins off everyones finish time (hope you’re following this). So if you cover the 4km faster than 15mins you’ve bought yourself some extra time for the 155km. Got it? This explains why the first few kilometres are ridden at such a breakneck speed. Here’s how it went for me…

Although I’d sent my entry in at the last minute I got number 103. This meant that I was allowed into the 1-200 pen. There’s around 1800 cyclists altogether of which 1200 are doing the full 155km distance (there were shorter options). The cyclists were held back by a fleet of motorcycle outriders and official cars. As the final minutes are counted down the commentator whips everyone into a frenzy, and then, partez!!!!

The pace was unbelieveable, you’d have thought the finish was just around the corner, I’ve been in slower criteriums!!! It was mad, and I was in the first 200, I can’t imagine what it was like further back. Anyway, we raced up through the official start where hundreds of screaming kids had been bused in to add to the atmosphere, armed with flags and baloons, a deafening spectacle.

Out into the hills, I reckoned that the safest place to be was near the front, and I tried to move up as best I could. But, so does every other rider. 10km gone and near the bottom of a tricky descent there’s a crash, bikes and bodies everywhere, possibly 20 – 30 riders down, and some of them look bad. There’s one in particular that looks like he’s slid down the storm drain, covered from top to toe in mud. There’s shouts of “bon courage” as we pick our way through.

Up ahead I can see a split in the field. That’ll do, I spend some energy to move up. We’re climbing now, a lot, there’s riders coming backwards, riders going forwards as the climbs bite. There’s even some riders from the crash, bloodied and muddied, but back in the action. I’m near the front of the second group on the road, there’s a long long way to go. Things seem to be settling down a bit now, we’ve been riding for 40 minutes.

The kilomtres fly past, the pace remains high, there’s no shortage of workers, and glancing over my shoulder I see there’s no shortage of sitters on either. After a while I start to recognise the riders that like to climb, and the ones that like to descend (like nutters). In what seems like no time at all we’re on the climb to Bursac, the half-way point. I’m expecting a bottle from Carla at the top so I stay right near the front. The climbs are long, but not steep, and I’m enjoying them!!!

Dependable as ever, my lover is waiting for me at a perfect place. I take a bottle and some encouragement. Over the top, we race down towards Silord the village of Andre Dufraisse, as we enter the village there are placards, one for each year of Andre Dufraisse’s reign as world champion, or French champion. It’s an impressive display. There’s crowds in the village to cheer us on.

After Chateauponsac now, and we are on our way home, there’s some tired legs, and still some big hills to climb. The final big climb after Compreignac is a tough one. I’m in a group of 7 as we yo-yo back and forth false flat after false flat.

A long fast descent then a sliky smooth rollercoaster, someone flicks a switch and we tap through like pro’s. The last 30 kilometres seem effortless as we float along. A motorcycle outrider clears traffic for us as we race into the outskirts of Limoges, he is brilliant. Into the “Arrive” at Panazol we sprint for the line 🙂 what a day!!!

Statistically, I was 62nd rider home, 5th in category. I’d ridden the 155km (with 2287metres of climbing) in 04:43:59:06 with an average speed of 32.748kph.

My S-Works Roubaix had performed faultlessly, a great bike for the job. I’d got through 3 * 500ml bottles containing High 5, and eaten 1 bannana and half a jam sandwich. Oh and half a small bottle of plain water that had been handed up at a water station.

The Repas at the “Arrive” was excellent. Food always tastes better when you’ve earned it, and to top off the perfect day I met Andre Dufraisse in person. He might be a very old man now, but he’s been there, done that!

On the last stage Ben rode to an amazing 9th place, and won the junior category. I was second team rider home in 31st :). I placed 9th overall in the master 2 category (FFC), but if they had a category for the over 50s I would have been second! Pete and Phil finished lower down the overall master 2 rankings, but that was due in part to the tactics we used. Overall we were 9th team, but as we were the first Equipe Anglaise (English Team) to ever enter they honoured us at the prize giving with a trophy and a huge hamper!!! Not bad for three ‘old fellas’ and a kid! You’ll find a full set of results here.

It was a fantastic event, and in all the years I have ridden and raced it must rank as one of the best I have ever done.

My Bike? – I used a Specialized Epic comp with Rebas, shod with a Spesh Rockster on the front, and a Specialized Chunder on the back. Both run with tubes at 45psi. It was just right for the job, and I made the most of the rear suspension on the rocky trails. Of course I’d love an S-works carbon one for next year!!!

My Training? – I spent months training for this event, doing long rides on heavy tyres. As the event got nearer I put long rides back to back over consecutive days. I even lost weight. It felt great to line up on the start line knowing that I had the miles in my legs. Riding so strongly on the third day, maybe I could have swapped some miles for speedwork. I was expecting to be in the saddle longer each day.

Would I do it again? – Can’t wait until next year! 😉

Gu̩ret РLa Souterraine 60kms

After a great nights sleep it’s an early start for the final stage. Crawling out of my sleeping bag I feel pretty good, nowhere near as stiff and tired as I was expecting. It’s now 6am, and what happens in the next hour and a half is nothing short of amazing. By 7:30am over 250 riders have been fed, their bags packed, and the hall cleared. We joke that there must be a basketball match on at eight.

We are on our bikes rolling along in a neutralised sort of way through the town of Guéret enroute to the start. Our plan today? Every man for himself! After two days of waiting for the ‘old fellas’ Ben is keen to race near the front. I’m keen to measure myself also as this is my first big race for years. The obligatory speech from the organiser and we’re on our way.

It’s uphill out of the town, but it’s not too bad as it climbs then eases then climbs again. The pace is high, and it’s hard to move up. On the higher ground the terrain is more rolling. I’ve managed to claw my way onto the back of a group of ten riders being dragged along by a couple of engines. I cannot believe how fast we are going as the two engines batter against each other. Why? I know not, maybe it’s personal.
Continue reading →

Bourganeuf – Guéret 60kms

Right, day two… after a reasonable night sleep I’m awake on a half-deflated air bed, dying for a pee. It’s 6:30, and there are riders up already fiddling and fussing. Now breakfast isn’t until 08:00, and the race don’t start until 10:00, so what they are doin’ is beyond me. I go for a pee, then get back into bed to watch. Conserving energy seems like the sensible thing to do. OK, some of them are preparing camelbak type things with powders etc. Dudes, there’s revitalment stations every 20km! Why would you need 1.5ltrs of water strapped to your back?

Breakfast is continental style, croissants, coffee, cereal, juice, biscuits, fruit, bread. Followed by…..a big dump of course! 😉 As I put my fresh cycling kit on and pack my bag it occurs to me that I don’t feel too bad. Bag loaded onto the camion, I’m ready. Carla’s voice in my head, “you should be spinning those legs by nowâ€?. So I ride around outside in an easy gear to loosen my legs. “Have you done any stretching?â€?, I go through a short stretching routine, then begin to warm up more purposefully.

I notice some of the “fast boysâ€? checking out the first kilometer or so. I join them. A flat start 500m dash, then a left-hander onto a short steep tarmac ramp (probably a minutes worth), then a right across the top of a field, and into singletrack. I reckon It’s gonna be a painful mad dash, might even throw breakfast back up…. Continue reading →