Never read anything at Midnight

On Apr 15, 2010, at 11:56 PM, Nan wrote:

Just read your great summary - only now I'm really going to vomit. This is insane, beyond me.


You read this at Midnight? Darn I was hoping you'd be asleep. Really you should read it in the daylight, with a second large glass of wine to hand and Bekka rolling around at your feet. Stuff read at Midnight always seems so distressing and depressing.

I have a long (of course) argument all laid out on training and prep and your technique for coping, but I need to be at work in a few hours.

You have made a great suggestion though. Maybe all of us should exert ourselves until we vomit (I'm eating breakfast so that sentence is distressing) and just get over the fear of finding that intimidating boundary.

Yes this is a little insane, but look at the four of us, we're not really the safe and steady path types, we're not the "I'm not looking up at that mountain to so I don't see what I'm missing", types are we Miss," I'm doing a Triathlon the week we go to France"?

Base jumping may not be our thing, nor is sitting around doing the same thing over and over when we have the option to explore.

This may be my last, best chance to explore a place I've never been (not just geographically). I know what I want to do and I know I may not be able to do it cleanly, but hey the bike washes off easily.

Ben

Nan: Ben and Julianne, my faithful friends, stuck by me after my foolish bike fall. (Here patiently standing in the emergency room). Now, to be a cyclist and to give up a ride on a sunny spring morning to hang out in a hospital just to see a friend through the ordeal, now that's sacrifice. Couldn’t want two better friends for the ride through the Pyrenees. Hopefully no more triage there! Thanks to you both.

So where are we going

Maps are without a doubt the coolest invention. A map can be read right to left top to bottom or upside down and make equal sense in any direction. Their story is both fiction and nonfiction.

Pyrénées
The snippet at left spans the the most famous of Pyrenian climbs from just east of the Col du Tourmalet down the pass to Luz-Saint-Sauveur (where we will spend 5 days) then down the Gorge de Luz to the turnoff (west) to climb the Col du Soulor and Col d' Ausbisque. At the north edge is Hautacam. Another famous and apparently god awful climb not on our itinerary, but maybe...Hautacam, like Luz Ardiden a dead end climb to a ski resort, has been a TdF stage finish 4 times - 1994, 1998, 2000, 2008. Armstrong gained a 4 minute lead on Urlich here in 2000. Securing his victory that year.

Armstrong crashed with Iban Mayo, then recovered and won the stage on Luz-Ardiden in 2003. A stage finish 7 times - 1985, 1987, 1988, 1990, 194, 2001, 2003. Besides Armstrong this climb has been won by the famous -Miguel Indurain (1990) and infamous -Richard Virenque (1994). Ardiden is not on the list either, but it's so close.

But I am getting ahead of the story.

The group ride kicks off from Toulouse, main city of the Midi-Pyrénées region. and heads to Quillan for the first night. Easy, flat. We'll get to shake off the jet lag and sort out the other riders on this tour.

From Quillan it gets more interesting. The first real climbs start on day 2 with three route options. All end on the Plateau de Bonascre.

Options, options

1. Drive to the town of Ax-les-Thermes and ride the final climb to Plateau de Bonascre - 7.8km averaging 8.6% (11.9% max)

2. Get on the bike at Quillan and ride 53km to its base going over Col de Chioula (1431m), then up the 7.8km to PdB. Quillan is at 291m, Plateau de Bonascre is at 1378m. Just 61 km of up-down-up.

3. The 3rd option is over Port de Pailhères, the race route, at 2001m just 114m lower than Col du Tourmalet, 67km to the base of Plateau de Bonascre, then the 7.8km to the finish. Porte de Pailheres is said to be a slow easy climb from Quillan for the first 32km, then a tough 11km at 7, 8 & 9%.
After all this riding it's into the van for transit to Luz St. Sauveur. Should be interesting, 16 very tired, and likely sweaty riders in one vehicle, just before dinner. At least our first view of the Tourmalet is not on the bike.

Morning of day 3 we're up in Luz St Sauveur. Up is figurative as Luz St Sauveur is the bottom of the bag. Surrounded by the most storied climbs in the Pyrenees - Tourmalet and Col d'Aspin east and up, Luz-Ardiden to the immediate west and up, Hautacam south and a little down then way up. It's south and west to the double up of Col du Soulor and Col d'Ausbisque.

4 days, 6 Cols, 4 are doubled up. Kind of a two for one heart attack Col combination plate.

Did I mention the Tour de France passes through town twice? And of course to get more than a fleeting look we too will have to climb up and over a Col to watch them come up the other side. 4 days, 5708 meters of possible up.

Then a change. After 6 days in the hills it is flatlander time outside of Bordeaux at Pauillac. The 51km Time Trial course is open to cyclist.

Then recover and next day watch the time trial on the next to last day of the 2010 TdF.

Then disassemble the bikes, box them up and get up early next morning and hop the TGV to Paris to watch the final laps on Avenue des Champs-Élysées.

Then we relax.