Hey folks…I had from 4:30 pm on Friday to 10:30 am on Sunday to do some riding, so I managed to get down to the Alps on the weekend…Friday evening 3 hour ride including an ascent of Alpe d’Huez in 58.50, Saturday 9 am to 6 pm on the bike with 8.5 hours of riding over the Croix de Fer, Col de Mollard, down to St. Jean de Maurienne over to St. Michel de Maurienne, up the Telegraphe over the Galibier and back to my start point at Bourg D’Oisans…over 16,000 ft of climbing in that time and nearly got killed on the Galibier descent flying around a blind corner at close to 70 kph to be greeted by a heard of cows…Sunday morning back on the bike at 7:30 am for another 3 hours with another attempt to better my Alpe d’Huez climb time, but this time the legs were toast and I only did 60.40…I actually was feeling smoother on the Trek OCLV rental bike by Sunday having gone through several micro adjustments (vs Friday when I just slapped the seat in position and hoped that I would feel fluid).
The Saturday ride was similar to the famed Marmott loop where you leave Bourg d’Oisans go up Croix de Fer, down to St. Jean, over to St. Michel, up Telegraphe and Galibier and down via Lauteret before the Bourg d’Oisan start of the Alpe d’huez climb. My plan was to do the Marmott loop but end on Les Deux Alpes (similar to when Marco Pantani beat Jan Ullrich in 1998), but I was forced up the Mollard detour that totally took wind out of my sails (added 90 minutes to my ride with the detour). I ended up just coasting in to B d’O at the end of the day at 6 pm after the hardest ride of my life (I think), and chose/was forced instead to save any remaining legs for a Sunday AM ride before driving back up to Geneva to catch a flt to London.
Anyway, pretty cool when you can rent a Trek OCLV with Ultegra for 48 hours for only 60 Euros. I brought my Arione Road saddle, pedals, and helmet from home! I have to say, that this was one sweet bike on the descents. Descending Galibier or Alpe d’huez, I was barely touching the brakes except the hairpins, connecting turns like a rockstart slalom skier just pointing my belly button at where I needed the bike to go and it would just rip down the mountain. The Mollard descent, however was pretty nuts. A few times I got into a trance and just let it rip on the single width road and then I would come flying around a corner and be greeted by a car and have to squeeze to one side to get by at high speed…at those times, I would I would try to suppress in my mind that I am actually a parent with real world responsibilities…something about flying down a mountain, with nothing but you, some carbon fiber, 2 square inches of rubber touching the road and 1000 ft drop on one side that on the one hand reminds you of your mortality, but at the same time drives you to the rush of “living on the edge”.
Anyway, I took lots of pics on the Saturday ride…here goes:
Ascent to Croix de Fer
Summit of Croix de Fer
Torturous ~50 min uphill detour back up to the summit of Col de Mollard (instead of continuing down the 30+ K descent of Galibier)
View from the Col de Mollard Descent
Looking up at the Telegraphe station near the summit of the Col de Telegraphe
Looking down at St Michel from near Telegraphe station at spot from where I took previous pic looking up
Scenery from the “Velvet slopes of the Galibier” (at this point, my speed is barely 9-13 kph up at >8000 ft above sea level
Galibier Summit
Herd of Cows on Galibier descent around 8300 ft above sea level that I nearly hit at 70 kph!
I hope this was a fun tour for the roads…Lots of Cadel, Contador, Rassmussen etc paint lines on the tarmac
