As I write this I’m half way between London and Washington DC. It’s two weeks, almost to the minute, before I’m due to collapse in an exhausted, but deeply satisfied heap at the top of L’Alpe d’Huez and, frankly, it’s starting to get a little bit too real.
It’s on that I haven’t made progress in the last 9 months- less than a month ago I’d never ridden 100 miles and I’ve now done it twice. The first time was over a course that involved 7,000 feet of climbing, the second just under 10,000. That’s roughly half and two-thirds respectively of what we’ll face when we leave Gap.
And everyone tells me that, although they feel infinitely longer, the climbs on the Etape won’t be as steep as they were on the Circuit of Cotswolds, where the gradients twice headed beyond 25% for sustained periods.
Anything over about 18% is somewhat academic for me – an extra couple of degrees doesn’t matter much when you’re walking – but what the two centuries proved to me is that I can climb 5-15% all daywithout much difficulty (or, to be fair, much if any speed…).
The
cut-off times don’t look too bad, either – in spite of RCUK’s attempts
to terrify us by actually describing the climbs... I crawled around the
105 mile Circuit of the Cotswolds course in eight and a half hours and
the time limit on the Etape will allow me two hours to do the extra
seven miles. Which seems about right.
So, the riding’s not worrying me too much. And the bike’s almost in
final spec. As supplied by Wilier the Le Roi was a very nice handling –
if slightly harsh riding – pro-quality aluminium frame and carbon fork,
with pretty decent road racing components – Ritchey RCS stem and bars,
carbon seatpost and Campagnolo Record everywhere. The Conti GP 3000s
had been well used, so they were replaced with a pair of 20mm GP 4000s,
which was a mistake and then with an Attack/Force pair which seem to
have improved the already impressive
handling.
Unfortunately, the bikes were in Dutch
classics configuration with a 52-39 chainring on the front and an 11-23
cassette on the back which wasn’t going to get 15 and a half stone of
fat forty year old up an alp in a month of Sundays, let alone 10 and a
half hours.
Initially, I toyed with fitting a triple
but that would have meant new front and rear mechs and a new bottom
bracket, so I opted for a compact chainset. Of course, Campag only does
the compact cranks for the top-end gruppos in carbon, so I opted for
the somewhat cheaper but only fractionally heavier Chorus version. A
couple of hundred winter miles with some dirty overshoes and the logo
will be sanded off anyway…
The theory is that you
need a new front mech for the CT cranks to cope with the 50-34
chainring difference, but Adrian managed to get it to work fine. Which
was a shame because I’d already ordered the CT front mech and was just
waiting for it to arrive.
I did my first century on the first drivetrain revision and it was fine
but I didn’t feel I had a lot in reserve with the sprockets I had on
there. So I bit the bullet and bought a 13-29 cassette – which required
a new rear mech.
After about 35 miles on the Circuit
of the Cotswolds I was riding along chatting to a guy who commented on
how much easier the course was than he’d been expecting – just gentle
rolling countryside. I was about to ask him if he was joking when the
road turned left onto a single track road and went straight up. Half
way up the second part of the climb I pulled a muscle in my calf which
I had to nurse the rest of the way round. By 45 miles any gradient
longer than a sleeping policemen had me reaching for that 29 tooth
sprocket. And, if I’m honest, I was tempted on a couple of the more
challenging speed bumps. But even in that state got to the 25% hill at
about the 60 mile mark before admitting defeat and walking what I
naively assumed would be about half of it (it turned out to be more
like 90%...)
With about 12 miles ago I was chatting
to a rider from Royal Sutton CC who seemed indecently fresh, but was
pleasantly surprised to find that he did 3 or 4 of these things a year
and that he’d only left about 20 minutes after me. I was somewhat less
chuffed when he admitted he’d stopped off for
lunch…
So, replacing the drivetrain and losing a
stone in weight have both helped – as have the miles I’ve put in. On
the one hand, the miles I’ve managed are far less than everyone tells
me I need but, on the other, far more than I’ve ever ridden before. And
they’re going to have to be enough now. There are two weeks to go. I
plan to lose another half a kilo (by fitting a pair of lightweight
wheels – with my diary for the next two weeks they’re only likely to
offset the body weight I’m going to add back on…) but there’s not much
more I’m going to be able to do in terms of
miles.
Tomorrow and Wednesday I’m at a conference in
the US and then flying home. Thursday I’m off to see a client in
France. Friday I have a morning meeting and might manage to squeeze a
short mountain bike ride in during the afternoon and maybe a club 10 in
the evening; Saturday I have commitments with the kids all day; Sunday
I’m photographing a mountain bike event. Let’s be generous and call
that cross training… I usually have to scramble up the odd dirt bank
loaded down with equipment.
Monday I have
meetings all day, Tuesday I might, just, get to Hillingdon to practice
at the pace I’m going to need for the first 50k of the Etape. Wednesday
I’m running a training course; Thursday I might get a ride in during
the morning and then in the afternoon I fly to Geneva, flying back on
Friday night to photograph a track race on Saturday morning, then
flying out to Lyon on Saturday evening to get to our Etape HQ (a field
with a tent in). If I manage a gentle 30 miles or so on the Sunday
after signing on (and before the World Cup final…) I’ll have squeezed
in 65 miles in a fortnight. Hardly ideal preparation, but when I look
back on how stupid the whole idea was in the first place; on the series
of colds and chest infections that kept me off the bike almost
completely from the beginning of November to the end of January and on
how much further, how much faster and how much, erm, uphiller I can
ride now compared to nine months ago I’m confident I’ll be getting to
the top of d’Huez on my Wilier, not in the back of the bus. I just hope
my team mates are waiting at the summit with a cold beer.
