Firstly, an apology.
I’m able to publish this blog every day but I wanted to publish this yesterday and it was just not feasible.
I was receiving great, fantastic and supportive messages about the blogs for the stages and I know people were looking forward to reading it but when we missed a channel tunnel train at 4.20am on Sunday morning after a 12-hour dash through the length of France in the car, it made it almost impossible for reasons of exhaustion and family and all that stuff to get this out.
And honestly, I think it works getter because if this is a blog to me, it’s given me 24 hours to reflect on the final stage of the Haute Route Pyrenees (HRP) and everything that goes with that.
I’m not going to do that thing where, because I have so much to say, I break this into 4 sequels and a prequel and a spin-off series.
I’m going to distil all my words into this post and then move onto the other amazing and wonderful things that are going on this week and from here.
We started off at 9.30am on Saturday morning for the final stage of HRP.
I would roll off the mountain and reach the race village at 3.14pm.
Nearly 6 hours to do 54 miles.
They’d saved the best till last. A ‘short, easy’ stage with almost 10,000 feet of climbing over 40 miles (+ a 12-mile descent afterwards).
Stage 5 started in Saint-Lary-Soulan which is where the village had been set up the day before.
It was the final focal point for HRP in a beautiful little town nestled in the valleys of the Pyrenees.
The night before we had all paid the extra for a 60-minute massage for our broken bodies (which was utter paradise) we’d been fed there, and we were able to soak up a little bit of the atmosphere before we drove up and over the hill to stay the night as the only residents in a ski resort which was effectively shut for the summer (Carl and Louis did a 5 video series of ‘who holidays in a hotel like this’ Loyd Grossman style. This is utterly hilarious and if you comment or message me then we’ll post these for you to see.
The thing was that the drive up and over the mountain was actually the first climb of stage 5 and so, it’s fair to say that by the time I had seen what we were in for straight from the gun on Saturday, I was somewhat concerned.
We were able to drive up that climb and then down it the next morning, so we had an idea of what was going on before we did it.
We set off at 9.30am on the 5th of 5 days with 0.8km of neutralised controlled speed, legs spinning before turning into 7 miles at an average of 8% elevation.
I met up at the back of the peloton with my new friends in our little ragtag bunch but particularly Matt from two towns down in Scotland where I grew up.
Louis went straight to the front, Alex a little bit further back from the front with guys that he had met from ‘the north’.
Louis would go on to have his best day of the whole event chasing a place in the top 50 (this is a quite unbelievable achievement considering that some of the guys at the top of the race were proper professional Tour de France cyclists some of whom had worn their jerseys.
Louis has thrived in this environment; he is a born racer, and he loves the race. He would ride away from the guys who were competing for the top 50 places up the final climb to finish an incredible 49th overall but still have time for an extraordinary act of kindness which I’ll explain later.
Alex too had his best day after devastatingly coming down with a cold on the Monday night before the start of the race having been in the best shape he’s ever felt on the Monday as we went for a short ride before the race started.
To watch Alex overcome this is inspirational, a real example of how to get sh*t done in spite of the sh*t that happens.
Alex would finish the stage in the top 100 which for someone of our age is an extraordinary achievement bearing in mind you’re racing against Louis Dunne types.
I felt so proud and privileged to be able to share this with these two guys who were both quite inspirational.
For Carl (our team manager) it was an easier day because we decided he didn’t need to follow us round the course because of the way the course was designed. He could rest up and relax for his own, epic contribution which would be a 12-hour straight driving stint all the way through France to try to make the train that we never made.
And so, for me I decided that my best strategy was to try to help ‘two towns down Matt’ and Fran who I’d ridden with for the last 3 or 4 days as I was, perhaps, moderately stronger than them and so, Matt and I set off tapping up the first climb with no sign of Fran at all who apparently was scrambling round the very back of the start trying to find us for the same reasons.
We had a great first climb well within ourselves and although we were about 61 minutes at the top (Louis was 41 minutes), we’d no need for the feed station at the top and rolled straight through with Fran finding us about ½ kilometre before the top.
We found the 3 of us with another group of 3 (two American former professional female cyclists) chasing down the descent and onto the rest of the stage.
The final stage was defined by the Col du Portet (pronounced portaaay) but Portet was 10 miles long with a gradient of 8% average but there was no let up anywhere on that climb.
It started with long sweeping runs towards hairpins as it climbed towards a ski station that we could see the night before as we travelled up to our accommodation that seemed, honestly, to be situated in heaven.
At the bottom of the climb, I had to say goodbye to Matt because I had to move on and push on as he was struggling, and I was becoming stronger and stronger and stronger as the week and the day went by.
I rode the first part of the climb with Fran up to the feed station at about 10km, she was struggling too.
A guy went past us with music on his iPhone (technically not allowed) and I thought “what the f*ck? Why am I not doing that?”
So, I started to take requests from the people around me.
It was another of my bloodstream moments in an event where I found myself singing ‘all the voices in my mind calling out across the line’.
It was hot.
It was heading towards 30 degrees on that climb and we found a fountain about 7km up where I stopped and refilled our bottles and poured water over my head.
On again.
With about 8km to go there was a feed station because this part of the Portet becomes a gated ‘no vehicle road’ apart from official vehicles.
It’s a beautiful thin ribbon of tarmac heading up towards the station in the sky. At that feed station we met someone else that Fran knew, and I knew what I had to do next.
Most of the time, in my circumstance, it’s a joy to ride with someone else but now it was time for me to ride by myself.
I had achieved more than I could ever have imagined this week, I wrote in my diary on the Monday before and set-up what I wanted to do. That had been smashed way out of the park and so, we set off with myself and Fran and Dave (whoever Dave was) and without saying anything I just started to push ahead.
I’d already met Louis before I’d even got to the feed station and after finishing, and I’m sure celebrating in his own mind he headed back down the hill. Stopped at a stream and filled his bottle with freezing cold water.
He knew what I would have needed, and he just circled back to me after he passed me and poured the full bottle of water down my back.
About 6km to the summit I met Alex coming back down.
The joy in Alex’s face was only mirrored by the joy in my face. It’s hard to tell you how wonderful it is to meet your friends in the middle of such a thing as you push yourself to and past what you ever felt you could achieve.
Alex told me what was coming and told me what to do.
I followed the thin ribbon past cows on the road and into views that are from your most beautiful of dreams.
With 3km to go you turn a right hander and you see the end, a winding ribbon of tarmac towards a tunnel and then an exit from a tunnel and 1 upward diagonal sweep to a hairpin turning right to the final long sweep to the car park at the feed station where the finish banner is.
You can hear them at the finish.
Immediately before the tunnel was the flamme bleu (in the Tour de France this is the flame rouge, but our sponsor was Santini so ours was blue) – 1km to go.
Alex had told me to give everything I had from the exist of the tunnel as I made the final right hander with 300m to go. I felt like I was emptying my very soul.
The last turn to the car park and I shifted up 3 gears and then pushed my peddles as hard as I’ve ever pushed them in my life.
I went faster and faster over that 50m. The announcer saw it and a few people around the finish saw it (everyone loves a sprint finisher).
Over the line and just wanting to get off your bike someone asks me “please can you take a photograph of my group”. I looked at the guy almost in disbelief and wanted to say, “can you see I’m having a medical emergency?” but of course I took the photograph with pleasure.
I didn’t know too many people at the top. Willy from Sterling was there having finished 5 minutes before me, I chatted to him for a few minutes whilst I had a drink and ate some ham.
Fran arrived about 7 or 8 minutes after me with her friend Dave.
I zipped up my top, rolled over the top and went to find my friends.
About 4km down the hill I saw Matt, I made sure he was ok and then at 3.14pm I rolled into the village and I was done.
We had an hour where we could chat and exchange stories and eat our burger and have a beer.
One of the happiest hours you can possibly imagine.
We got our stuff in the car and our bikes on the back and we headed for Calais.
I hope this little series has given you a flavour of what it’s like, not to ride a bike, but just to do something which takes you to a place where you don’t normally go, and you see things that you don’t normally see, and you meet people that you don’t normally meet, and you feel things that you don’t normally feel.
There will be blogs after this about what’s changed in me and how I’ll try to harness the inspiration and creativity that these types of events provide.
For now, though, It’s just this.
Alex, Carl and Louis, thank you for sharing with me one of the greatest experienced that I have ever had.
Throughout this process we decided to raise money for Cancer research in conjunction with the guys at The Campbell Clinic in our two-pronged attack.
Some of the team decided to take on the Race for Life on the 26th of June and some of the team decided to take on the Haute Route Pyrenees.
At the time of writing these blogs, our combined efforts of fundraising, including gift aid, are at about £15,000. You can still donate here for the Race for Life or here for the Haute Route Pyrenees and we’d love you to help.
Take a look at the Haute Route Pyrenees highlights here!
Blog Post Number - 3138
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