I wrote after the last PBP that dragging my bike to the start line was
more difficult than the ride itself. The difficulties in '99 (bikes caught
in Paris metro ticket barriers etc.) paled in comparison with this year! My
trip started on Thursday lunchtime when I grabbed a standby seat on the 2pm
flight from Hartsfield to Kennedy, hoping to connect with the flight to
Paris that evening. A few minutes after we stopped at the gate in New York
the pilot announced that there would be a slight delay as the "power in
this building appears to be out". It was only when we were able to leave
the plane two hours later, that the greater extent of the problem became
apparent.
As the reality of what was happening dawned on me, I more or less gave up
hope, as once flights resumed it was unlikely that my standby ticket would
get me onto any of the sure-to-be-overfilled planes to France. After
sitting around for two hours I noticed that a couple of gate agents were
calling passengers to board a flight. There was still no power of course,
but in the gloom of early evening passengers with boarding passes were
being allowed on a few planes. Maybe my flight would take off? I'd been
told that my connecting flight to Paris departed from terminal one, but I'd
also been told that terminal one was closed, and that if I left terminals
two or three I would not be able to re-enter. I wandered around and
eventually found an agent to check my ticket. No, apparently the departure
gate was in terminal 2. I walked rather quickly from terminal three to
terminal two and arrived at the gate to find a small group of people
already boarding the flight to Paris.
Thirty minutes later the plane pulled back from the gate and we were on
our way. Quite how this plane was able to leave when just about every
other plane in the airport was grounded remains a mystery. Eight hours
later I was in Paris, having escaped from the chaos engulfing the East
coast by the skin of my teeth. As expected our bags hadn't made the trip
with us, but the Service Baggage de Air France people were confident I
would have my bags by Saturday at the latest. I called the service baggage
people from the hotel several times and learned on Saturday that my bags
had arrived in Paris. On Sunday I was told that although my bike box was
scheduled for delivery on Monday, my second bag had not yet been "scheduled
for delivery". I took that as meaning "we haven't found your bag".
On Sunday afternoon I borrowed my roommate Todd's bike and rode down to
the sports field to plead my case to the PBP officails. Jennifer Wise
(RUSA president) offered a ride on the back of a French tandem (the stoker
was a DNS) in the event that my bike didn't appear. I replied that I
wasn't yet that desperate! After some back and forth between myself and
the officials - official, "Your registration form doesn't have the bike
inspection sticker", me, "That's because I don't have a bike." , my name
was added to a small list of delinquents who were to present themselves at
the gym on Monday at 5pm. Back at the hotel I decided that expecting
Service Baggage de Air France to find and deliver my bags to the hotel on
Monday morning was overly optimistic, and so I set off for CdeG airport on
Sunday evening. Service baggage de Air France is well hidden in the
airport, situated just after the passport check for arriving passengers.
To gain entry to this area I needed to pass through security, who initially
wouldn't let me through as I wasn't a departing passenger. Eventually I
discovered that a voucher from the information desk with the box labelled
"lost bag" checked gained me admittance. The gentleman at the SBdeAF desk
was friendly enough and after I'd explained the circumstances he put a call
in downstairs to his friend Hubert, who started to sort through a mountain
of baggage. An hour later Hubert appeared from the lift with both bags. I
bounded over, showering him with "merci beaucoup monsieur"s, but he simply
replied with a slightly disdainful "service" (sairveece).
Monday morning broke misty and cool after some heavy rain the previous
night. I thought I'd better give the bike a spin and the "prologue" seemed
a good way to do so. The prologue is a leisurely tour of the communities
which make up St. Quentin with speeches at the beginning and raffles and a
free T shirt and drink at the end. About half way around the course,
riding with David Bundrick, I managed to lock my front wheel onto the rear
wheel of the rider in front of me and went down. It turned out that only
my pride was bruised, but after all I'd been through it seemed ludicrous
that I might become a DNS from crashing in the prologue.
The bike inspection was straightforward once I'd persuaded the official at
the gate, who was intent on keeping all and sundry out, that I needed to be
inside the gym at 5 pm. I'd decided after my experience in '99 that trying
to fight for a place in the first couple of waves heading out from 10pm
through 1045pm was energy sapping and not much fun, so I sat on the wall
around the soccer field until the line had thinned to a trickle before
joining the other B type personalities making their way to the starting
line. I crossed under the banner at 10.55pm and had the first 1 km
entirely to myslf! Riders soon started to appear all around and the great
red LED snake made its way toward the first checkpoint at 220km. I passed
a pleasant few hours chatting to an Ozzie from Tasmania and stopped on the
side of the road a couple of times to refill my water from locals with
bottles in hand. This enabled me to bypass the water stop at Mortagne au
Perche and continue on to the first control at Villaines la Juhel. Before
arriving at the control the sun had risen and this prompted an episode of
yawning and not being able to focus on the road. Spotting a likely ditch
on a side road I peeled off and took a 30 minutes nap. At Villaines I
bumped into Steve and Tris from SC, Todd, and a couple of other faces I
recognized.
From Villaines I left with Tris and we spent the rest of the day riding
with various groups, often trying to decide whether to stay in a particular
group or not. The mild headwind encouraged us to find groups whenever we
could. We arrived in Loudeac around 8 pm and decided to continue on to
Carhaix as it was still light. The section to Corlay is perhaps the
hilliest part of the ride, so it was ideal to ride it during the cool hours
around twilight. I remembered missing a right turn on the stretch into
Carhaix in '99, but the turn was much better marked this year and we had no
problem finding it. In this regard my fusion LED headlamp proved very
useful, as it's wide, but faint, "beam" picked out any reflective arrows
over a large swath. I found by sweeping a junction with my headlamp I was
usually the first to pick out the reflective heads of the arrows. It is a
pity that the organizers couldn't also make the shaft of the arrow
reflective, so that we knew which way the arrow was pointing! I generally
found myself switching off my micro halogen when climbing or sitting in a
group (the micro halogen only gave me a detailed view of the derriere in
front of me) and using just the fusion headlamp.
In Carhaix it was time to eat again - soup, rice pudding, yoghurt,
couscous - and head for the dortoirs, which were a couple of hundred yards
away in the school gym. I quickly settled down on a cot under a blanket
for 3 hours, while Tris fiddled with his magic potions and remedies. He
then sat down on his cot and a dreadful rustling noise started up. I sat
up, and two other bodies on adjacent cots came to life and stared at him.
Tris looked around, got the message and dropped his half opened space
blanket on the floor.
By the time I'd walked back to the bike in the pre dawn cold my teeth were
chattering. I reckon this was the coldest morning of the three and I had
all my clothes on leaving Carhaix. It was a very pleasant ride into
Brest, although I had to fight another bout of post sun-up sleepiness. As
we dropped down the hill to Brest I realized that the route after Sizun had
been changed substantially from '99. Tris and I stopped to take each
other's photo on the bridge and proceeded to the control. A large bowl of
coffee (after 8 weeks with no caffiene) wiped away any lingering mental
cobwebs, and we set off back toward Paris along the valley. Just after
Landernau one of my two Cateye micro halogen lights parted company from the
bike and separated itself on impact into all it's component pieces. Given
how hard it hit the ground I was surprised that the damage was limited to a
cracked switch plate and a missing bulb.
On the top of Roc Trevezal we bumped into Chris and Kevin and spent a few
minutes comparing notes. I don't think we stopped long in Carhaix as there
was a line for food. On the hilly road to Loudeac we joined up with
several groups and made good progress. Near Corlay we came up behind an
older French gentleman who was listing appreciably to the right. Lumbago
(the same word in French) was causing him distress and this was the only
cure he could find. Unfortunately his imbalance meant that he had already
fallen off his bike four times. We pulled past in a hurry.
On through Loudeac to Tinteniac where Tris and I debated stopping. I
think Tris would have stopped here, but I was wide awake and enjoying the
cooler evening temperatures, so we elected to ride the 50km to Fougeres. I
got lost in '99 approaching Fougeres in the dark and, you guessed it, we
managed it again. This time we arrived at a junction and a Frenchman who
had been following us immediately said "c'est pas la bonne route" - needs
no translation right? - and turned left. We shouted to a couple of riders
a hundred yards ahead to stop but they weren't convinced and carried on.
After consulting my maps, but not figuring out where we were, we followed
the Frenchman, and sure enough we joined back up to the route after 2km.
In Fougeres I was still not sleepy but Tris was ready for some shut eye, so
I decided to at least lie down. Although the mats in the rooms were not as
comfortable as the cots at Carhaix, and the odour of a dozen randonneurs in
a hot, unventilated room, was overwhelming, I nevertheless slept soundly
for three hours. Apparently the better sleep option was in Tinteniac which
had beds with sheets and pillows!
The departure from Fougeres around 6am was interrupted by a pantomime act
by a British rider. As I was standing by my bike donning reflective gear a
rider arrived and immediately began to shout "Where's the control?". One
guy shouted back "Up the hill", as the control was a couple of hundred
yards further on from where we were standing, which was outside the
restaurant. The delirious British rider ignored this advice and began to
circle the bikes parked near the restaurant, shouting pitifully for help,
and repeatedly yelling "Where's the control?". He then dismounted in a far
corner where there was a bright light from a neighbouring warehouse and
tried to climb the chainlink fence separating the two properties!
Thankfully a couple of officials had come over and were able to grab hold
of him before he hurt hmself.
I haven't yet mentioned that Tris had been riding with a sore ankle since
Loudeac on the way out. The pain was on the outside of his right ankle and
it hurt most when standing. Tris may have the highest pain threshold of
any rider I know, as he rode the brevets with some broken ribs and also a
cracked collarbone, from two separate falls during brevet season. He'd
stopped in Tinteneac the previous night but the doctor had left for the
evening so nothing was done. He was now riding in obvious discomfort and
was determined to seek help at the next stop in Villaines la Juhel.
Within an hour of leaving Fougeres I had a violent rear flat and found
that I had completely worn through my rear tire to the cotton casing! I'd
swapped this tire only a month before the ride, so I can only imagine that
it was in a much more worn condition than I'd realized. I applied a Park
tire boot but this only lasted 20 miles before it also wore through. At
this point I would have resorted to scavenging from the roadside to effect
a repair but Tris was kind enough to give me his spare folding tire. He
slept while I mounted his 20mm Conti gatorskin onto my Mavic MA2 rim -
something of a mismatch!
At Villaines Tristan went off to seek medical attention and after making
sure that he was being seen to I headed out. The 30 kms either side of
Mortagne au Perche are hilly and I found myself in my granny on several
occasions. I hooked up with a pleasant English guy on the way into
Mortagne and decided to stop there for a meal and a 15 minute cat nap.
Unfortunately I couldn't really find anywhere in the shade that was
suitable, and after ten minutes lying on some pavement I gave up and
carried on. I'd bumped into Jimmy Williams who had been riding for several
controls with an English tandem and after the hills near Mortagne had
subsided they came screaming past, riding a tailwind and slight downhill,
with another tandem and single in their wake. By now I was "smelling the
barn" quite strongly so I jumped on their collective wheel only to subside
30 seconds later laughing at the effort of trying to hang onto a thirty mph
train. Jim Solanick appeared ahead and I rode in his vicinity for a while.
The barn smell was only growing stronger and as I approached Nogent le Roi
a rotating paceline of a french pair and an Italian formed. We made
several attempts to get something organized but nothing worked until we
started a clockwise rotation with the subsiding part of the rotation next
to the kerb. On the few occasions that I've ridden in rotating pacelines
it's always been an anticlockwise rotation, but regardless, it passed the
time nicely for over an hour before some more hills pulled us apart.
In Nogent Le Roi I witnessed another episode of bizzare behaviour, this
time from the captain of the British tandem pair that Jimmy Williams was
riding with. As I was parking my bike the captain was complaining loudly
about his stoker who had apparently walked off. As his stoker is partially
blind this didn't ring true, but regardless, the captain was working
himself into quite a lather. He buried his head in his hands and bending
over the bike began to sob. The sobbing increased in volume and he then
started to wail and scream, stood up again and began waving his arms
around. Everybody in the vicinity froze, except a couple of PBP officials,
who grabbed an arm each and took him to the medical station. I thought
that might be the end of their ride, but 5kms from the end the tandem rode
up behind me, accompanied by Tris and Jimmy, the pair of them acting as if
nothing had happened!
The last leg is known to be tricky as there are many turns and, as I found
out later, some of the arrows had been removed by locals. The best policy
is to find a group and stick with it, no matter how slowly they might be
riding, as otherwise you will only find yourself catching them up
repeatedly as you miss turns in the dark. Ten headlamps are better than
one. I finished feeling much less spaced out than in 99, although I had a
little less sleep this time, and with nothing more than the usual soreness.
A week after the event I have some lingering finger and toe numbness but
I'm confident it will disappear soon. Oh, and the flight back on Saturday
was blissfully uneventful.
Here are the times my card was swiped at each checkpoint. Mortagne au
Perche and Nogent le Roi are not controls on the way out:
0 km St Quentin 18/08 22h07
220 km Villaines 19/08 08h36
303 km Fougeres 19/08 12h18
356 km Tinteniac 19/08 15h32
441 km Loudeac 19/08 19h41
517 km Carhaix 20/08 00h08 sleep
604 km Brest 20/08 09h13
685 km Carhaix 20/08 13h42
761 km Loudeac 20/08 17h21
846 km Tinteniac 20/08 22h41
899 km Fougeres 21/08 02h27 sleep
982 km Villaines 21/08 11h05
1061km Mortagne 21/08 14h58
1145km Nogent 21/08 19h35
1202km St Quentin 21/08 22h30