The Raid connects the town of Hendaye on the Bay of Biscay with Cerbere on the Med, 710km (440 miles) in all. The route takes you over many of the cols made famous by the Tour de France including the Tourmalet, Aubisque, Aspin, Portet d’Aspet and the Peyresourde. Just to make it more interesting, I’ll have 100 hours to complete it, just four and a half days. The first successful traverse was made in 1951 and many have done it each year since then.
Day One
We gathered at 9, a diverse crew. Grizzled Paris-Brest-Paris veterans, triathletes, recreational cyclists, novices and even a father and son. 50:50 on the shaven legs front. Exit the car park and I find myself a reluctant lead out man and honorary map reader for the day. We pedalled through scenary which turned from the Surrey Hills (without the stockbrokers) to the Highlands of Scotland – undulating and ever more remote as we pushed inland.
Tomorrow is a big one including the Tourmalet. I hope I will be in better nick than Alphonse Steines who was sent to recce the pass in advance of its first crossing in the 1910 Tour. His car was blocked by snow four kilometres from the summit. He was found half frozen by the police the next morning and sent the following telegram to his boss in Paris: “Got over the Tourmalet stop signed Steines”. Later that year when the first riders went over the pass the leader shouted at the organisers “You are all assassins!”
Day Two
This evening finds this diarist lodging in the small but perfectly formed village of Ste Marie de Campan. A place unlikely to feature in the annals of history were it not for an incident in 1913. Back in those days, as well as having to ride bone shakers with fixed wheels, riders in the Tour were allowed no outside assistance during the race – no drinks, no mechanics, no Mavic vans. The leader in the General Classification, a chap by the name of Eugene Christophe broke the forks on his bike descending the Tourmalet. He walked down into the village to find a blacksmith to solder his forks. Unfortunately the race referee was hovering like a vulture to make sure Eugene did everything himself. He dutifully hammered away for the next four hours but that’s not where the story ends: he got an additional penalty for not operating the bellows himself!
And how was it for me? The Tourmalet is different from your average climb because it basically goes straight up a valley, an unremitting gradient of between 8% and 9%. My pedal cadence plan worked well until the second half of the Tourmalet when all bets were off; it was a case of banging it down to bottom gear and praying.
Day Three
It started out so well. We rolled out of the hotel to blue skies and the cutest little col you could imagine – the Aspin. Stunning views, a very doable gradient and a picturesque herd of friendly cows waiting at the summit. The Peyresourde was next and it ran the Aspin a close second. A dream of a descent of that col rapidly led to a downward spiral for my day as I missed my lunch rendez vous and got caught in a literal no-mans-land as there was no-one from the group to be seen. I made lunch a priority and found a fine restaurant to enjoy it in.
Dozing in the sun I ran through some calculations in my head; it was two o’clock, I had covered only a third of the day’s distance and I had no clue where anyone was. Time to panic. I shot off up the road, ticked off the Col d’Ares like it wasn’t there and still no sight of the lads. A couple of demonic descents (well by my standards anyway), they must be ahead. By this time I had been pedalling 50 kilometres on my own and strange sensations began to overtake me. I was descending the road but I was worn out; the cruellest climb of the whole trip was just ahead and I was on my knees.
The Portet d’Aspet is literally a deadly climb. In 1995 it took the life of Fabio Casartelli, Olympic champion and team mate of pre cancer Lance Armstrong. He lost control nearing the foot of the descent and crashed into a concrete block designed to stop cars going over into the ravine below. Not far from the spot now stands a moving and beautiful monument. I plonked myself down there and wondered how the hell I was going to get up the 17% gradient which kicked up from this point. I thought this the end of the line, time for the broom wagon.
I remembered I was a coach and that I should be able to work out what to do next. I had eaten a good meal so I shouldn’t be short of calories. I looked down at my bottles and they were empty: I was simply dehydrated. I remembered I spoke French (you can tell the brain works slowly in this state) and walked back to the nearest human habitation. There stood a grizzled chap with an accent you could cut with a knife. He filled my water bottles and a litre went down in one go. I hopped on the bike and went straight to the summit. It was as simple as that.
At the top I found Andrew, our guide, opened my mouth and just babble came out; I wasn’t making any sense. Although I had recovered physically, I was mentally unprepared for what would come logically after an ascent, yes, the descent. There were lorries going up and down the pass seemingly taking delight in piling mounds of gravel all over the road. To the non cyclists amongst you, please note that gravel and steep descents do not mix. The Tour was due to go over in 3 weeks and the road was being lovingly repaired for the big day. Well, that’s good news for Lance and the guys but not so good for this cowardly descender.
I carried on babbling to Andrew about anything that came into my head; why they don’t make groups like the Clash any more, where had all the middle distance runners gone – I was talking and talking because I did not want to go down. It was starting to get dark by now so either I was going down on the bike or in the van. I pulled myself together and pedalled down. The road back was a lonely one. I had spent 100k out of 168k out on my own, 6 hours out of 8. This was as much a mental game as a physical one.
Day Four
Day Three had left me wiped. 100 kilometres of lone riding, dehydration and the scariest col in the Pyrenees all took its toll. My head was spinning during the evening meal at the hotel and I could not focus on what people were saying to me. What was worse was that I could not eat; my efforts had exhausted me that much that I had lost my appetite. How was I going to replenish my reserves to ride the next day?
You have heard of the expression “ We’ll have that hill for breakfast”? Well for the second day in a row that’s how we started. On Day Four we pedalled left out of the hotel and we were on another legendary climb. The previous day’s was the Aspin, today it was the Col de Port. I took it cautiously and rode up alongside the last guy I had seen on the road yesterday morning. We chatted a bit then I realised that we would have made a strange sight for the neutral observer. I was gloriously resplendent in pink, clad in Telekom colours from head to toe and he had the full US Postal monty. It was a preview of a scene to be played out on those roads in just a few weeks time except this Jan was about 10 kilos lighter and Lance had Singaporean features!
I got to the top OK. It appears that the Tour’s tales of “riding into fitness” were true. A top guy could finish in a dreadful state and the next day go out to win a stage – how? A club mate told me about his experiences on an “End to End”, a Lands End John O’Groats ride. He said he went through hell on Day Four only to come through stronger after that. The human body has incredible powers of self repair and adaptation.
The rest of the day was a bit of a slog to be quite honest. Coming down off the Col de Port we were on Routes Nationales and they were every bit as busy as ‘A’ roads in this country. The road up to Andorra was a steady two hour climb with long stretches of dual carriageway taking duty free shoppers up into the high mountains. We crested the Col de Puymorens and descended into the Cerdagne. This was strange border country, a high plateau of meadows formed by a prehistoric lake. It is altitude training territory with Font Romeu visible from the road but to be honest we had come through much more stunning landscapes than this in the preceding days.
Our group was not the only one out on the road attempting the Raid. We had criss crossed along the way with a Dutch team whilst a club from Bordeaux had been tracking us since Hendaye. There was a good camaraderie and Euro 2004 added spice to the exchanges. As we started to come down from Mont Louis, a 25 mile stretch from 1600 metres down to sea level, the French riders stormed up behind us. Their attitude had been a more relaxed one throughout; where we had stops for coffee, they took beers and brandy. I think this accounted for their riding style on this monster descent. The Entente Cordiale between our nations that had held hitherto was shattered when one of our party was overtaken on the inside of a hairpin by a French woman. Now this guy is no chauvinist and an ardent pro European but that was too much. There ensued a high speed devil takes the hindmost down the mountains between the Brits and French where more than a few risks were taken. One of our number decided to take a curve on the wrong side of the road and was close to ending up as a mascot on the front of a camper van coming up the other way. Still 170 kilometres and just over 7 hours in the saddle we all got to Prades in one piece ready for a few beers and an England victory in the quarter finals……
Day Five
Whilst you all woke up on Friday with penalties on your mind, we had the scent of the Med in our nostrils. Today we would finish up at lunch time with our toes in the sea and the Raid under our belts. Most of the guys were going to chain gang it at 40 kph but when I got out of the hotel I knew it was going to be different for me.
The previous day when I was coming down the last climb I caught sight of Mont Canigou; at that moment I knew I was going to finish the Raid. Mount Canigou is the tallest mountain at that end of the Pyrenees; indeed it was thought to be the highest peak anywhere in ancient times. It towered up behind the hotel in Prades with snow still on its peak and I just had to stop to admire it. In the late 70s I had spent a month perched on the side of it working at the abbey of St Martin du Canigou restoring an old chapel in return for for board and lodgings. At the time it was run by a wonderful old Abbe; despite it being a monastic community he was happy for a confirmed atheist like myself to help out. As well as working on the restoration there were treks to the top of Canigou and music recitals with Beethoven ringing out across the valley.
With those marvellous memories still resounding I let everyone go and hammer their way to Cerbere and I pootled along down memory lane, stopping at places I remembered from those times. At a certain point I realised I was doing rather too much pootling and not enough pedalling; I was in danger of missing out on the 1 pm deadline. I didn’t want to be the guy that had completed the Raid Pyreneen in 100 hours and 5 minutes so I got a move on. I stood out of the saddle and tackled the Corniche. The last time I had been along here was in a car with the family en route for the Costa Brava. Back then it was the main coastal route to Spain if you didn’t want to motorway it through Le Perthus. I remember it as being sick making in the car with its twists and turns and precipitate drops but on the bike in the June sunshine it was simply glorious pedalling through Collioure, Port Vendres and Banyuls.
The guys were hanging out in the restaurant at Cerbere by the time I got there with half an hour to spare before the cut off. Most had had a swim, got changed, packed up their bikes and had lunch by the time I arrived. We kicked back and started to reminisce already about the trip. I remembered a sight from the third day that I had not remarked upon as mere surivival was uppermost in my mind at the time. “Do you remember the climb up the Peyresourde?” I said. “Half way up there was a woman standing at the side of the road. She was incredibly beautiful and dressed in a striking way. She was barefoot and all her clothes were spun from raw uncoloured wool. She looked like something from a long gone age, like from Manon des Sources”. “God yes!” replied one of the group, “I remember her but I saw her the day after that on the Col de Port”. “No” said another “it was the Col d’Aspin. What’s more I had also seen her ten years ago when out mountain biking on Exmoor”. We christened our apparition the Angel of the Mountains and left for the coach with an unrequited sense of longing.
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