the big one

mercredi 20 juillet

Andy Schleck says Alpe d’Huez is mythic. The Tourmalet is a giant. What word can possibly describe the magnificent monster, the beautiful beast that is the Galibier?

From the north it’s a 34km ascent in two parts: the 12kms of the Col du Télégraphe and the 18kms to a bleak point on a ridge that is the Galibier. In between the road descends gently for four kms into Valloire.

Not all of the 16 of us attempt it; not all who attempt it make it. This is the climb I have wanted to test myself against for as long as I've been cycling seriously.

Rain falls all night. I have an aching tooth. My back hurts, and I feel generally crap. I slither out of the top bunk like a slug. Will we ride today? The prospect of the Galibier in sleety rain or snow is hellish.

We drive to the start point at St Michel de Maurienne (90 minutes). The wipers swish rain off the windscreen all the way. The cloud is low; it tells us nothing. Each individual will decide whether or not to ride. We extract the bikes from the van and assemble, grease and tweak them at the base of the climb to the Télégraphe.

Expectancy and apprehension mount. Riders don slickers as a shower hits. We depart. The treed road to the Télégraphe twists its way at a consistent grade on a good surface. It’s hard in its own right, and a fine warm-up for the big grind to come. And what a grind it is.

I begrudge evey metre lost on the four km descent to the ski resort of Valloire. Finding the road through towns is often a mystery. Only the stream of bikes guides me out of Valloire. The valley of the Valloirette River is shallow and easy going, until it isn’t, about three clicks up the valley.

No tree breaks the rock ramparts, the scree slopes or the alpine pasture above Valloire. Above Plan Lachat the climb gets serious: steep, switchbacked, without guardrails, vertiginous drops. Each cyclist must find a way to overcome this climb. The aloneness is serious, and profoundly personal.

The weather clears and we climb in 18-degree sun, sweating and grunting, each pedal-stroke propelling us a metre or so closer to the Holy Grail. Postcard peaks clad in sunlit snow surround us, pilgrims on a sacred mission; upward and upward,stroke by stroke, inch by inch up the final gruelling kilometre.

It might be midsummer but snow lines the road and chills the wind whistling off the Grand Galibier at 3229 metres. The we aspire to is at 2645 metres. Tomorrow it will witness the highest ever stage finish in the history of the Tour de France.

The temperature at the top is seven degrees. My fingers freeze in the breeze before I get back on the bike after the obligatory photo under the Galibier sign.

The descent is perilous, the road lumpy, your safety entirely in your own hands. Hulk stops every kilometre because he can’t grip the bars. I descend alone, just as I climbed alone.

The final descent from the Télégraphe is a fabulous blast on a wide clear road with sweeping curves and tight hairpins and only a taxi in front of me prevents me getting to the bottom faster.

What a day!

[73.16kms @ 15.6kph. Montage 2297m, Max alt 2660m, max climb 15%]