Notes from Europe
Mike rode for us in The Tour of Northland and has been in Europe for the last few months. He has sent us an update and some great photos we thought you all might be interested in.
I thought I would send a little note to let you know a bit about what I’ve been doing in Europe bikewise.
After 6 weeks without touching a bike, I finally made it to Alpe d’Huez. There are lots of other rides and mountain bike tracks in this part of the French Alps so bike hire is readily available.
Around 1000 people ride up the 14km climb everyday in summer. The change in elevation is about 1100m so it’s not super steep but my legs weren’t happy by the end of the ride. Although I wasn’t the fastest rider on the day, however I was the best looking in my Avanti-plus kit! I went pretty slow as I was quite unfit and didn’t have bike shoes so it took over 80minutes to climb.
After a day off, I invested in some new bike shoes so I could tackle Col du Galibier. I set of from Bourg d’Oisans at 720m and 47km later I was at the top of Col du Galibier at 2645m altitude. Again, it wasn’t too steep but the air definitely got a bit thin up there. It was an amazing ride with amazing scenery.
A few days later I met up with Tim Hitchcock and we saw a couple of stages of the Tour de France. Pretty amazing atmosphere with all the other people watching the race. I had the NZ flag flying and yelled out to Julian Dean as he rode past.
Tim wanted to do the Alpe d’Huez while he was in the area so I went up again with him. This time was a bit faster at 73minutes, just under double Marco Pantani’s record.
Tim went back to England to look for a job while I repositioned myself closer to the Pyrenees. About 3 weeks later I was at the top of Col du Tourmalet at 2115m. It felt like it took 3 weeks to climb but actually I did some farm work in between. I also rode up Col d’Aubisque while I was in the area.
I’m now in the Paris-Roubaix area so that’s next on my agenda. I think it will be the most exciting and dramatic of all.
In September I will spend time in Switzerland and Italy. I’m planning to do some rides from the Giro and train up strong to return to NZ fit for K2.
Attached are a few photos for your interest. I hope all is well and you’re selling plenty of nice Scott bikes. Also a pic from Tour of Northland too.
Cheers,
Mike
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