Le Cure Cycling Challenge Part 1: Le Grand Depart

Boy oh boy, I did not know what I was letting myself in for when I signed up for Le Cure, a four day cycling event in the Alps. Sure, I thought, I’m a seasoned alpine cyclist. This will be a doddle, I’ll just be there to enjoy the scenery. Little did I know!

Firstly, I should tell you that I am a total sucker for a sponsored charity event. So when a near total stranger on twitter asked if I wanted to join, her raising money for Breast Cancer research at the Royal Marsden, I jumped at the chance. That person happened to the Carla “Queen Hornet” Francome, cycling activist, TV producer, writer and twitter aficionado. If you haven’t followed her yet, I highly recommend her for some incredibly funny banter @CarlaFrancome. Anyway, the day after I ran the Hackney Half Marathon for a different charity (total and complete sucker), I put down my running shoes and started setting my alarm for 6am Swains Lane reps.

I won’t bore you with our training schedule but suffice to say, I haven’t been awake this often before 6am since I used to go clubbing. Not always helped by Carla being unreasonably chirpy at any time of the day. Still, it was great experience and getting back in time for the school run, so my husband didn’t file for divorce, was an added bonus.

August came around quicker than should be allowed and suddenly the event was upon us. I was already in France with my family, so got dropped off at the station to catch the train back to the mountains, which we’d only left 10 days before. As I had already booked a two-part holiday, meeting friends and family in different parts of France before booking this event, what could have been a 2 hour drive over Col du Lauteret, ended up being a 10 hour drive, an overnight in Paris (awesome), a 20 minute metro, a sweltering 8 hour train ride in a carriage with broken air con, then a 30 minute bus.

Day 1: Sestriere to Barcelonette

124.4km Distance 2165m Vertical

All 55 curistas ready at Le Grand Depart

Our start point was in Sestriere, just over the border from France into Italy. The bike mechanics worked late into the night, unboxing and rebuilding bikes for the 50 riders taking part, ensuring we were all ready to go for the 8am Grand Depart. I say 8am, we all gathered at 8am before Paddy, one of the organisers, ordered all of the fast crew to go grab a coffee for a couple of hours.

The first part of the day went smoothly. It was a gorgeous climb up Montgeneve, especially for those of us who found the dedicated cycle way with its own tunnels, several of the group later told us they had not. So far so good. The altitude was rising, but so was the temperature.

By the time we stopped next to an airfield for lunch, we had reached 30 degrees. Nothing a bit of camaraderie and few capfuls of cold water from the nearby river couldn’t solve. Then it started to go a bit wrong. I foolishly waited for the slow group to arrive to make sure my friend was OK. She was, just quizzical as to why I’d waited. I then set off with the only other group left who set a too fast pace for me. Golden rules for climbing: always set your own pace

The road then got steep but crucially, it also got HOT. The air temperature was over 35 degrees but the blacktop was way, way hotter. The road turned into a radiator and bike computers were registering horrifying temperatures like 45 and 49 degrees. People were nearly passed out by the side of the road. Someone was vomiting with heatstroke and had to be rescued. Still, the road kept going up.

About two hours after lunch, I couldn’t take it any more. There was no shade. I had drained and refilled my bottles several times and I was still thirsty. I threw in the towel and climbed into a support car. I couldn’t do it. They didn’t have space for my bike so it sat outside while they called one of the vans that could rescue me and my trusty steed. One of the organisers paused at the car to check if I was OK. Steve was tomato red and with sweat pouring off in streams, but he kept on going. I was inspired by his determination.

By that time, I had spent 15 minutes in air con and eaten a banana that I still think may have been spiked with something, heat stroke had been averted. I got back out of the car and back on the bike. I told myself I would do another 10 minutes and see how I felt. Just keep turning those pedals. An hour or so later, a slight breeze lifted my spirits and a few wisps of cloud lowered the temperature. I was going to make it.

It was around that time that Tiff, the queen curator and general go to person on Le Cure, drove past. “There’s a storm coming” she yelled at me, when I was about 2km from the Col. Great. By the time I reached the Col du Vars, a light smattering of rain had started to fall. Cue scoffing down a second banana and snack bar in approximately 20 seconds, donning a gilet and heading straight down the hairpins on the other side, with the one rider who had waited for me. Everyone who had been behind me had been caught by the sweep and deposited at the top, so we were the last riders up.

The hairpins were fun, as they often are in a downward direction, but the clouds were growing black and ominous. The drizzle was becoming a downpour. Raincoats were handed out when we met the support van for a final time at the bottom of the hill and our now group of six riders started the 20km ride to Barcelonette.

From there on in, it got a bit more lairy. We caught up with Carla in a tunnel going through what would normally be a very stunning series of gorges, but was currently a wall of water, interspersed with tunnels, with the occasional car coming the other way. Cue wave of water, which was more of shock than anything else, we were already soaked through.

We finally made it out of the mountain roads and into the towns, where we saw our beloved Tiff one more time. She and Hilton, another of the support crew, were standing in the deluge next to a very very large puddle, screaming at us to go onto the other side of the road and around it. She later told us that Hilton had tested the puddle depth and come up to his waist. Then came the thunder, the lightning, a road which was indistinguishable from a river and a frankly terrifying ride home.

Our drama was nearly complete when we reached Barcelonette. Unfortunately we had the wrong name for our hotel, which turned out to be a youth hostel a few km out of town. There was a slight sense of humour failure as we dripped and dragged our way through town and out the other side. With a group our size, they’d had to split us over four different spots, so Carla and I waved goodbye to everyone else who were staying in actual hotels, right in the centre of town.

Still, after walking back into town in dry clothes and not in the rain, plus the first couple of beers, it all started to feel like something that had happened to someone else, quite a long time before. Funny how your memory can do that