SJP 2010 CYCLOSPORTIFS: L'Ardéchoise Cyclosportif

June 15th, 2009
Ardéche Region of France, SW of Lyon, 3hrs from Geneva

This can be a three day event. Sort of like the Golden Triangle except there were 13400 people signed up. The longest course is the La Meridionale-Montagne Ardéchoise: 654kms, 35 passes and 11255m of climbing !!

7700 people lined up on Saturday for 6 different courses from 66kms to 275kms with 5100m climbing.

I rode the L'Ardechoise circuit above. 216kms, 4100m climbing took me 8 1/2hrs.

Drove there the night before. The town was totally quiet. Crashed in my van. I was woken up at 6am by a constant stream of cars, bicycles and people gearing up. The start was unreal. I lined up but couldn't see the start banner in front nor the end of the line behind. The route went through dozens of towns, every one decorated with bicycles, banners, live music, people in costumes passing out cakes, cookies, cheese and drinks like it was Christmas. At the far end of the course, things thinned out slightly as different cyclists took different junctions for the various distances. At one point I was completely in the countryside, rounded a corner and entered a super small town to see a Yeti and Roman gladiators in the distance. Huh? The whole town was dressed up and on the route cheering and passing out drinks. I rode through with the biggest grin on my face. All 13000 people had to ride this final climb to the finish. There were at least 12 switchbacks. Every corner had a band or choir playing or singing traditional French songs. One corner had an electric rock band playing Loverboy, I couldn't believe it!! At the finish there was a huge lock up for bikes and a buffet for every finisher. Definitely one of THE best ride I've ever done.

Some pics I took:
View towards the start line.
Tons of "scrubbers" as my Dad would say.