Bikepacking trip Stage race
WILLIAM BIBBY, 59, OXFORD JOSHUA COULLING, 30, NEWBURY
Last July my daughter Sarah said: “I am meeting my boyfriend in Nice on 17 August. Do you think I can cycle there?” When she couldn’t find a companion, I offered to join her. I’m a weekend rider really, and Sarah, who was 22, just commuted around London. Our only experience was a two-day coast-tocoast, with no luggage, so touring across France was a proper adventure.
My sister had done St Malo to Nice as a supported ride, so I started with that 14-day route plus inspiration from a Saddle Skedaddle route I saw online. I bought the France En Velo book, in PDF format – we would have missed the best swim spots without it. Always take paper maps, too.
I rode a Cannondale Synapse and Sarah was on a Cannondale CAADX. We used strap-on front fork cages to carry our tent and sleeping bags. We were also recommended a lightweight Trangia cooker. A halflitre tin bottle was useful for transporting milk, but after some broken eggs in a pannier, a plastic egg box would have been handy. A combined international adaptor and four-way USB charger is very useful, too.
A friend suggested that there are only six happy cycling hours in a day: two hours, coffee, two hours, lunch, two hours, stop. That turned out to be spot on. Our itineraries had days of 100-140km, so we wanted to average 20kph.
My highlights were swimming in the Verdon gorge and getting up Mont Ventoux. People would fill up our bottles and cyclists seem to get special treatment at campsites. We didn’t usually choose a campsite until midafternoon. Despite the great food: steaks, moules frites, pains au chocolat… I lost 7kg.
After 1,600km, I felt euphoric when we cycled down the promenade in Nice. Spending time with a grown-up child is so special. Cycle touring is best with a companion – for safety, better decision making and fun. If I did it again, I’d lose the deadline, eat more plats du jour, taste more cheese, drink more wine, swim in more rivers, visit more sights and eat more ice cream.
“A friend suggested there are only six happy cycling hours in a day: two hours, coffee; two hours, lunch; two hours stop. That was spot on”
The 2022 Haute Route Alpe d’Huez – a three-day race with 7,900m of climbing – was my first multi-day event. Although I’d cycled when I was younger, I took a hiatus until five or six years ago, when I heard people at work talking about road cycling. I thought it sounded fun. So I started riding, and I built up from the 80km Garmin Ride Out sportive to the 180km Fred Whitton Challenge.
But preparing for a stage race involved evolutions of everything I’d done before. I knew basic mechanical skills, but now I learnt much more. At the race, I saw people struggling with broken chains, punctures and shifting issues, but I was comfortable giving the bike a once over. And, using my power meter and heart rate monitor, I really scrutinised how I was training.
The hardest part was preparing to ride on consecutive days. So I focused on big volume, around 10 hours per week, which is hard with fulltime work. But the key was consistency – and back-to-back days. On Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday, I did longer structured intervals to prepare for Alpine climbs. And I would do hard efforts on Saturdays and three to four-hour rides on Sundays. I also did strength work and swimming to keep me injury-free as the training volume increased.
Body management is so important on multi-day events. At the race, I did muscle activation each day to make sure my hamstrings and glutes were firing. And after each stage I’d do foam rolling and sometimes get a massage. I had a ‘daily greens’ supplement full of vitamins, minerals and probiotics, so I didn’t get sick. And I stuck to plain food to avoid stomach problems.
One thing I got wrong was my gearing. I was running a 52/36t chainring with an 11-32t cassette. For most sportives, that would be fine for me. But by day three, you need any gear you’ve got so I’d consider a 50/34 with an 11-34 cassette.
The Haute Route was amazing, especially the time trial up Alpe d’Huez. You have some tough days as the fatigue mounts up, but I did it with a couple of mates and that sense of fun and shared hardship got us through.