Pedalling Through the Timeless Pyrenees
The cols of the southwest are the backbone of the Tour
The cols of southwestern France are the backbone of the Tour
The Pyrenees Mountains straddle the border between France and Spain, and run from the Mediterranean coast right across to the Bay of Biscay, with the Principality of Andorra landlocked in the middle. They are an annual feature in the Tour de France, and usually show up in the Vuelta a España. Even more than their more illustrious Alpine cousins, the Pyrenees lie at the heart of Grand Tour racing. They were the first serious mountains to be included in the Tour de France in 1910.
My own Pyrenean romance may not be as long as the Tour’s, but it goes back almost 30 years. It also marked my first encounter with true mountains. I raced over them too. It was hard, but I held up and even stayed on to race in those mountains for some time afterwards.
If you watch the Tour on TV, you can see the differences between the Pyrenees and the Alps. The western mountain range is, of course, smaller, and the peaks are not as high as in the Alps. You could say the Pyrenees are less dramatic visually. On the road, however, that’s not the case. Pyrenean climbs tend to be long and heavy going, as surfaces are not as silky smooth as in the ski-resort-rich Alps. These roads are often narrower and more twisty. The inclines suit a climber who can smash the extra road drag and do so alone. If you ride them, you’ll notice far less traffic buzzing around compared with the Alps.
Since the Pyrenean climbs are somewhat more compact than the larger cols in the east, it’s a little easier to crack off a number of huge passes in a day, even from a single base. There are also fewer grinds on main valley roads in-between climbs.
When I head back to the Pyrenees, especially after a very long break, there’s something of a sweet ride down memory lane for me, although some things do change. There’s more traffic in the cities these days. Still, the riding and the climbs’ rustic nature have altered little since my first venture out into the mountains.
Back then, I came armed with a lowly 23-tooth sprocket, the largest on my cassette, and a 42-tooth chainring. That was about all we had available. There was no Internet or lengthy TV coverage of the Tour to get any sense of what the Pyrenean beasts were really like. These days even the top pro riders would think hard about my old leg-buckling gear ratio. For me a 34-tooth chainring with a 32-tooth cog, at least, is the order of the day. Most pros run a 26- or 28-tooth bottom gear.
Bikes and gearing may have changed along with my shape and fitness levels, but the Pyrenees remain a fascinating and challenging place to ride. Thankfully, they are far less touched by development, and are somehow a whole lot more relaxed and organic in their approach, in comparison with other major European mountains.
Throughout the years, I’ve ridden the lion’s share of famous passes, and from coast to coast, too. Yet in reality, I haven’t even scraped at what’s on offer here. There are so many brutal and stunning climbs pinned to remote slopes that will never make the hit lists of the Grand Tours for commercial and logistical reasons, yet these are perhaps the hidden gems of the Pyrenees, and are amongst the finest climbs around.
Taking the road less travelled is definitely the way to go here. The next time I get a chance to ride these amazing roads, I think I’ll be taking a gravel bike along for the show. A few dead-end climbs only stop where the hard stuff ends. The gateway to the real adventures lurk in the dust of the high Pyrenees.
“The inclines suit a climber who can smash the extra road drag and do so alone.”