In September 2017, I paid another visit to the French Alps for my very own Tour de France 2017.
Unlike during my previous Tour in 2014, I picked a single location for our base camp: Briançon.
Briançon is the sole subprefecture of the Hautes-Alpes department in the Provence-Alpes-Côte d’Azur region.
It is the highest city with more than 2,000 inhabitants in France, at an altitude of 1,326 meters.
Its Vauban fortifications (the city wall, the forts of Salettes, Têtes, Randouillet, the Y communication structure and the Asfeld bridge) have been on the UNESCO World Heritage List since July 2008.
Like Bourg-Saint-Maurice and Jausiers in 2014, the city of Briançon is strategically located at the base of several mountain passes…
To the west, you can cycle the Lautaret and Galibier, and you can get up the Col du Granon, a fork of the Lautaret and probably the toughest climb in the region.
To the south, you can climb the Izoard and continue over the Agnel into Italy, or head towards Barcelonnette via de Col de Vars.
To the east, you enter Italy via the Col du Montgenèvre towards Cesana Torinese, as well as via the Echelle which connects Briançon to Bardonecchia
I was planning on cycling the Gran Fondo Sestriere, which was part of the Marmotte series in 2015. I did set out for that GF, but I did not finish, because I got a flat just when I was starting the (first) ascent to Sestriere and I found out I didn’t have any spare tube(s) with me…
And since I completed the Marmotte Hochkönig in Austria, I was hoping to cycle the route of the official Marmotte Alpes, but that didn’t happen, because of the fact that the days were (already) short and cold.
