Cyclopaat, an alter ego with a twist
I will finally get to cycle the Pyrenees during my Tour de France 2023.
Okay, that should probably read “in the Pyrenees” for I will mostly cycle the central part of the Pyrenees range.
It would be nice to cycle the “Raid Pyrenees” that is (also) available as a Tacx series of RLV’s.
This is covering many Pyrenees climbs, from East to West, and I’ve done that indoors.
As you will/should know, my favorite cycling activity is destroying myself on as many cols/passes I can find.
While my heart lies in the Dolomites, I never object to any other area with mountains to do that.
The Orange Cheeto has beaten me to it, but I, too, have an announcement to make that actually has any value.
And no, unlike that moron’s, mine – obviously – is not one that will make any MAGAt happy, but I’m sure that none of those is reading my blog.
After all, it’s not about child-trafficking – and worse – reptiles ruling the world or any other conspiracy theory.
Which they love so much they’d kill or die for it, in order to rule the world NAZI-style instead.
…
Sorry, I got carried a way a bit there and that distracts from the actual announcement.
When I got home one day and Paula handed me an envelope, I thought for a moment she was handing me the divorce papers.
But it actually contained my birthday present 🤣
It was a printout of a reservation she had made on Booking.com and while she knows that my hearth lies in the Dolomites, that was just (way) too expensive.
As we both have fond memories of last year’s stay in Saint-Jean-de-Maurienne, she figured this would be more than a consolation prize.
HELL YEAH!!!
Just inside the top 25 of Europe’s highest mountain passes, the Col d’Izoard (2,360 m) is located in the French Hautes-Alpes department.
It is part of the “Route des Grand Alpes”, running over the part of the D902 between (north-east of) Barcelonnette and Briançon.
That part first goes up and down the Col de Vars, runs through the famous Gorges du Guil from Guillestre and then up and down the Izoard to end in Briançon.
The Col d’Izoard has been in Tour de France stages no less than 36 times, lately in 2019.
In 2017’s stage 20, the Izoard was the only time the stage actually finished on its summit.
While Warren Barguil won that stage, more memorable and perhaps more impressive, at least for me, was Annemiek van Vleuten’s win in La Course, the one day women event.
While Barguil was actually slower on the ascend than runner up Romain Bardet, van Vleuten was only beaten by a handfull of (other) guys, out of the entire TDF peloton.
As promised, I will conclude the reporting on my Tour de France 2021 with a recap.
I cycled 14 out of 15 available days and have my own stupidity to blame for having a “rest day”.
While I guess this Tour de France once again showed I’m (still) capable of pushing myself through – and over – my limits, there’s no denying that I will have to take it down a notch.
How much will also depend on my capability to keep enduring the back pain on every climb.
Sure, taking in the mostly overwhelming landscapes, the feeling of tininess when looking around and the stunning views are great “distractors”.
But I keep increasing the number of short breaks to ease the pain, which eventually do not help very much any more either.
On the upside, these enable me to take in more of the views and make pictures too 😂
Anyway, lets get to the recap…
