Climbing Mont Ventoux

It is topped by the barren moonscape known as the toughest climb on the Tour de France.  It is a 22 kilometer unrelenting climb from the town of Bedoin to 1,912 metres of altitude with an average slope of 7.5% although it starts out fairly gently. The town of Bedoin is at less than 400 metres altitude so there are 1,576 metres of vertical to climb the top.  The last 15.6 kms. are an average slope of 8.6%.  It is Mont Ventoux, the Giant of Provence.

Cristina and made this climb with Mimi and his brother Claude on a perfect September day. 

Claude watched Cristina and me get ready.

 Cristina, Mimi and Claude had a coffee, while I had water and then we put on our helmets.

 

And got on our bikes.











And then we were off.

The first half of the climb is through the lush forest.  Here Cristina, Mimi and Claude rode together while I was already off the back trying to get warmed up and get my legs going.  A rider is trying to keep up with them but didn't manage to hang in very long with them.

 

Being the old pro that he is Mimi thought to shed his helmet first and here gives it to his wife Jacqueline.  Soon Cristina and Claude too took their helmets off for the uphill grind.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I was too far back to see they had taken their helmets off and the idea never even occurred to me.  I had tucked my sunglasses into the holes in my helmet, zipped open my jersey to stay cooler and pounded up the hill, alternating between standing up on the pedals and sitting and churning my legs.

 

 

Cristina was calling out for more water to Mimi's wife, Jacqueline, and Pascaline who supported our ride. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 Jacqueline exhibits perfect form running before her to hand off a full water bottle to Cristina.  Notice how professionally she holds only the bottom of the bottle so there is lots of bottle surface for the cyclist to grab.  She too is a pro at this.  She seems to enjoy it in fact.

 

 

Mimi was enjoying his ride.

Here I have climbed out of the forested part of the ride and am now in the sun with the increasingly more desolate landscape surrounding me.











Claude could not keep up with Cristina and Mimi and was in between them and me.  Here it looks like he is looking behind him to see if I'm catching him.  I was but I didn't manage to quite reel him back in before the finish.  I ended up a couple of minutes behind him.

 

 

 

 

 

Mimi and Cristina topped the climb.  The barren landscape is unmistakeable as Mont Ventoux.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 I came up about 11 minutes later.








Here's the link to the details of my climb (control click on the link):

http://www.strava.com/activities/tt-up-mont-ventoux-from-b%C3%A9doin-paca-france-with-mimi-80017257?ref=1MT1yaWRlX3NoYXJlOzI9ZW1haWw7ND04Mjk2NzE%253D

 

On the way down we stopped by the monument to Tom Simpson who died on the slopes of Mont Ventoux in 1967 in the Tour de France.  It is about 1 km. from the summit.  Mimi finished the Tour de France that year and remembers how hot is was.  The Tour doctors considered cancelling the Mont Ventoux stage but let it go after taking some blood pressure samples from the cyclists.  Mimi says Tom looked a wreck before the stage started, let alone later on.  He was full of uppers and alcohol and with the heat just crumpled and fell 1 km. from the top of Mont Ventoux. 

 

Mimi remembers looking at him as he passed and finished the stage.  Mimi was back a ways in the race as he had flatted and rode the last 3 kms. to the top of Mont Ventoux on a flat tire.  A helicopter was summoned to take Tom to the hospital but it took a while for the helicopter to arrive and the riders were all gathering around as the stage had finished and they watched Tom be loaded into the helicopter.  But it was of no avail.  Tom was dead.  The next day the peloton let one of Tom's teammates get away and win the stage to honor Tom's memory.

 

After paying homage to Tom Simpson, Cristina, Claude, Mimi, Jacqueline, Pascaline and I shared a bottle of champagne and had lunch at the Chalet Reynard to celebrate the climb.  The restaurant is 6 kms. from the top of the Mont Ventoux climb on the route back to Bedoin.  The food was very good, most of us had huge plates of spaghetti Bolognese, one ravioli forestiere (with morel mushrooms) and one bavette frites (flank steak with fries). 

It was also a great place to buy commemorative cycling clothing sporting Mont Ventoux in big letters and the 1912 altitude in sharp black, white or red with trim of the other two colors.  The clothing was marked down 40% since it was no longer high season so we took advantage of the opportunity and loaded up.  The owners were keen to talk to us since we were "exotic" Canadians and could speak French.  We were treated very well. 

 After lunch we jumped back on our bikes for a fast downhill on a good road where you could see most of the turns and let it rip.  I was amped up for this but there were cars on the road and cyclists coming up so I had to keep slowing down until I could pass the cars (who can't handle the turns at speed as well as bicycles but are faster on the straightaways if they accelerate).  Here's my downhill ride from the Chalet Reynard:

http://www.strava.com/activities/descent-of-mont-ventoux-to-b%C3%A9doin-paca-france-80017195?ref=1MT1yaWRlX3NoYXJlOzI9ZW1haWw7ND04Mjk2NzE%253D

We cycled into Bedoin and called it a day of cycling and went our separate ways.  Separate, but united in the fact we had each climbed Mont Ventoux and knew what the Giant of Provence was to climb.  Perhaps the toughest single climb in le Tour de France.