The UCI Pro Tour rolls into the tiny town of Plouay every August for the Grand Prix de Bretagne. It's a 248km 13 laps of a course that has its start/finish line near the town's velodrome. The preceding day sees the junior and ladies races and the major teams usually field strong B teams for the main event. So the likes of BMC, HTC Highroad (with Renshaw), Sky (with Swift, Thomas & Bosenhagen), Europcar (with Voekeler), FDJ, Leopard Trek, Cofidis, Astana, Saxo Bank and more fielding teams gives a mini TdF flavour.
Via Nirone 7 posing next to sponsor's banners
On the Friday, the amateurs get a turn with sportive, randonee, VTT and walking events available, all using the same start line as the main event. I was entered into the randonee event as there's some kind of licence / medical cert requirement for the sportive. Even these amateur events attracted a full page preview and 3 page report in the Ouest France newspaper.
I opted for the 90km ride but managed to miss the big start (1900 in the randonee) by 30 minutes because I'd got mixed up with when the campsite allowed car movements in the early morning, but the organisers still allowed me to run. Nice. This route was constantly undulating, no real big climbs, but no rest sections either. There was one refreshment point where I filled up with water and enjoyed bananas and madelines. I probably picked off 100 or so riders over the route which made me feel better, given their 30 min head start. Nice weather too, wet roads to start with but no rain nor wind and temps around the 20 mark. Had my first puncture after 4000 miles of puncture free riding on Conti Gatorskins, but it was just over 1km from the finish so I walked it over the line. Good job my French is poor so I didn't have to understand the commentators' sarky remarks.
56 miles in 3 hrs 33 mins including the walking, so pretty pleased with that. Post ride refreshments included the option of a beer! Shame I had to drive home.
So that's all my riding done now, next time on the bike will be on the way from Euston to the hotel in London on the night before the first day of L2P. Gulp!
.JPG)
