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Not long on miles but high on quality. And 90F at the top, which is pretty hot for 6500ft.![]() First train from Grenoble to Chambery, where we took advantage of the 50 minute layover to change out my front tire, which had actually worn through. Next train to Albertville, which was where Kevin and I stayed on his 2nd trip here, so brought back a few memories. ![]() It's a beautiful mountain that photos don't do justice to. We had planned to eat at one of the 3 restaurants surrounding the lake as you near the final part of the climb, but after waiting for quite a while for service at each one, we moved on. Actually, the first restaurant wasn't bad, but we ordered just cokes because they had no sandwiches on the menu, just expensive regular meals. Seems like I might finally be getting used to the heat. Makes sense; this was our 4th ride here, all of them during their much-advertised heat wave. Fortunately it doesn't get REALLY hot until 3pm, so if you ride earlier, you miss most of it. The descent towards Bourg St Maurice is incredible. It will be fun watching how the racers do it without going over the edge. The first part is fast... with a tailwind, possibly the fastest speeds anyone might ever hit (not us though; no tailwind and we were not wanting to take too many risks). I could imagine the pros could actually hit 60mph without much effort. But, just for the first couple of miles, after which it gets narrower and the corners are often banked the wrong way. Still a fun descent though. Steeper on the Bourg St. Maurice side than Albertville. No ride tomorrow; we're taking the train to Orange to catch up with the race and get photos. Thursday the race comes to us! Still working on the best way to see it, but thinking we'll ride up to the top of the Galibier, then head back down a bit to find a good place for getting downhill photos. This will be an interesting stage, finishing on a descent. |
Post date: 2019-07-23 14:21:25 Post date GMT: 2019-07-23 21:21:25 Post modified date: 2023-02-27 22:58:00 Post modified date GMT: 2023-02-28 06:58:00 |
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