My desire to write about PBP experiences and finish uploading photos is competing with the need to triage the disgusting cricket situation at work, and prepare for the start of the fall semester, which is tomorrow. But here we go.
Sometimes it makes sense to write about brevets in a chronological order, but I'm increasingly thinking this one is going to manifest in a non-chronological order instead. A large part of this is because what's most interesting to me this time around are certain contrasts between the 2015 and the 2023 experiences.
And I also want to write about certain parts more than others. For example, I have only a couple small snippets of memories from the first night on Sunday, but some very rich memories from the final night, Wednesday.
Sunday was the first stage, where we set out a couple hours before sunset, then rode through the night, arriving in Villaines-la-Juhel just as the sun came up. By the way - maps of each segment are available through the
PBP website, should you wish to understand each stage in nearly as excruciating detail as one does when actually riding them.
Sunday was the first really warm day, so I tried to hang out in the shade near the starting line as much as possible before it was my turn to line up, have my lights and night-riding gear checked, get my first brevet card stamp, then finally process through the start chute. I was also nervous, both about the start and about the heat, as indicated by the fact that I had to pee no fewer than 5 times while I waited. Five uses of the
PStyle, right off the bat!
Having Rambouillet as the starting and finishing location is far superior to the location in 2015, at San Quentin-en-Yvelines. For one thing, the organizers have figured out how to make good use of the grounds at the
Chateau de Rambouillet. But secondly, as soon as the ride began, we were out on country roads. No initial trepidatious stage where the excitement from beginning mixes catastrophically with unfamiliar "road furniture," leading to crashes and premature endings almost before the ride has gotten underway. Instead, we could gradually stretch out our legs on the smooth country roads after all the standing around, and try to find that magical gear somewhere in between "hauling ass faster than prudent" and "gently cruising along." One should try to avoid blowing out one's legs right out of the gate, there will be plenty of time for that later on.
As the sun set and night fell, I encountered some of the other women participating in the ride: a pair of Canadian sisters, and a French woman, none of whose names I can recall by now. While we waited for our start, the announcer had informed us that a full ten percent (10%) of the riders this year were women, a cheering fact given that ridership by women had been increasing from the 2015 to 2019 editions (from 6% to 8% of the participants). As a member of the minority gender, this statistic encouraged me. I generally enjoy doing sports with other women, and don't often have the chance in randonneuring. It was only after the ride concluded that I learned the statistic had been inflated: we were only 7% of the participants this year. And yet. There we were, making it OUR ride.
That first night, I also remember being dazzled by the view of the stars out in the countryside. The first stages featured mostly rolling hills out among open fields, so we could see very long lines of bicycle taillights heading off far into the distance. A classic PBP experience.
But that's about all that I really remember of the first night, other than that I managed to keep my stop at the first control in Mortagne-au-Perche very brief, so as to work on banking time for sleep later on in Loudeac.
So let's now turn to Wednesday night. First, recall the
Wednesday afternoon heat and hills. By the late afternoon and early evening, I was beyond tired. I'd had to spend a solid couple of hours Wednesday morning riding hard to get caught back up to the scheduled control closing times, then found myself just barely crawling along in the heat of the day, struggling mightily to stay ahead of the red line. I'd arrived in Villaines-la-Juhel at 8:46 pm by my chip time, 20 minutes ahead of the control close at 9:06 pm, just stringing along from control to control without managing to gain any spare time. After having my brevet card stamped, I was planning on just heading out as quickly as I could, but a woman volunteering at the control noticed me and asked what I needed. When I said, "Food," she indicated that she would not take "No" for an answer and insisted on leading me over to the restaurant at the control, informing me that the vegetarian options were great and that there was a separate priority line for the randonneurs (as opposed to the townspeople, who were also queueing up in a very long line to enjoy dinner).
I accidentally failed to take advantage of the kids who volunteer at the Villaines control to carry the randonneurs' trays for them, but I do have to admit that the vegetarian lentil stew was some of the very best brevet food I had the entire ride. As I gobbled it down as quickly as I could, I learned from a nearby randonneur that they'd learned of the cyclist who "won" PBP this year, who was an American! I must be pleased and proud of my countryman! Did I know him? At the time, I didn't think so, but later on I came to learn it was one of the riders I'd met while volunteering for the domestic New York-Montreal-New York 1200k brevet last September! Very cool.
Having successfully inhaled a late dinner and refilled my water bottle and Camelbak from the water pitcher at the table, I wasted no more time at the control and got back over to Froinlavin, gingerly hopping on* to continue pedaling with the Relentless Forward Motion I've learned can carry me from one control to the next. Survival mode.
The trouble was, it was still warm, and I was still exhausted and in want of some sleep.
Randonneur strategies vary when it comes to sleep management. Some people will ride even past the point where they are literally falling asleep on the bike. From my years of doing these rides, I've come up with a basic rule for myself, as first implemented at PBP in 2015. If I am so tired that I'm falling asleep on my bike, I will pull over and take a 10-20-minute power nap. This is not negotiable, because I have heard far too many horror stories that have resulted from riding while sleep-deprived.
Wednesday afternoon presented tough-enough riding conditions that I was forced to entertain some PBP possibilities that I'd hoped to avoid. My default is to do everything in my power to ensure I can finish on-time, pushing through all kinds of pain and exhaustion and discomfort, riding and taking short breaks or stops as strategically as I know how. After all, the average pace required to successfully complete a brevet really isn't all that fast, a speed of 15 kph, or about 9 miles per hour. But I also know that part of strategic riding in hot weather requires not riding too close to my upper thermal limit. Twenty minutes blowing past my upper thermal limit for the sake of speed will cost me several hours to cool back down, in the best case. So there really wasn't much I could do to try and go faster to work my way through the hills during the heat of the day. Gear down, spin up, walk as needed. Try to eke out speed on the downhills. It was frustrating to observe other riders who somehow retained the capacity to charge up hills in that weather, knowing such an effort would be foolhardy for me. So at last I had to let myself consider the possibility that I might just have to finish PBP "hors délai" - that is, having successfully completed the distance, but taking more time than the allotted 90 hours. Oh well. I would at least have my successful 2015 finish as consolation.
In any case, I knew I'd burned all of my hard-earned time buffer at the Villaines control, and then some. It was still uncomfortably warm, and I was having an increasingly hard time keeping my eyes open. I did everything I could to keep moving forward, but as the merciless sun finally set, I started keeping an eye out for a spot somewhere, anywhere, to lean my bike, pull out the space blanket, and close my eyes for a few minutes.
Finally, along a gentle descent, I saw a farmhouse conveniently right next to the road, with a promising-looking gentle ditch bordering the road. The ditch was more gravel than grass, but when you're tired enough, it's comfortable enough. Earlier on, I'd watched one of the Guardian Angel volunteers stop to get a Japanese rider who was ditch-napping to move his head further away from the edge of the pavement, so I was careful to set up my sleep space a good 2 feet from the edge of the road. I set a timer and closed my eyes.
Twelve or twenty minutes later, my cell phone alarm went off, and it was time to get up again and back in the saddle. I wheeled Froinlavin back up to the edge of the road, swung my right foot over, and then fell to the pavement with Froinlavin on top of me because I hadn't managed to lift my leg high enough to clear the luggage piled up on the rear rack. Shaken, I had to quickly scramble back up again and get Froinlavin back off the road to avoid causing further accidents with oncoming riders. I then darted out onto the road a couple times to retrieve a handful of batteries and othe items that had scattered out of my handlebar bag.
Shaken, I eventually attempted a more careful remount and succeeded, and gingerly pedaled onward, with a new awareness of just how fatigued I must be. Yes, the idea of a safe return, regardless of how long it might take, was sounding more and more like the correct tack to take.
On I went. At some point, tiring of the endless dispirited monologue that was playing and replaying itself in my head, I thought to pull out the mp3 player I'd been hauling along the entire time, to put on some music. When we first set out on Sunday night, I'd been delighted when a French rider had actually started to sing along with one of the Chants de Marins I was playing. But that song then proceeded to become my internal soundtrack for the majority of the brevet, and I was starting to grow a bit weary of the tune. Time to listen to something else.
Sifting through my playlists: ages ago, I created a playlist entitled, "Bike Rides," for the occasions when we go on social bike rides. Hmm, maybe it was time to fire it up? Worth a try.
The music was like magic. I was transported out of myself, singing along to certain songs as the rhythm, variety, and pep pushed me up the hills. The mp3 player is now a cherished and vital piece of randonneuring equipment.
But I was still tired. I am fairly certain I "ditch"-napped twice again in the city of Alençon, on some sidewalks, which was also a section where I saw the flashing lights of ambulances twice. Not all riders were able to avoid catastrophe.
After the second ditch-nap, which was on the corner of a somewhat prominent urban intersection, another English-speaking rider came up and asked if we could ride together for safety's sake. "Of course!" I said. She, too, had seen no small amount of sketchy sleep-deprived cycling shenanigans, and was prudent enough to realize that some nighttime conversation could help. Here, at last, was the equivalent of what had happened every single night in 2015: a chance to talk with someone to while away the hours of darkness! It had only taken three nights of relative solitude to reach this point this year! She introduced herself as L, a Texan now transplanted to Germany. She and I were both amazed to discover that I'd lived in Texas not far from where she grew up, so I was familiar with her hometown! An unusual occurrence, as that part of Texas is rural. I, in turn, was surprised and pleased to discover we were almost exactly the same age! I was also surprised and pleased to discover how helpful it was to have a conversation partner at that stage in the ride; at long last my mind was pushed out of the well-worn ruts it had been in for most of the brevet and I savored the chance to think about new questions to ask and favorite stories to share.
Alas, our time riding together was short-lived, as soon thereafter L was struck by her own nap attack and prudently decided it was best to heed the desire to sleep. Meanwhile, the conversation managed to completely perk me up and I was awake and ready to RIDE! After the afternoon malaise, what a feeling! Before we parted, I gave her my spare Fenix flashlight to use, as she was down to just a dim, battery-powered light that made it difficult to descend the hills at speed. And then I was off again.
It always feels incredible to get a second, third, or fiftieth wind. Awake again, flying along in the now cooler air under a star-studded sky, I observed a fatigued rider on the road ahead of me engaging in a textbook nighttime randonneuring activity: first, he slowly wobbled across the road from the right side all the way to the left. He paused, precariously, along the left edge of the road, then ponderously steered and wobbled his way all the way back across the road to the right edge. At that point, I thought, "Hmm, is he going to correct back out again and repeat his meandering route? I will need to be strategic about going around him." Instead, after another ponderous pause, he simply continued riding forward, straight into the ditch at the edge of the road!
He was quite fortunate that the ditches in that part of the countryside are forgiving to sleepy bicyclists: grassy, not too steep or deep. The ditch brought all of his remaining forward momentum to a halt, and he and his bicycle then simply flopped to one side, in a position where he could simply lie in repose for a minute or two, should he wish.
At this point, I had just reached him, so I asked, "Are you all right?" He groaned or mumbled something incoherent in reply, which I took to mean he was fine. I do hope he stayed in that ditch for at least a couple of minutes to sleep. As for me, I forged onward.
There is a dog-leg in this section of the ride, in a small village called Le Pont de Pierre. Coming into the village, there was one of the many small roadside support stands set up by locals to encourage the riders, this one managed by two young boys who couldn't have been more than 10 years old. Spying some coffee fixings, I pulled up for a quick stop. In addition to the piping hot coffee, which I gulped down, one of the boys held out a large bowl, and urged me to eat some of the olives and pickled beans therein. I obliged, noticing, as I did so, an open garage behind the boy containing several mattresses each occupied by exhausted, snoring randonneurs. It is a scene that will be forever etched in my mind: these two young boys up far past their usual bedtimes, doing what they could to keep the riders glued together and moving forward, working by streetlight late into the night. While I ate the olives, a paceline flew by at speed, and the boy interrupted his hosting efforts to shout at the riders so they would notice the turn they needed to quickly make to stay on the route.
I am fairly certain that a substantial number of riders, like me, owe their success to French people like those boys. I would love to go back and say hello and thank you to them someday.
Fueled further by the caffeine, I rocketed onward. I was so suddenly energized that I caught up to that peleton and then simply blasted right past it. The final stretch of that stage, towards Mortagne-au-Perche, features rolling hills along roads where the trees are so thick overhead that the roads become tunnels. I don't know if the cause was fatigue, simple nighttime optical illusion, or both, but as I continued along that section, I became aware that the only way I could actually tell whether I was pedaling up a hill or coasting down was based on feedback from Froinlavin; the tree tunnels created the illusion that everything was flat. If I felt resistance, I pedaled. If the resistance lifted, I coasted, always and forever flying forward.
At long last, arriving at Mortagne-au-Perche, the clouds of uncertainty lifted. I reached the control at 2:48 am, full hour and four minutes before closing. It was then that I knew: I
could finish. And likely on time.
Not only that, I could afford to rest again. And so I did. I gulped down yet another quick meal of plain buttered noodles and some almond pudding, added my phone and the mp3 player to the electronics charging pile, set an alarm on the GPS, and got 45 minutes of glorious, heavenly sleep, sacked out along a wall behind the brevet card bénévoles.
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*Weakest aspect of my preparation: saddle and bike shorts. Ouch. This was all known heading into PBP. Abundant pressure pain, chafing, probably some contusion pain, too. I'll be working on this with my bike fitter soon; the fitting right before PBP was too close to the event to make major changes.
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