Paris – Roubaix – Amateur Version – June 1997 - Part II

Paris – Roubaix – Amateur Version – June 1997

Part II:

Treatment for Heat Exhaustion (not recommended for the fainthearted!):

So when I left you, I had my head buried in my hands and I had given up. The remaining three members of the ‘A’ team had taken their leave and left me in a puddle on the floor of a hall in a village somewhere in NE France.

I didn’t know it yet, but the support team was waiting outside for me to gather my wits; they had recovered my bike and loaded it onto one of the Range Rovers.

I was desolate, all that planning and training for nothing. Over 120 miles gone and that was it; over! A hand shook my shoulder and I looked up to find a big matronly woman, one of the race organisers standing over me. She and asked me what was wrong; I must have looked very bad to have taken her attention away from her job of doling out refreshments to the hungry cyclists. I struggled to make myself understood and resorted to pointing to my head and stomach saying ‘mal’ and ‘soleil’.

She eventually got the message nodded, grabbed me by the arms and hoisted me to my feet. I swayed a little as the blood rushed from my head and slowly followed her outside, back into damned sun. She led me to a chair and made me sit down and calmly told me to rest while she got help. I did as I was told thinking she was looking medical assistance – I expected to see the French version of the St John Ambulance.

Next thing I knew I was jumping up out of the chair a split second after I was drenched in ice-cold water! I swear by all that is dear to me, the bloody woman actually threw a bucket of ice-cold water over me.

And the effect?

Well it was like being given a shot of adrenaline. Panting for breath and wiping the water from my eyes, I turned to shout at her when I realised that she had given me the best treatment possible. There’s no way anyone in England would have done such a thing – just imagine if I’d had a dodgy ticker? It doesn’t bear thinking about really, but it worked for me then and there.

I felt instantly better and now had a decision to make, could I continue?

Damn right I could. I almost ran back into the hall and wolfed down a number of goodies from the food tables. Cakes, biscuits, cakes, chocolates and yet more cakes were all washed down with about a gallon of cool, still lemonade. I then rushed out to the Support Team and retrieved my trusty old, hard-worked cycle. Despite aching legs, I tore off after my group with renewed vigour. The Support Team raced ahead in the Range Rover to let the guys know I was back on my bike.

I don’t know how much time I’d lost on my group at the rest stop, it seemed like an age but was probably only a few minutes, but I was determined to rejoin them or collapse trying.

A few minutes later I was astounded to see a familiar figure on a bike heading towards me - Ian! Apparently, after hearing that I was back on my bike he retraced his steps to help me regain the peloton. What a star! He had been magnificent all day long, shepherding us through the race. He had acted as a sort of ‘domestique’ for the whole day and here he was now back here helping me – I felt somewhat emotional but manfully pushed it to one side and struggled to stick to his back wheel as he pulled me onwards.

After about a half an hour of gut-wrenching, leg-burning work Ian and I finally made it to the back of the peloton. I felt as good as I had since the early hours of the race. I was also pleased to find that we had finally caught up with the four-man ‘B’ Team and the whole party was together again at last; at least for a short time.

We carried on, chatting making relatively good time but it soon became clear that the two mountain bikers in our group were struggling to maintain the pace of the peloton. They were continually falling behind and without discussion, the rest of us eased off the pace our little group found ourselves alone in the French countryside once more.

It was getting on towards late afternoon and it soon became clear that the mountain bikers were in serious trouble. One was suffering terrible saddle sores (I don’t even want to go there). The other was suffering a recurrence of the knee injury that had seriously curtailed his winter training. Both of them had to pull out at the next feed station, poor guys. No amount of cajoling or encouragement on our part could get them to change their minds. Neither of the guys had managed to complete a good winter training programme and this was what happened when you were under-prepared for 'L’enfer du Nord'. I, of course, knew exactly what it felt like to be at the end of your tether but still couldn’t persuade them to push through their own private pain barriers.

Reluctantly, we left our two inconsolable friends to the comfortable Range Rovers and, with a couple of envious glances at the upholstered splendour of those beguiling car seats, we continued ever onwards. We still had a hell of a long way to go, and now time was becoming a problem. We needed to reach Roubaix before the official end time of 19:30 hrs or our final race card would not be stamped and we would lose our sponsorship, (an honourable mention here goes to my brother Tim, who stumped up to the tune of £100, a really generous amount at the time).

Unencumbered by our slower mountain-bike colleagues, we upped the tempo as much as we could and flowed along stretches of modern road and bumped along the occasional stretch of pavé – horrible stuff!

We began making up for time lost but by late afternoon clouds had started bubbling up from the north. Topping that, the wind increased noticeably and became a slight headwind; the first we’d had that whole day.

One benefit was that the clouds cast welcome shadows over us and we finally gained some protection from the BBQ heat of the sun. Then, almost without warning the heavens opened.

Thunderstorm:

Black clouds materialised out of nowhere and within minutes the blue sky disappeared. Thunder and lightning boomed and glared around us like the End of the World. Then stair-rod rain soaked us from head to foot, causing chafing in places that were already chafed enough, thank you very much.

The shocking summer storm not only increased our discomfort, as if we needed any more, but it added to the level of danger in two ways:

· Firstly, the pieces of pavé, warn ice-smooth on the top surface after the centuries traffic became even more treacherous and slippery

· Secondly, the innumerable potholes that we had tried desperately to avoid all day long were filled with water making them invisible

Being rain-saturated wasn’t a problem. Truth be told, after the scorching heat of the day it was a bit of a relief, but the under-wheel conditions spelt potential disaster. When I took a second tumble after my front wheel found a second particularly nasty hidden pothole, I called for the others to stop. We grouped together under the inadequate shelter of a couple of trees and had a quick discussion. We had to shout to make ourselves heard above the din, but quickly decided look for a place to hide from the rain and lightning.

We gingerly made our way towards a group of farm buildings a short distance away and managed to take shelter in an old a barn. Darkness in the middle of the day was like Armageddon (as in “Armageddon out of this rain” – thanks for that go to Spike Milligan c. 1972).

Whilst tour of us sheltered in the barn the intrepid Ian and his mate Dave, the second best rider in our group (there's always a Dave somewhere isn't there), decided they wouldn’t wait any longer. They struck out bravely for the finish, desperate to complete the race before the fast approaching deadline. The rest of us cowardly souls waited out the storm; about 20 minutes as it happens.

As soon as the storm passed over us and the rain abated we were off, gingerly at first and then with more confidence and daring. The sun returned as quickly as it had left and it became instantly sauna-hot; the sweat began running off us in sheets and we were in danger of running out of water again.

One of us, Mike, nearly got creamed by a car when tiredness caused him to forget that the French drive on the ‘wrong’ side of the road. We’d been off road on the pavé for quite a while and he simply forgot to look the correct way (left) at a junction. A disaster was narrowly averted and we were off road again minutes later only for me to pick up a thorn and a front wheel puncture. We wasted another few precious minutes for the closely following Support Team to arrive with my spare wheel. By this stage grip strength was too far gone to allow me to change tyres so we waited.

That was the last of the disasters really. We arrived at the final ‘Secret’ marshalling point and feeding station a little after 17:00n hrs and filled our water bottles for the final time. We had our cards stamped for the penultimate time and learnt that we were still about 40 kms for home! Yes, that’s right; after all we’d gone through.

All that pain and we still had some 25 miles to go; nearly two hours at our current rate of progress. It would be touch-and-go. The information hit us like a blow to the guts. We were however, assured by a marshal that the going was set to improve with stretches of renovated pavé making the going better. We were also promised long downhill miles on smooth roads into Roubaix. We didn’t really believe him, but he turned out to be quite accurate, bless him!

We were still passing the occasional desultory cyclists, but mostly we struck on alone and largely in silence. I can’t describe with any degree of accuracy how ecstatic I felt when we finally rode into that wonderful town on the French/Belgian border. We all shouted out with glee and sprinted along on smooth roads towards the velodrome and the finish line. We were going to make it!

Velodrome – the reason it started in the first place:

We had arrived in Roubaix with only a few minutes to spare. Ian met us, still on his bike, on the outskirts of town and advised us to go directly to the control station before hitting the Velodrome.

Race rules stated that two laps of the Velodrome were to be completed before our cards could be stamped, but as we were foreigners and the last to finish, we were to be allowed special dispensation. We arrived at the finish line to rousing cheers. It turns out that the Support Team had been priming the pump for us and the remaining crowd of spectators and successful riders cheered us in as though we’d won the damn race.

It was great to be reunited with the whole group and it turned out that Ian and Dave had beaten us home by over an hour! We’d so obviously been holding them up all day long – I said they were really good didn’t I?

With our cards duly stamped, we mounted or trusty steeds and completed the honorary two circuits of the high-banked concrete velodrome. For safety, and because I am a coward at heart, I stayed on the low inner lap; Ian completed another couple of laps on the high banking – he could be a little annoying at times!

What a day! What a relief to stop pedalling!

I think riding in the Paris-Roubaix is like bashing your head against a brick wall - it’s such a relief when it stops!

Silence:

I forgot to say this earlier, but I feel that this episode is too important not mention before signing off.....

Shortly after the half way mark, we were cycling through a particularly beautiful stretch of countryside when I noticed the silence. I could hear nothing but the sound of tyres on tarmac and chain-sets ticking; no birdsong, no insects, nothing. Despite the calm and tranquillity of the place, I actually began to feel a little uneasy. This was long before my episode at the rest stop, so it wasn’t the heat affecting my judgement.

I asked one of the French riders if he could sense something too. He nodded and solemnly pointed to an approaching signpost which simply read “La Foret du Somme”. We were passing through a place that thousands of Allied and German soldiers had died horrible, needless deaths some eighty years earlier. I swear I am not making this up I did feel something ominous before reading that sign! The whole group cycled on in silence, alone with our thoughts and then the pavé started.......

Race Times:

On 17^th April, the Professional PR97 race was won in an unbelievable time of 6h38'10'' (24 mph!), by the phenomenal Frenchman Frédéric Guesdon! I took over 11 hours, excluding the long enforces rest stop (an average speed of just 14.5 mph!).

Incidentally, 1997 remains the most recent French victory in the event.

What a day!

Epilogue:

Such were the stresses on my body caused by gripping hard to handlebars, that it took over a week for me to be able to hold a pen, or even tie up my own shoelaces – never again! Well, maybe.

Note:

*My PR97 race-card has been lost over the years and I’m afraid I cannot remember the actual details. These race details relate to the event in 2004 which I found on the ‘Interweb’, but they look to have followed the PR97 route pretty closely.