TdF 2005 - Literally In A Ditch

July 25, 2005
Bonjour Everyone,

The final stage of our Tour de France was spent on lawn chairs in ditch on the side of the Col de la Gachet (a 3rd category climb at the 40km mark of the 55,5km individual time trial). We parked in a wheat field at the top of the mountain and walked down to our spot. There were some crazy people on the mountain yesterday, and we weren't even close to being considered for that group (I won't repeat some of the things they had painted on the street).

The mountain was lined in people as it was too narrow for vehicles to park where we were standing. There is a great communal sense that envelopes the Tour, especially after you've spent hours on end with the people standing and picnicking around you. We had a whole afternoon's worth of conversation with the older French men standing next to us using only the words "(George) Hincapie", "New York City", and "oui", and a few hand gestures here and there. The Dutch people across the street (more of a country lane than a street) showed us the time splits on their cell phone stop watch (and gave us each a piece of gum), and we exchange a few "great day for a time trial" and "poor Rasmussen" (you'll know what that means if you caught the stage today, but in short any guy who has to change his bike three times in 55km and flies head-over-heels into a ditch is having a bad day) with their far-better English.

The cyclists came by one at a time every 2 to 3 minutes. It was one of those stages where people pack the road and a thin line opens up to let the cyclist pass through. When you watch on TV it's the kind where Angel gets nervous about the spectators colliding with the cyclists and talks to them in hopes that they will hear her and move out of the way. I'm sure a couple of times today during the 155 times a biker rolled by we were a bit too close but everything turned out fine in the end. You just get so excited and they are right there, RIGHT there so much if you don't jump off the road sometimes they'll hit you. Since they only pass every couple of minutes between riders everyone floods the street to talk and stand in someshade. As soon as you hear the next motorcycle siren people go back to their spots on the road to cheer and repeat the process all over again.

Angel wants you to know that on Thursday at our Chambres d'Hotes dinner when the fromage course came and I asked our host what a particular one was called he said, I don't know, it comes from the house over there, and he pointed to a house on the other side of the valley.

After putting about 2,500km on our car since last Saturday we're now trying to figure out how to pack all of the caravan booty, direction signs, and PMU sprint point hands. If all goes well we'll be on our flight tomorrow afternoon from Lyon and will speak with you all soon.

Hope you have enjoyed at least a bit or two from our roadside Tour updates.

Oh yeah, so Lance won the stage today and it was incredible! He and Jan Ullrich powered up the mountain like they were machines (see above photos, top Lance, bottom, Jan). Everyone else looked like they were just out for a leisurely stroll in the mountains.

Until next year.