15th ‘PARIS-BREST-PARIS’ 2003                                              by Greg Cunningham

- AN UNUSUAL CYCLING HOLIDAY IN FRANCE                

 

I spent last August cycling in France.  My trip was focussed on the 1,225km ‘Paris-Brest-Paris’ (PBP) Audax event, a major non-competitive ride that is held once every
4 years and took place this year from 18-22 August.  The aim is to complete the distance within 90 hours, including stops.  So it’s a pretty daunting quest.

 

There were 4,069 starters - for the first time, more foreigners (2,064, including 81 Australians) started the event than French (2,005).  3,465 riders finished within the time limit (including 68 Australians), so the abandon rate was about 15% overall. 

 

I was successful, with an official time of 83h 37m.  I had 13 hours’ sleep at 3
pre-arranged chambres d’hote (B&Bs), completing daily stages of 470, 350, 315 & 90km.  I estimate that I spent about 55 hours riding.

 

I am very grateful to my Canberra cycling friends for their encouragement throughout this year, which kept me on the rails at some crucial times and motivated me to keep going with my PBP quest. 

 

The day after the event ended I sent a report to the ‘PP Longriders’ e-mail list recounting what a fantastic cycling experience it was - how well the huge event was organised and the wonderful experience of riding past cheering French spectators throughout the event and of riding with so many people from lots of other countries. 

 

That piece will be published in the Audax Australia magazine “Checkpoint” and is available at www.pedalpower.org.au/events/longrider .  This supplementary article provides some background to my participation in the event, and outlines how the ride unfolded.

 

How it all began…

 

I first read about the 1991 PBP event in US “Bicycling” magazine, and then learnt more about “this most famous randonnee of all” in 1995 when I joined Audax Australia.  In 1997 I heard a lot more about PBP when I did the first of my 4 “Super Randonneur Series” (a set of 200, 300, 400 and 600km rides) with John Quinn, a 1995 PBP ‘ancien’ (veteran) in Tumut. 

 

After finding out how demanding it was to do a 600, the PBP distance seemed unattainable.  But I was inspired by reading about the 1999 event and, while still daunted by the distance, by mid-2001 I began to think a bit more seriously about the possibility of attempting the 2003 event. 

 

I focussed on arranging adequate lighting, to ride for one full night and most likely for part of 3 other nights.  I took the advice of other Audax riders, including a mate of mine in Canberra, Bob McHugh, and purchased a Schmidt hub dynamo.  My father wired up a dual headlight system like Bob’s, and I tested it on my commute and on my 3rd Super Series during 2002.

 

Preparations…

 

At the turn of this year I was still unconvinced that the PBP distance was an achievable ambition for me.  Given what’s involved in qualifying for the event and in organising a trip to France, I dragged my feet a lot but just managed to keep the idea of doing PBP alive. 

 

I qualified at the last minute in late May by completing another Super Series.  During May I had travelled to Sydney twice, to do a 300 and a 400 in the Hawkesbury and Hunter Valley regions.  In the middle of the month I was the only rider on Jon Gowland’s Canberra 600 (Jon was ill).  There had been no scope for missing or abandoning any of these rides if I was to qualify. 

 

I continued manicly doing things just in time during the two months that followed.  I had to submit the PBP entry in the first week of June, arrange leave from work, make travel and accommodation arrangements, and continue to train each weekend over distances of 200-300km in the cold Canberra weather.  In late June I also rode a 400 in the Hunter Valley region with 4 other PBP entrants.  This started at 10pm on a Friday night at Hornsby to simulate the PBP start time.

 

Helpful advice…

 

In the period prior to leaving for France, I benefited greatly from e-mail advice from a French rider preparing for his 5th PBP – Daniel Lemoine, who my good friend David Thomson met on the ‘Tour of Corsica’ Audax ride last year. 

 

I was encouraged by Daniel’s view that 600km rides are more difficult than PBP because there is no support and “you do not have the ‘ambiance’ (the crazy ambiance) that we have during the event.  So the motivation is easier to find in PBP”.  But he cautioned that “everybody meets the ‘man with a hammer’ at least one time on the road”. 

 

Daniel had arranged to stay at 3 B&Bs along the way, so he would ride stages of 470, 355, 300, and 100km.  Since I planned to tour the PBP route before the event, I decided to try to book some B&Bs and adopt a similar schedule, to reduce the uncertainty about when, where and how much I would sleep.  From reading PBP experiences, this was a key factor affecting the outcome for many first-time riders.

 

Finally in France…

 

I secured 5 weeks off work, and I left Australia on 26 July, arriving in Paris to see the last day of the Tour de France on the Champs Elysees on the 27th.  Seeing that wonderful spectacle with half a million others was a great way to start my PBP quest. 

 

Following that I spent 3 weeks touring, including during the two-week heatwave, as final preparation for PBP.  I followed the PBP route out to Brest and rode back to Paris a different way.  Carrying a touring load, I averaged about 120km per day up until about a week before the event, after which I started to wind down.

 

This tour helped me acclimatise and considerably improved my fitness.  I also arranged B&Bs for the 3 PBP nights.  The schedule that I adapted from Daniel Lemoine’s meant that if things went roughly to plan, I would have only about 90km to ride on the last day. 

 

If I started out at 5am, allowing for tiredness I thought that I ought to be able to get in by 11am, giving a 5-hour buffer before the 4pm deadline if something went wrong.  As it turned out, I comfortably achieved this objective.

 

How it unfolded…

 

The atmosphere created by the cheering spectators and the thousands of riders was wonderful.  And I can vividly recall the line of red tail lights snaking ahead through the countryside as far as I could see (no flashing lights, though – these are not allowed in PBP because of the mesmerising effect on following riders).

 

The atmosphere was such that I felt like I could be whisked along by tacking onto unstructured groups of riders as they rolled by.  However, for a long time on the first night I rode to my own pace to avoid overdoing it in the initial few hundred kilometres. 

 

But the ‘man with a hammer’ still visited me relatively early in the event.  I had a pretty worrying time for several hours on the first afternoon, after about 300 km when my left leg was aching.  This sapped my energy and made it difficult to get into a rhythm.

 

I began to seriously question how I could possibly ride another 850km or so feeling like I did.  But after a longish rest and some food & drink, I started again and the discomfort didn’t return, and while my energy level continued to fluctuate I didn’t get that low again. 

 

Into the second day I seemed to be getting consistently stronger.  On the morning of the third day I was still riding well, and I started to think that I could get through the event successfully provided that I could stay healthy and I had no major mechanical problems.  On that third day I rode strongly most of the time, particularly in the hilly areas, and it turned out to be the best day I'd had all year on a long ride - after having already done well over 800km.

 

On the last night I had about four hours’ sleep, and got going again at 4.45am.  Once I reached the last controle at Noget-le-Roi before daybreak, I began to feel pretty confident, and I really enjoyed the 60 km ride from there on.  It was wonderful to hear the applause of the crowd when I reached the finishing roundabout. 

 

Afterwards…

 

I felt much better than I expected after such a long ride - I always assumed I’d be completely exhausted if I ever got to this point.  But I felt fine and alert, although in the days following the event I did come to realise how tired I was because of the sleep I’d missed. 

 

I spent the rest of the day either watching other riders come in or mingling with Australians and others I’d met along the way.  I had a few beers with members of the Willesden Cycling Club in London who I’d ridden with for lengthy periods on the first two days.  I stayed into the evening for the closing presentations and speeches (which were translated into English), when I learnt a lot about how the event was organised and the personalities behind it all.

 

On following morning I went out riding in my official PBP jersey, a wonderful red, white & blue design with images of the Eiffel Tower & the event logo.  I didn't wear it during the ride because I wanted to earn it first. 

 

Soon after leaving the hotel an older French cyclist dressed in street clothes spoke to me as he rode by, after seeing the jersey.  It was so pleasing to be able to respond to his question in my minimal French (together with a smile I couldn’t hold back) to simply say "oui, finis Paris-Brest-Paris". 

 

 

[this article appeared in the October/November 2003 issue of “Canberra Cyclist”,

 the journal of Pedal Power ACT]