Day 12--Tourist Time.

Dan went for a ride.

....we went to the castle

Day 11--The Sting of the Climb

Day 11---Today was Dan's day to drive the van so Randy, Ryan, Tom and myself headed out from St. Girons toward the town of Oust, Col de Latrape, Aulus, Col d' Agnes to finish in Foix, Fr. The weather started cool and overcast as we road out from St. Girons along the Salar river. This river was extremely clear and popular with fisherman and river kayakers. Another thing that was popular was Tom's muffin. Just as Tom took a bite a bee landed on the muffin and was consumed with the muffin in a single bit. As can be imagined, hilarity soon broke out as the bee tried to gain is freedom by stinging Tom in the mouth and on the lips. The bee was soon free and Tom less than happy.

We warmed up as we turned into the Vallee d' Ustou and slowly began to gain on the up coming Col de Letrape. We soon caught up to local man out for his morning ride and he joined our group for a few kilometers until he peeled off for either his home or his confusion at our “city sprints”. The Col de Letrape was a bit over 5km and moderately steep with a good rhythm. By this time the sun begun to burn through the clouds opening up the views of the valley and mountains above. We were soon over the top of the col and raced down into the down of Aulus for a quick snack and to fill out water bottled with the town's local water know for its healing powers.

Dan had warned us that the Col d'Agnes started quickly. He wasn't kidding. For the next 4km we churned our pedal over to climb the unrelenting grade and we hit the first set of switchbacks that broke up the climb to more manageable grades. We went over the top at 1570m and headed straight down for lunch above lake Et de Lers. We enjoyed omeletes and quiche at this idealistic lunch spot.

We got back on the bikes with heavy legs and full stomach to ride the next 30km down into Foix.

Even though the distance and vertical were less than other days we all seemed to agree that this was the hardest day.

We are now in the town of Foix which was the seat of the counts of Foix who were associated with the Cathar faith which many have learned about reading The Divinci Code.

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Day 9--I'm calling it 6 Cols

Day 9 was a huge climbing day. We left our ultra plus hotel in Gisset and headed out to a supposed 4 Col day, but by the end of the day we went up and over 6 distinct passes so it's a 6 col day in my book.

I think the highlight was seeing Casertelli's monument where he had an untimely death racing for the Motorola team.





GPS

Day 10

OK, here we go with a review of day 10. We climbed the route the Tour took this year as it left St. Giron. All of us are constantly amazed at the way Tom whips out the Visa to buy a new bike, purchase table dances or expensive wine---maybe the last two go together. What a guy !
Anyway a great ride today about 5 hours worth, 80 miles and 8,000 ft of climbing. This damn Ryan can spin up the hills with no effort--none at all. He is not winning the green jersey however, but that is due to old guy tactics. I think the overall review is that this is the best ever--and we are still moving into the mountains. In the morning we go to Foix and some hotter, dryer weather. Check back for a review from the boys, because it really does get better.

GPS

Day 8 - Crack in Our Universe

Last night a strong thunder stormed moved through the area leaving us running around our rooms closing windows and grabbing drying clothes from the balcony. Made you wonder what the net day would be like.

This morning we woke to variable conditions. After breakfast we decided wait out the weather and tune our bikes before making ride plans. However, ride plans were soon derailed as we hunted down a loud click on Tom's bike. After adjusting the headset, stem and wheels I made the fortunate and unfortunate discovery that Tom's frame had cracked on the downtube. It's good that the crack was found because if the frame was to fail at that point the consequences are hard to think about...ugly at best. As I write this Tom, Dan and Ryan our in town looking for a replacement.

No riding today and likely a late night building up a new bike for Tom.

Looks like the US did well in BMX!

Day 6-7

Reports soon to come....

until then photo dump

Day 5

Sorry for the delay. The hotel in St. Lary-Soulan offered WiFi for lots of Euros.

Here's Tom's take on the day.....

We left Argels-Gozost at about 9:ooa enroute to the famous Col Du Tourmalet (2114 meters)which was about 25 K from our hotel. The climb was 18k from Bareges with 8-10% and the last K much steeper. Long climb but went quick, about 1 hr 5-10 minutes. Broke out of clouds at about 3k to go which exposed great views as photos will show. Lots of people and riders at top. Scottie was driving the van and met us at top. We decended down the other side after buying a few souvenirs and quickly hit a thick layer of clouds. We were in a world of pain for the next 8-10k as the conditions were herrendous and we froze our asses off. Dandy Dan had no gloves and did not complain. I don't think Dan feels pain like a normal person.


Eventually we broke thru the layer of pain and hit the sun again. We pedaled real hard down below to warm back up. Next we rode rollers to the Col De Aspin which was about 5k at 8-10%. We got seperated from Dan here and went different routes. The Aspin downhill was long and very fast, our favorite to date. We hit 75k per hour and passed 7 cars, 5 at one time; WOW! We finished the ride at St. Lary Soulan, the site of our hotel and a large ski area. The Pla d' Adet starts here also where Hincape won a stage 2 years ago. Our ride time was 4:20 hrs with 9000 feet vertical.
Oh and by the way, Jackie---check out the picture of Dan at the top of the Touremelet to see what happened to your jersey !