Stage 4 – Puy St Vincent

Today we did the fictuous neutral rollout of 4km and then again got into the cars.  It was a shame for the spectators who had lined the switch back climbs and then sadly watched us all drive past in the cars.  I am sure they think we just drive from stage to stage and don’t ever ride!

Today’s change of plan was supposedly due to a bad landslide which had completely blocked the road.  This section of road had no possible detours so the stage was changed and we again piled into cars and drove nearly 100km to detour the apparent landslide.  The entire race caravan drove in convoy under police escort.  It was actually great fun to have the traffic at every intersection stopped so we could drive through without stopping.  With the temperatures still above 40 degrees and many of us drinking litres of water, about half the caravan pulled over for a pee break.  It was an amusing sight to watch, with the policemen then helping us to catch up to the cars who hadn’t stopped.  I am sure the speed limits were bent on several occasions.

As I speak French, I watched the news that night to see the report on the landslide, but the incident was never mentioned.  Apparently, the landslide was a story fabricated by a few individuals who were not happy with the way the race was organised and they wanted to make life even more difficult for him.

So after driving nearly 100km we pulled up in drizzling rain at 5pm and were told our stage would now be 35km.  I grabbed our race bible and the profile of the final section looked all uphill.  Great!  Some riders started to protest.  They were chanting “hotel, hotel – lets just go to the hotel.  The commissaire sensing that we would refuse to race, suddenly popped his head out from the sunroof and blew his whistle.

Fellow aussie Sara Carrigan wasn’t even on her bike so she completely missed the start.  Without any warm up, the Russians threw their bikes into the big ring and started driving it hard.  The entire peloton was strung out in a single line and was soon smashed into little groups.

Gaps were opening up everywhere and I found a small group with team mate, Christine and we worked really hard to chase the front group.  I worked too hard because just as we caught them, the climb started and I had nothing in my legs.  I blew into a million little pieces and was soon passed by the entire field.  I eventually found my legs and rode from car to car and until I reached the grupetto – the flat land riders who survive the climbs and excel on the flats.

I found my rythym and soon found the tempo in the grupetto too slow, but it was foolish to ride away and expend sacred energy to finish 50^th instead of 60^th when there were still 8 hard days of racing left.  After the race, we only had a 45 minute transfer which was a huge change from the many hours of travelling we have succumbed to so far.