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london-paris: later that same century
for those of us of a certain age, there is the opportunity to luxuriate in what might have been compared to what, sadly, certainly is. as a relative latecomer to the joys of road riding, there was never any danger of my having been recruited to the professional cause, at the time blissfully unaware there was any cause to be recruited to in the first place. not for me the lengthy days and nights of inveterate training, acquiring skills and fitness that would have me see off my peers in no uncertain fashion come the weekend.
yet, professional cycle racing is still one of the few sports where estrangement from those deserving of hero worship is considerably less than that of formula one motor racing, for example. that in itself, however, is still barely sufficient for the wannabe or distinctly 'has been' pelotonese to identify with the travails of the modern-day cycling pro. yes, we can all jest about going back to the team car during the sunday ride, or make merry about the likelihood of mavic lending a yellow skoda for neutral support on the way to debbie's café, but what's that really like?
i ask that question because few of us possess the fitness, skill or tactical nous to replicate even a short stage race. but that scarcely undermines the quest to find out what it's like to 'simply' ride a bike all day. that bike, all but hypothetical, would be devoid of spare tubes, tyre levers and multi-tools; the ride would be over closed roads, with motorcycle outriders to stop traffic and in place of a mavic car, there would be at least a fully equipped following vehicle with a mechanic ready and willing to leap out and perform a wheel change in the event of a puncture.
and best of all, there would be a luxury car (maserati anyone?) up front, announcing your impending arrival.
under normal circumstances, the foregoing would be the fairy dust of which dreams are made of. indeed, it's not hard to convince yourself even during a lone saturday ride, that a chasing peloton is hot on your heels, if only you can maintain the breakaway till the coffee shop or reality intervenes.
however, the dream outlined above, need not remain the articles of fiction; there is a way to emulate the professional peloton without straining much over 25kph, yet accoutrements such as luxury coaches, neutral service and closed roads can all be had as you wend your merry way towards paris, just as froomey and his pals do every july. the annual hot chillee, london to paris ride, once the province of late june, now arrives on the champs elysées on the saturday afternoon before the tour de france gets there and in 2018, it will take place for the fifteenth time. it's a ride i undertook in 2007, 2008 and again last year, along with hot chillee's founder, sven thiele.
as this year's ride approaches, i asked sven what his background in cycling was prior to 'inventing' the first london-paris ride in 2003?
"My only experience was as a passionate newcomer to cycling, looking for events to participate in. I was racing 3rd cat, badly, in the Surrey League. My real job was in technology and certainly in those days cycling was nowhere near as cool as it is now. In terms of 'sportive' style events, there were stunningly few in the UK. As it turns out the Dragon Ride and the Fred Whitton Challenge started up at the same time as we did with the London-Paris."
sven makes a good point, for it is only in the last decade or so, that the sportive market has not so much blossomed as exploded. however, the majority of sportives take place over a single day, with one or two of the shorter routes being accomplished in a matter of hours. and with no disrespect to any on the calendar, aside from timing chips, feed stations and the occasional event featuring closed roads, there is little to identify them with the professional milieu. the hot chillee london-paris event, however, occupies three whole days. but the question still remains, why ride from london to paris in the first place?
"Probably my passion exceeded my ability! Our thought was, "how hard can it be to ride three long (200km+) stages?" It so happened that we could create a 630km route from London to Paris; with Paris being the home of the Tour de France, it seemed to be a natural finish."
it's hard to argue against the french capital being the ultimate endpoint for any lengthy bike ride, if only due of its long-standing association with arguably the greatest sporting event in the world. however, though paris is currently the event's finish line, that hasn't always been the case. in my first year of participation, we rode to plymouth and took the overnight ferry to st malo in southern france, heading north to versailles that year. when did the route change to its present parcours?
"You will have ridden the 'long route', which included two 200km+ stages. The following year in 2008, we replaced St Malo with Calais and the stages became 3 x 100 milers which was more manageable from both the riders' and crew's perspective. The route still changes in part every year, like including parts of the Tour de France route, but visits London-Calais-Amiens-Paris. It is surprisingly hard to get 600 hotel beds for riders and crew!"
the last time the tour de france made use of a few of the paris-roubaix cobbled sections, vincenzo nibali took the stage victory, while several others claimed the stage to be barbaric and dangerous. yet, from a spectator's point of view, it provided a real sense of drama and derring-do in a race that sometimes seems to have gone soft at the edges. hot chillee have provided in the past for those who wish to put their handlebars where their mouths are and ride from dunkirk to roubaix, but in 2008, a few of those lumpy stones featured en-route to paris, and to be perfectly frank, i'd have gone back and ridden them again, if i hadn't worried about everyone else riding off and leaving me behind. in the light of this year's tour incorporating cobbles once again, does sven have any plans to do likewise?
"Yes we did include cobbles. We found that many riders were nervous of this, and so separated out the cobbles into a different event, the HotChillee Roubaix, where we cater for more hardcore classics-style riders!"
as i mentioned above, the annual london to paris ride was once the preserve of a late june date in the calendar, but last year's superb event moved tantalisingly closer to the tour de france heroes we were all emulating in our heads, arriving in paris on the eve prior to that of the real tour. there are no words to describe the elation of riding up the champs elysées in a combined peloton of 400 riders, round the arc de triomphe and down to the eiffel tower, all on closed roads and on a saturday afternoon in july, the day before the tour de france does much the same thing (albeit a tad quicker and without a texting australian weaving all over the road in front).
at the time i asked sven if he thought london would offer the same luxury if he opted to reverse the route? but was getting to paris the day before the big boys always the ultimate plan?
"It was a dream from the beginning and along the way opportunities and contacts aligned to make this possible. Being able to ride with rolling road closures into Paris a day ahead of the Tour finish is special and very emotional. We have now also developed a TdF finish line hospitality package which means we watch the pros finish on the Sunday, which is a wonderful way to finish off the ride."
not only was the london-paris peloton able to experience such a fine finish, but the luxurious parisien hotel in which we stayed overnight, was pretty much slap, bang in the middle of the city. which beggars the rather obvious question, how on earth did he manage all that?
"I'm really not sure! I think if there is a strong enough dream or passion, then one works incrementally over many years to make something happen!"
aside from a lead car ahead of each group (a maserati ghibli in 2017, now that you ask), announcing the presence of an oncoming peloton and ensuring that a breakaway is a complete non-entity, the five london-paris pelotons are accompanied by a set of burly but highly jovial motorcycle outriders who, once across the channel, simply shut down everything: roads, roundabouts, traffic lights; you name it, they close it. within each group of riders on the road, there are also several hot chillee 'ride captains', making sure everyone is coping with the pace and pulling into line those who don't always look out for their own safety. have there always been ride captains as part of the event?
"We introduced the Ride Captains in 2007. It was actually an idea of the GC winner, who felt that with a few 'Peloton Patrons' we could better manage large groups on the road from a safety and etiquette perspective. Some of the group riding skills in those days was below par compared to now."
i can vouch for sven's appraisal of those group riding skills, for as one, resident on a small rock in the atlantic, there is a dearth of others with whom to practise the necessary ability to ride in relatively close formation. aside from such a mitigating factor, a distinct lack of top line speed and a desire to see france at a more leisurely pace encouraged me to join one of the slower groups on each of my three years of participation. however, had i had the option of riding the event more frequently, i have little doubt that such skills would have become second nature. as the ride prepares for its 15th year of existence, other than himself, has anyone ridden the lot?
"I did actually miss one year (regrettably), but we have a fairly significant group in the '10 Club', for those riders who have completed ten editions. The first person to ride ten consecutive editions was Ian Whittingham, founder of Sigma Sports!"
i'd be fibbing if i said that those three days in july come cheap. on my first ride in 2007, i recall the cost of entry being not much more than £400; today it's almost four times that amount of money. however, pretty much everything has increased in price over the last ten years and very much in favour of hot chillee, not only has the route and support noticeably improved, but the standard of accommodation and food is immeasurably better. and it was pretty good then, too. to be honest, i left paris last year wondering a) how they managed it all for the price, and b) how can it possibly get any better? in the light of the latter question, are there any cunning plans afoot for the next fifteen years?
"I have been very fortunate to be part of this wave in road cycling and have thoroughly enjoyed it; and I do see it growing even more. For the last three years, I have been working on launching a seven-day point to point gravel race; the Rainmaker Rollercoaster in the Western Cape in South Africa. I always regretted not getting into road cycling earlier, but with gravel riding I'm so glad I started when I did! I think this is the next big wave."
this year's hot chillee london to paris ride takes place between 26 - 29 july and is all but sold out. if you fancy participating in the 2019 event, sign up for hot chillee's newsletters on the website linked below. however, there's still time to enter the inaugural 'rainmaker rollercoaster' seven-day gravel stage race taking place between 6 -12 october 2018 across south africa's western cape.
friday 15 june 2018
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