At around 7 that evening there was a colossal dinner for the thousands of cyclists. Yet coincidentally, I found myself sitting by a French cyclist named Jacques who I had sat with at dinner before the start of last year's Boston-Montreal-Boston.
Finally, it was time to go. I rode to the Gymnasium with Klaus and Miguel Vilaro, a neighbor of mine in Brooklyn, and we shuffled into this massive line of cyclists spread out across the field behind the gymnasium. I still thought I was crazy for attempting this ride, but sandwiched between Klaus and Miguel (a psychologist), I thought myself at least well prepared for that contingency!
As we approached the exit gate, it closed on us. Apparently, the 10:00 p.m. starters were such a large group that the organizers had decided to break it up into three groups, to reduce the chances of some major pileups (they marked our cards to indicate that we were actually starting at 10:30). We were in the last group. After about another ten minutes, we were ushered up to the starting line. Klaus, Miguel and I were ranged across the road right behind the ribbon, with a huge mass of bikes lined up behind us, headlights flashing. We felt like we were at the very head of a race, even though there were now several thousand riders who had already left ahead of us. Various ride officials and local politicians gave excited speeches, cameras flashed, and at last we were off, charging out between parallel columns of spectators cheering us on!
A pace car led us through the first ten kilometers or so, so we were somewhat limited in speed -- probably a good thing, given the crowd. Finally it pulled away on a turn and we were off into the darkness. By now the pace picked up to a good 30 to 35 km/h or so, with Klaus and I pulling away from the pack. Although I know that I usually need to keep a nice steady 25 km/h on these long rides, I've accepted the fact that I can't control my adrenaline-fueled desire to just crank it out for the first hour, so I may as well just let it happen. We soon found ourselves catching up with the end of the group that had left 15 minutes before us, and it seemed that within no time we were well enmeshed in an endless snaking line of red tail lights before us. Although the route was well marked with pink arrows by the side of the road, it would be hard to lose the route with this sort of crowd for the first day.
I don't think I can fully describe the heady excitement of finding myself finally on this ride, after all the preparation, anticipation, and just plain fear of pain and failure. I was probably a bit of a Pollyanna that first night, babbling like a fool about how much fun I was having.
Eventually we settled down to a reasonable pace, falling in with the occasional faster paceline. As we barreled through the various villages that night, clumps of spectators would cheer us on, even in the wee hours of the morning. Then we'd be back out on dark wooded roads or passing through empty cornfields under an endless starry sky. It was totally exhilarating.
Riding at night is something that had at first terrified me during the brevets, but once I became comfortable with it I began to really enjoy it. All four of this years' brevets I had ridden had started at 10 p.m., to help us get used to the start time of PBP and the all night riding. Although they all started in Manhattan and ground up through the Bronx and lower Westchester before reaching open country, by 1 a.m. I'd find myself with two or three companions gliding along on empty, silent roads under moonlight while all the world seemed asleep, with the occasional sound of an animal of some sort scurrying through the woods.
Here, of course, it was a bit different in scale. I remember stopping at one point along a climb out of some village and looking back along the road, where a long line of bobbing white lights could be seen climbing up after us. For some reason, it always seemed to remind me of one of those old movies such as "Frankenstein" with the villagers on the march with their burning torches!
I was carrying two headlights, as I'd learned (like most riders) that all systems will inevitable fail in the middle of the night. My plan had been to rely mostly on a small 2.5 watt Cateye headlight that used only 2 C cells and cast a decent enough beam when one was in a pack, while reserving my 15 Watt NiteRider headlight (which cooks through 5 D cells in about 3-4 hours) for when I was alone or at the head of a pack or on a fast downhill. Unfortunately, within the first hour the Cateye's switch broke, and no amount of jerry-rigging would get it back on. So now I had to rely only on the NiteRider, which was already falling apart after the contacts broke that morning, and for which I had only one set of cells. Much to my surprise, I was able to nurse the NiteRider through the entire first night on one set of cells, although it was hardly brighter than a birthday candle by dawn. This, of course was of great concern, since not only would inadequate lighting risk an accident, but I could also be given an hour penalty or even pulled out of the ride by PBP officials.
The ride seemed quite effortless that first night. I was riding at a much more relaxed cadence than usual (down around 60 rpm from my normal 80), pushing high gears at a much higher speed than I expected, I guess because of the slipstream effect of the huge pack. In the 140 kms. to the first checkpoint Klaus and I stopped only once, in a dark medieval-looking town at maybe one in the morning for a bathroom break and to refill on water, and I sat under a streetlamp and tried without success to repair my backup light.
We arrived at the first checkpoint, Mortagne au Perche at about 3:30 a.m. Actually, it was only an official checkpoint on the way back from Brest; on the way out it was a food stop only. Klaus didn't want to stop, but I was dying for a quick cup of coffee and a quick snack of something besides the Power Bars I'd been religiously consuming at a rate of one per hour. Plus I was still riding in shorts, and needed to put on tights for the early morning chill. We were back out of there in about 1/4 hour, picking up Dave Goldstein from New York with us.
Within a mile from there, Dave flatted, and we stopped to help him fix it in the dark, training our lights on the work. An hour later the birds began to sing, and soon the sky began to get grey and I caught the first of the four beautiful sunrises I would experience on this ride. During my all night brevet rides I had learned to really love those hours just before and after dawn, when the morning air was fresh, the roads empty, the birds singing, when it seemed we had the world to ourselves. After each all night ride, I always felt that the sunrise was one I'd really worked for and deserved!
Shortly after, we rolled into a village, and I spotted a patisserie which had just opened for business. The cyclists descended on it like a hoard of locusts, quickly cleaning it out. I bought a few pains au chocolat (chocolate croissants) and retired next door to a cafe to enjoy them with an expresso.
By about 7 a.m. or so we arrived at the checkpoint in Villaines la Juhel, the 220 km. mark. We were already 1/2 way for the "day" (we planned to ride 445 km. to Loudeac before stopping to sleep). At the checkpoints, one handed the officials a little booklet where they stamped in the arrival time, as well as a magnetic card which they swiped through a reader hooked into a computer network that tracked the arrival of each rider. With this system, one could instantly inquire about the location of any rider, or at least which two checkpoints they were between. Apparently, the public in France had access to this information as well through some sort of national data network known as Minitel. It was an impressive amount of organization, especially given that for some period of time the 4,000 riders were spread out from one end to the other of the entire 600 km. course. Occasionally motorcycle patrols would pass us, on the lookout for riders in distress, as well as to enforce the rules of the ride, including lighting and the ban against support vehicles on the course itself (they had to take different routes to the checkpoints).
The Willesden support van was at Villaines, however, with lots of pastries and other treats. David's girlfriend, Abbey, who was supporting him in the ride, was waiting as well, and offered me a peanut butter sandwich, which really hit the spot at that moment. Klaus stopped to repair a slow leak. I changed back to my shorts, refilled my allotment of Power Bars and Cytomax powered energy drink that I'd cached in the support van, and we hit the road.
The next segment, 80 km. to Fougeres, was one of the prettiest. The route followed many small back roads, winding through tiny villages and past comfortable looking farms, occasionally dropping into some early morning fog. By the time we reached Fougeres it was getting quite hot. The checkpoint was very crowded, and rather than eat there, we rode to the next small village and bought cheese and bread and juice, and Klaus and I found a shady spot under some trees along the road and picnicked. We promised each other not to nod off, but it was so relaxing lying on the grass watching the cyclists go by, and within a few minutes of finishing lunch we both were asleep, though thankfully we woke up within maybe 15 minutes. That brief nap really helped.
There was by now a slight tailwind, and although the country was fairly rolling, we had a nice ride for the 60 km. to Tinteniac, the next checkpoint. Although I usually find that Klaus kept a good pace for me -- indeed, I often have trouble keeping up with him -- I was starting to pull away from him a lot that afternoon. I tried to slow down and trade pulls with him, but I began to find that I had a good deal of power the longer I rode. He begged me to just go on ahead, but I was reluctant to leave him that day, as I had gained a lot of respect for his judgment as far as pacing ourselves.
After Tinteniac, we had just 80 km. to go to Loudeac. We were hungry, though, so we stopped at a supermarket and loaded up on food again (as well as D cells) and had lunch again. There was a pretty good long and steep climb to an interesting village named Becherel, with a great view at the top. By 6 p.m., I was getting sleepy, so we stopped for some cafe au lait at an outdoor cafe. Yes, I think it is possible to fall asleep while pedaling. As we rode along that afternoon, we still would encounter clumps of spectators along the way, even at isolated country crossroads, cheering us on! We were just starting to reach for the headlights when we reached Loudeac at 9 p.m. I was quite pleased with the pace. I'd covered more than the first third of the entire ride, some 445 km. in just 22 and 1/2 hours.
There were big crowds at Loudeac, and the showers were completely out of hot water. I was tired and sweaty, and I craved a wash, but no way was I up to a cold shower -- I know I would have gotten the chills in the cool night air. I noticed one of the Lightning F-40 fully faired recumbents laid up for repairs, as well as the triplet (apparently rear axle problems).
John, one of the support people from Willesden, was in a lawn chair waiting by the checkpoint for us to arrive, and directed me to the van. When I made my way there, they gave me dinner and pointed me over to a tent to sleep. First, though, I went to phone Margarita in London to let her know I was alive. She said she was contemplating coming down to Paris to see me come in at the finish. Then I had to get myself packed for tomorrow -- change into fresh clothes, put a second set in the pack, restock the food and Cytomax, etc. Doing this at the end of a ride like today's required a great deal of deliberate effort at concentration, but I knew I going to have an even harder time of it when I woke up in a few hours.