Samatan – Pau 159 km
With all the excitement around the Twilight Criterium in Boise Idaho, (more on this soon) we had almost forgotten about the Tour de France. But the Tour de France did not forget about us. We were on the edge of our couch watching Chicago local Christian Vande Velde in the break today – he deserved a break today after yesterday.
But the winner by a hair or two was a Frenchman, Pierrick Fedridgo. He won in Pau today and two years ago. Way to go Pau, I mean Pierrick.
Incidentally, Pau is the most visited town by the Tour de France next to Paris. Even more incidentally, Mary Todd (Hero) Lincoln stayed in Pau toward the end of her life. Unfortunately, Mary died 21 years before the Tour de France was born. And another thing: Mrs. Lincoln lived with her son Tad (Tad Todd?) in Chicago’s West Loop, home to Tenspeed Hero headquarters. That was of course years before we moved in, and even before J.P. Graziano.
And what’s this we hear about oil on the course? It is starting to look like a Warner Brothers cartoon except a bike rider does not recover as quickly as a cartoon coyote.
Post script: Our colleague Paul Sherwen said, and not for the first time, that after riding the tour for three weeks one becomes a different kind of bike rider. I for one have noticed the same thing after sitting on the couch for three weeks watching the Tour. I have become a different kind of bike rider.