Stage Three

 

I was intently downloading the four cycling podcasts I’m keeping up with that give daily reports on The Tour as I sat outside the closed tourist office in Vitre, taking advantage of its WiFi.  I’d arrived before noon and it didn’t open until two.  I would have liked to have done some charging too, but was at least happy that it’s WiFi didn’t require a password.  After several minutes I glanced up and not thirty feet from me a Tour course marker had appeared on a light pole in front of me, always a glorious site. 

The course crew had diligently gotten an early start, as Vitre was less than twenty-five miles from the stage finish in Fougères.  I was surprised the flashing lights on their bright yellow vans hadn’t alerted me to their presence.  I would have made a quick dash for a photo.

That may have been a disappointment and the lack of electricity, but I could be very happy that I was able to purchase a train ticket from the nearby station for my return to Paris from Libourne, north of Bordeaux, where The Tour’s second time trial will be conducted on the penultimate day of The Race.  

I was nervous about getting a ticket for me and my bike, as I’d been unable to at the Montparnesse station in Paris, largely because I was dealing with a new, inexperienced agent.  I feared perhaps all the trains had been booked up by Tour followers wanting to get to Paris for the final stage.  My train departs a little before five, before the TT will have concluded, but it gets me into Paris by eight, enough time to ride out to the start of the final stage on the outskirts of the city and find a place to camp along the route.

I was just sorry I didn’t have time to linger at the train station to do some charging, as I was getting low enough I was rationing my podcast listening.  I needed to supplement what my generator hub was providing, as my solar panels weren’t making much of a contribution.  

The hardest rain yet of the trip hit as I was cutting twenty-five miles over to Laval, the arrival city for the Stage Five time trial.  I hadn’t expected rain and had put on my last pair of dry socks to start the day after camping near some bee hives in a heavy dew.

Signs in the center of the large city of Laval pointed to a Fan Park, where the eighteen mile time trial would conclude.  A large crew was busy erecting tents and other structures behind a long fence around a vast park.  There was a large screen televising the day’s stage.  It was a little too far away to make out much, so it didn’t alter my plans of finding a bar.  

But first I cycled two miles north along the Mayenne River to Chargé, where the time trial would start beside its cathedral.  The only structure erected there so far for the stage two days away was a small stage. An older French couple  in matching outfits riding a tandem had also come by to check it out.  They were snacking on a sectioned chocolate bar and broke off a couple pieces for me. After I took one the lady pushed another towards me. 

Rather than intruding upon a trendy bar in the heart of the city, I took my chances on finding a small neighborhood bar on the outskirts.  I found exactly what I was looking for.  The Race was even on the television, even though no one was at the three table bar except the white-haired lady bartender.  She was enough of a Tour enthusiast to have the map of this year’s route taped to a wall.

The peloton was assiduously chasing down a breakaway with twenty kilometers to go on this sprint stage.  All was fine until nine kilometers to go when race favorite Roglic inexplicably took a tumble as he rode along on the outside of the peloton.  He was back riding quickly with torn pants and jersey and several teammates to help.  But they had a minute to make up on a fast-charging peloton, which they never did.  

Not long afterwards the other race favorite and fellow Slovenian, Pogacar went down with several others.  And that wasn’t the end of this disheartening stretch, as 150 meters from the finish, two of the other high profile riders in The Race, Ewan and Sagan, went down, making for a thoroughly demoralizing end to the stage.  I was lucky to miss Geraint Thomas, another of the favorites, falling and dislocating his shoulder earlier in the stage.  He had it snapped back in place and caught back up.  

There were hopes that today would be the third straight storybook finish with 36-year Mark Cavendish, who’d missed the last couple Tours, winning the stage, but he was nowhere to be seen.  Instead it was won by Tim Merliner, teammate of the man in Yellow, Van der Poel, who was part of his lead out train, lending the incongruous site of the Yellow Jersey in the lead closing in on the finish of a sprint stage. 

Before I left, the bartender presented me with a pen.  I thought it might be emblazoned with The  Tour logo, as she pointed out some tiny script on it, but it was commemorating some anniversary relating to Laval.  Still, it was a nice pen.

Shortly after I set out, the rain returned.  I had crashes on my mind and hoped the trend wouldn’t continue.  When after an hour the rain hadn’t relented, I checked my iPad for municipal campgrounds.  There was one five miles up the road.  It had warm, not hot, showers and no electrical outlets other than heavy-duty three-pronged ones for the camping cars.  But it had WiFi, so it was redeemed, and a grassy spot under a tree.