Paris Brest Paris

Ride Report

From the Randonneurs USA website:
“First run in 1891, the 1200-kilometer (750 miles) Paris-Brest-Paris, or "PBP" as it is commonly called, is a grueling test of human endurance and cycling ability. Organized every four years by the host Audax Club Parisien, the Paris-Brest-Paris Randonneurs is the oldest bicycling event still run on a regular basis on the open road. Beginning on the southern side of the French capital, it travels west 600 kilometers to the port city of Brest on the Atlantic Ocean and returns along the same route. Today's randonneur cyclists, while no longer riding the primitive machines used a hundred years ago over dirt roads or cobblestones, still have to face up to rough weather, endless hills, and pedaling around the clock. A 90-hour time limit ensures that only the hardiest randonneurs earn the prestigious PBP finisher's medal and have their name entered into the event's "Great Book" along with every other finisher going back to the very first PBP. To become a PBP ancien (or ancienne for the ladies) is to join a very elite group of cyclists who have successfully endured this mighty challenge. No longer a contest for professional racing cyclists (whose entry is now forbidden), PBP evolved into a timed randonnée or brevet for hard-riding amateurs during the middle part of the 20th century. The event is held in August every four years.”
Riders who want to participate in PBP must prove they are likely to finish the ride by completing a Series of Brevets in the calendar year of PBP, before the end of June. The Series consists of 200 km, 300 km, 400 km and 600 km Brevets. I completed the Series offered in Oregon this year. About half the qualifying kilometers were ridden in the rain, which turned out to be good preparation for PBP.

The bicycle I rode on PBP was my old Gunnar cyclocross/rainbike/commuter rebuilt and repurposed. It was stripped down to the frame, powder coated and wrapped in spirals of reflective tape for night riding. I installed fenders, front and rear lights, barend shifters and a Brooks leather saddle. Glen Peltier checked out the bike and helped me build some robust wheels after I cracked a rim in the 600km qualifier.

The weekend before leaving for France I used MVBC’s Covered Bridge Bicycle Tour as a shakedown ride. I packed my bike exactly as it would be in France, and left my house in the dark at 4:30 AM to ride to the volunteer breakfast before working at the registration. Then I rode the metric century and back home to pack the bike away.

I met a bunch of Pacific Northwest Randonneurs (recognizable by their bike ride t-shirts and bike boxes) at the airport in Seattle and we flew direct to Paris via Air France. Many Americans used the same travel agent, converged in Paris and stayed at the same hotels in Saint Quentin near the start of the ride. Bikes and bikers just took over. At my hotel a very large meeting room was used for bike assembly and to hold the bike boxes and luggage while we did the ride. There were always plenty of bike nuts to talk to as we got over our jet lag and prepared for the ride.

I call it a ride, although it could also be considered a race. There are several time limits (80, 84 or 90 hours) with separate starts. You select your start and that sets your time limit. All finishers within the time cut receive a medal, and are listed in the results alphabetically. It sounds very non-competitive, except the finish times are also listed next to each finisher’s name. In reality, it’s as competitive as you want it to be. My objective was to finish just short of 90 hours using all the time available to have as much sleep as possible.

John Kramer from Bingen, Washington and I had pretty compatible riding styles and objectives but he had much more experience on 1000km rides. I had better language skills. Together we made a pretty good team, so we started the ride together. The evening of Monday, 8/20/2007, we rode from our hotel to dinner and then to the start at the local high school. When we arrived around 8:30 PM the queue of riders was already completely around the track. It soon became clear we would be in a later wave of starters so we chatted with some Bulgarians and distributed some Oregon flag pins as we slowly worked our way around the track. We finally reached the front at around 11pm, just as it started to drizzle. The rain increased in intensity and the rain gear came out, got put away and finally got put on permanently as we reached the front. Our start delay would be credited to us at the end of the ride. We queued again at the start line to listen to the instructions and then some speeches from the mayor, club president, etc. There was a huge crowd of spectators and they were enthusiastic despite the light rain that was falling. At last the gun went off and we rolled across the starting line at about 11:10 PM.

We cruised out of town with a police escort and people at the intersections to stop traffic and wave us through. The stories of being in a stream of lights stretching to the horizons are true. Looking ahead it was all red lights and in the mirror all white headlights. The speed out of town was steady, with groups forming and re-forming. We quickly got onto the small roads. Route markings didn’t matter; there were always red tail lights ahead. We’d started at the very back of the 90 hour group and the 84 hour group wouldn’t start until 5 the next morning. We probably started 4500 people back from the front, with only a thousand behind us. Even as we passed people, we’d always have a crowd around us. The rain stopped after midnight. The terrain was a series of gentle hills, with a river or stream between each pair of hills. The villages were at the bridges, or the hill tops, or both. The ride reports that said there would be 30,000 feet of climbing. Very few of the hills were short enough to be “rollers”, they all required using low gears to get over them.

The French people by the side of the road were especially friendly. As we rolled through rural France at three in the morning we’d hear individuals and small groups cheering us on with “Bon courage”, “Bon route”, “Allez, allez”. In many of the village centers there would be a tent selling water and other drinks with a few Randos and a lot of locals partying. As we rolled through the night toward Mortagne au Perche the skies cleared and the stars came out. There was a tailwind, the hills were mild and we were making good time. The riders were still tightly grouped, so I could see a string of red tail lights that went for miles. I’d dried out from the initial rain at the start, things were going great and it promised to be a fun ride.

We stopped at the cafeteria at Mortagne to grab a quick bite to eat. Coming out of the cafeteria, the rain turned hard and steady. The hills also got longer and steeper. The climbs were not memorably difficult but the descents in the dark, with heavy rain and fogged glasses were exciting (in a terrifying way). It was easy to stay awake on the descents because of the attention required to stay on the road. The red tail lights ahead provided necessary guidance through the curves, but the world beyond the cone of light from the headlights was invisible.

The heavy rain came and went, but it was never dry long enough to allow me to completely dry out. Many of the riders rode the event on “racing” bikes without fenders and with marginal raingear, but most of the riders from the Pacific Northwest were better prepared for rain. I had full fenders with mudflaps on the bike, a Showers Pass rain jacket, wool long sleeve undershirt and wool socks. Luckily the temperature at night only got down to around 10C (50F), so hypothermia wasn’t an issue while we kept riding, and climbing.

We arrived at the first official control at Villaines la Juhel at 9:45 am. The controls were set up in high schools or community centers and all offered similar amenities; a restaurant (the school cafeteria), a bar, an infirmary, a dormitory (the school gym with mats on the floor), showers and a bike shop with repair facilities. Rain jackets were a hot item in the bike shops this year. The quality and cleanliness of the facilities varied considerably and we suffered from being late starters and towards the rear of the stream of riders. It became our practice at the controles to get our Brevet cards stamped as quickly as possible, get in the cafeteria queue immediately, eat a full meal (dessert first, soup, entrée and main course) and buy a large water bottle, refill water bottles and head out of town. All the time off the bikes in the queues was recovery time, but we longed for horizontal recovery time, actually sleeping. We kept a high but sustainable pace while on the bike, hustled through the controles and tried to build margin relative to the time cuts so that we could invest it in sleeping.

Our objective for the second night was to sleep at Loudeac, 450 km into the ride. We’d sent our drop bags with dry clothes and spare food and batteries ahead to Loudeac and planned to use them on the way out and back. We arrived at 11 pm, after being on the road for about 24 hours. We took care of the essentials, had a shower, changed into fresh dry clothes and slept under the eaves, out of the drizzle. When we woke up after an hour of sleep it had stopped raining but it was still dark and the roads were wet as we saddled up.

The hills between Loudeac and Brest were longer and steeper. There were lots of oncoming descending headlights as we climbed; the faster riders who had ridden straight through the night were already on their way back from Brest. There was a real risk of a head on collision if one of the descending riders were to doze off, so we watched them warily as we climbed. We rode steadily, stopping occasionally in a village for coffee or a bite to eat. I was carrying bike food, but ate very little of it since we were going at a low enough exertion level that we could digest “real” food, and it tasted way better. We perked up when the sun rose. We had breakfast and another hour of sleep at Carhaix, then back on the bikes for the last few hills on the way to Brest. After another meal at Commana it was mostly downhill with a strong headwind to Brest. We rolled down to the river and had a couple of celebratory photos with the famous suspension bridge in the background. The controle at Brest was located sadistically at the highest point in the city, and there was a real party atmosphere when we finally arrived. It was sunny and people were hanging out on the grass. We arrived about 2:15 pm, and the deadline at the controle was 6:45 pm, so we had about four and a half hours of margin at the halfway point. We made a quick stop at Brest and got on the road again, trying to get even more margin and invest it in sleep at Loudeac. A brisk tailwind and sunny weather sped us on the return trip. About this point I saw Dave Kamp, the other rider from Corvallis, riding outbound towards Brest. He did an 84 hour start so I did some math in my head and figured he was close to the time cut. I never saw him again until we returned to the US. He finished with one minute (no kidding) of margin.

We had crepes in Commana and they fuelled us into Carhaix. A quick meal stop and we got back on our bikes just as it began to rain heavily again. Intermittent heavy rain showers turned to a steady drizzle as night fell and we climbed the series of hills between Carhaix and Loudeac. The climbs weren’t bad, but they were punctuated by another series of terrifying downhills in the rain, in the dark. The stream of riders was pretty well spread out, but they were still useful as pathfinders down the hills. Many of the riders were getting dangerously sleep deprived after 48 hours on the road and it was on a descent in this leg that I saw an Italian fall asleep while descending and start to veer off the road. There weren’t cushioning blackberries like the Pacific Northwest, just a narrow shoulder then hard Breton granite. I was descending about 40kph and overtaking him on his left when he started to make gentle S turns on the road and then onto the shoulder. His compatriots were in a line behind him and yelled at him to wake up. He woke up and applied the brakes as I flashed past. I didn’t hear a crash so I assume he was able to stop. It was too rainy for ditch naps, so people had to tough it out to the next control even if they were sleep deprived.

We arrived in Loudeac at 2:30 am, checked in at the control and had a large meal. John had a hotel room reserved and luckily another Rando was checking out so I got a used room with a spare unused bed. I had a hot shower and a very welcome three hours of sleep in an actual bed. The proprietors opened the bar/restaurant especially for us and made breakfast to order; fried eggs and pasta, coffee, bread and jam and croissants. The cook was very friendly and we exchanged pins. We got lost walking back to the control and finally found it and got on the road at around 7:30 AM. The extended sleep stop put us behind the original intermediate control deadline, so we’d have to keep a steady pace to get back some margin relative to the end time. I used my precalculated cheat sheet of times and distances and figured we’d need 13.3 kph including stops, or to maintain 20 kph while on the bike with no more than 6 hours of off bike time. It was definitely doable if we didn’t “hit the wall”. John reminded me “when you hit the wall, you hit it hard”. So far the ride had gone pretty much according to plan, perhaps with more queueing time and less sleep time than expected, but with a good on-bike speed. We were going over terrain we’d ridden on the way out, and we knew the worst of the hills were behind us. Our objective was to beat the 20 kph on bike time and earn back some more sleep time.

It was raining as we left Loudeac, but it was already light and the weather improved through the day. It never really got warm and sunny enough to dry out my shoes but the rain jacket and wool undershirt kept my core warm and dry. We made good time on the moderate hills and our spirits were good. The weather was improving and we were well past the halfway point and confident of finishing.

We met a guy from Chicago with a “stop this endless war” bumper sticker and had a good chat about politics and philosophy. We rolled together into a village between Tinteniac and Fougeres and shared a pot of excellent soup and a pizza. We gave away more pins and had enough time in the bank to stop several times for coffee on the way to Fougeres. People had set up stands and sold or gave away for “donations” coffee, water and home made baked goods. There were often kids practicing their English and they appreciated the pins. Sometimes they would give out postcards and just ask for it to be mailed back with a stamp. The people were very friendly and seemed to be delighted to have international bicyclists cycling by their door. There were also lots of people just standing by the side of the road, watching the stream of bicyclists passing by and shouting encouragement “Bon courage”, “Bon route”, “Allez”. It was a fun ride in the short intervals when it wasn’t rainy and dark.

After Fougeres it got very dark and rained very hard. Many of the cyclists had stopped in the towns we passed through, or were ahead of us in Villaines, so we were riding without a lot of company. Route finding became more difficult without a stream of red tail lights to follow. This was a hard leg, with uncertainty about the route, declining temperature, and a hard rain. It was the third night on the road and we had to keep pushing on. The rain made ditch naps unappealing, so we just had to push forward. We arrived in Villaines la Juhel at 10:45 PM. The whole village seemed to be working at the control and there was a crowd shouting encouragement as we rolled into the bike parking. The encouragement helped a lot, but we also needed to get warm, refuel and get some rest. We had another large meal and then checked into the dormitory for an hour of sleep. I took off my wet shoes and socks and lay down on the mat for instant oblivion. When I was wakened an hour later, I told John “these dormitories are starting to smell really bad after three days”. I put my wet shoes and socks back on and we headed for our bikes. It felt like there were rocks in my shoes, but I just wanted to get started. Just out of the control, I stopped on a doorstep to take the rocks out of my shoes and discovered where the bad smell was coming from. Wet socks and shoes for three days had caused the soles of my feet to turn into white prunes and begin to rot. I put on dry wool socks, but had no choice but to put the wet shoes back on. It wasn’t raining and I hoped that my feet would dry out before there was permanent damage. For the rest of the ride, it felt like my shoes were lined with sharp rocks. The “no whining” button on the back of John’s Carradice bag encouraged me to ignore the blister on my butt, the aches and pains in every muscle and my sore feet and just tough it out. At this point in the ride, we started seeing people with Shermers neck (can’t hold their head up), people riding while standing (saddle sores), more and more people taking ditch naps or just sleeping while standing on their bikes. We were past the 1000km point and the stress was showing, but the end was also in sight. There were just 200km to go.

The day warmed up and there was actually a little sun shine. Our sleep at Villaines had used up our margin, so 20 kph and no more than an hour at each of the remaining controls would get us in just before the deadline. It didn’t seem like a lot of margin, so between Mortagne and Dreux I went to the front of the group and pushed the pace up. We got back on track and even had enough time for a short nap at Dreux.

The last leg from Dreux to Saint Quentin was a celebration. We were confident of the finish and just needed to keep a steady pace and suffer for four more hours. The organizers picked a beautiful route through wealthy suburbs of Paris, but they also managed to pick up some of the steepest hills of the whole ride. The scattered showers as we rolled into St Quentin were a fitting end to a difficult ride made even more difficult by the weather. There was a large crowd at the final roundabout on the way into the finish and they cheered and clapped. They were happy to see us and we were happy to be there. We chatted with other riders at the control while we waited to get our brevet cards stamped and collected.

The official time will eventually be published, but we ended up with about 88 hours used out of the 90 available. We took a few photos, grabbed our free drinks and headed home. The 5kms back to the hotel after stiffening up at the control were the most painful ones of the whole ride.

It was the longest and most difficult ride I’ve done. I always felt confident in finishing and the preparation and planning paid off. Riding with John Kramer also helped me to finish; his pacing and the wisdom he’d gained in multiple 1000km rides were both invaluable. The rain and cool weather increased the Did Not Finish (DNF) rate to 30%, and there were rumors of some serious injuries. I’m thankful for having completed the ride safely, for the opportunity to meet Randonneurs from all over the world, and especially for the opportunity to meet some of the friendly people of France.

My feet healed within a couple of days, I was back on the bike (riding slowly) after three days and the only lingering effect is some tingling in my fingers and toes that is slowly diminishing.