If you’re planning on attending the 2014 Tour de France, which starts Saturday in Leeds, England, and want to know how to watch the Tour de France up close and personal; two items are absolutely necessary: a GPS and a corkscrew. If you forget either of those, you’re lost and screwed.
I’m a retired American sportswriter who covered Le Tour seven times. Following it as a journalist is much different than as a fan. I have a parking pass. I have a press pass. I have a media center where I can watch the entire race on multiple TVs while drinking what the French pass off as cold water.
However, I rubbed elbows with enough fans to know how to watch the Tour de France if I was at one. By the time the cyclists wind their way to Paris for the finish July 27, 2 million fans will have lined the streets. If you’re one of them, here are a few tips on how to watch the Tour de France that will come in handy:
1. Rent a car or motorhome
The public transportation in France is good, but it’s not this good. The Tour de France starts and finishes in towns you’ve never heard of. If you wait for a bus or train to take you there, the peloton (pack of cyclists) will have already come and gone. So will every decent piece of French bread.
Book a motorhome rental or hire car in France . You should book plenty of time in advance, especially if you are considering motorhome rentals in France , which are very popular, and are great for camping out on the route. Pay the extra and get a GPS. The signage on French motorways is fine, but in the towns it’s awful. In the major cities, the boulevards are so famous you’re expected to know what they are. In the small towns, they’re so small you’re expected to know where everything is.
My Kodak moment of covering Le Tour is a shot of me circling a roundabout endlessly like a cartoon character trying to decide which exit to take.
2. The starts are better than the finishes
This is where you get up close and personal with the cyclists. You can go right up to team buses and hang out. You can watch them warm up on their stationary bikes and conduct interviews. Some will even sign autographs. The buses usually park in one area near the starting line about an hour before the start.
When they do start, they often do a ceremonial trip around a few city blocks before taking off into the countryside. Stand on a street corner and see how fast they go without putting in any effort.
3. Go to the mountains
There are many places to view the race. The start. The finish. Along a country road. They’re all valid. The most popular, by far, is going on a mountain.
Pack a cooler of beer, hike up early before it gets too hot and find a place to wait. And wait. And wait. When the cyclists start climbing, however, the wait is well worth it. They’re obviously going slower and they’re all spread out. Your viewing pleasure will last a long time.
If you see cyclists putting in extra effort and attacking, you might see the turning point in a race. And if you have no shame and a lifelong dream of being on TV, don a tutu and run alongside the leader. Maybe your friends back home will see you and never associate with you again.
The first classified “mountain” stage is Stage 10 on July 14, 161.5 kilometers from Mulhouse to La Planche des Belles in the Alps. The route will cover seven mountains, including a 15-percent grade up the Col des Cheveres and a 20-percent haul to the finish in La Planche des Belles.
If you run out of beer, find anyone wearing orange. The wildly friendly and rabid Dutch fans will usually hand you a Heineken.
4. Go to the countryside
If you’re not into crowds but into France, go to one of the villages the peloton passes through. Go in the morning to its outdoor market and buy the fresh bread, cheeses, meats, fruit and the local wine.
(If you forget your corkscrew, buy a knife and cut your own throat. You don’t want to sit in the French countryside without French wine.)
Pack the lunch to the outskirts of town, find a nice patch of grass and sit down. While you’re eating, inevitably villagers will come sit nearby. One will likely have a radio broadcasting the race and you’ll know when they’re getting close.
The problem with this vantage point is you wait all day and the peloton passes through in about 30 seconds. Then you pack up and leave. View it as a picnic with a happy ending.
5. Go to the finish
This is where you see the sheer speed and power of cyclists. They come barreling down the final straightaway at upwards of 80 kilometers an hour and the heartbreak of losing by a single spoke after a five-hour ride is etched in cyclists’ faces.
The finish area has a broadcast of the race and often a big screen to watch the progress. You can have an aperitif in the town while you wait and then crowd along the guardrail to watch them fly by.
Don’t bother chasing them to the team buses. They rush the cyclists inside and take off to the hotel.
6. How to watch the Tour de France – Rent a bike
If you want to work off some of the bread and cheese you’ve consumed so far, towns along mountain routes usually have bike rental shops. Park in town and rent a bike then try climbing the mountain that the cyclists will zoom up a few hours later.
Don’t worry about making it to the top. Go halfway and wait for the peloton. Then find a man in orange.
Hope this helps give you a few tips on how to watch the Tour de France up close and personal. Print it and shove it in your backpack next to your Michelin maps.
Bon voyage.
没有评论:
发表评论