Hilariously placed off-route TdF sign at top of Cragg Vale

20 years ago I was knocked off my bike in central London riding home to watch the highlights of the Tour de France, which visited that year for the first time since 1974. I also met my partner. I am delighted to say that only two of these events are having anniversary celebrations this year. I last wrote about 2014 in January, having started the year with more kilometrage than I have ever gathered in Winter, and some high hopes for the year.

I did complete a 600km Brevet de Randonneur this year, but won’t manage a Super Randonneur Series. I have really enjoyed my riding this year, and will ride just one more event I think, in August. The Tour did come, and I am still reeling from having this slice of French spectacle rushing past the end of my road, slowly. But most of all I am delighted to say that I am still together with @accidentobizaro. Our relationship isn’t about cycling, but it is interwoven within our lives both as an intermittently shared activity, but also as a topic of conversation and as a jumping-off point for many seemingly irrelevant features of our lives. We have climbed Pyrennean and Alpine Cols together, but it is the climbs of the Vosges which the Tour de France visits this year on stages 9 and 10 which I think are most apt – our last big cycling holiday before starting a family was an extraordinary experience. Hair-dryer winds on the flat, and the cool at the top of the mountains; birthday cakes; anniversaries; Cremant…

BMC, Katusha and FdJ get stuck

So, let’s aim for a return to these shores for the Tour in 2034, I’m waiting… if it comes before, all well and good, but it’s something to aim at.

Addendum: as I was taking the photo of the rather misleading TdF sign at the beginning of this post I talked with and photographed a rider from London who had grown up in Hebden Bridge. His son had the same name as me, and lives in Stoke Newington, where I was living in 1994. Jung would like this very much.

Chalk on the road, Stage 2