Col du Sabot (aborted)

Today’s ride was to take on the tough climb from Allemond, where I’m based, to Col du Sabot, a col that’s been high on my wishlist for a couple of years. I got a late start today, primarily due to oversleeping. I had usual porridge and honey and pre-ride banana. Got my sandwich and all other stuff ready and left at just after 11, but had a problem when my Wahoo wouldn’t load the route properly. It took me about twenty minutes of faffing around before I had the idea of loading the old version of this route. It was OK after that.

The rest of this post is from two reports – one during the ride and one afterwards:

First report coming from le Collet (8 miles done) A couple of miles from the start, the road came over the dam by Lac du Verney as if I was going to Col de la Croix de Fer.

Then it turned towards Vaujany and it was very steep all the way up to Vaujany.

Then it felt like an easier gradient to the next village, La Villette, and I’m just on another steep bit now. It’s one of those cols where I can’t really see how the road is going to get through the mountains ahead of me – there’s a whole wall of mountains around me and no sign of a road up there.

The road surface has been excellent up until now although I’ve just noticed that the bit going onwards isn’t quite so good. There have been loads of road workers around. They’re on their lunch break at the moment, but are in the process of repairing bits of road, cutting the hedges, mending walls, etc – it’s amazing how they look after the place.

At the moment there’s a hazy sun on me but up until now it’s been predominantly cloudy, which is actually really good because it’s so steep and I’m sweating anyway.

I stopped somewhere before Vaujany to have an energy gel and then I stopped just at the last village and had paracetamol just to ward off slight twinges in my back.

So even though the sun would make things look better I’m quite glad that it’s cloudy today. There’s only a few bits of blue up there at the moment. I left later than normal – it was wall-to-wall sunshine this morning so it’s probably better that I missed getting baked in the sun.

So I’m just going to press on now – I’m wondering which way this road goes to get over the mountain.

Report from end of ride Just further on from that stop where I did the report above, the road switched back to the left, so I then knew that the road to the col was somewhere up the left-hand side of me, but I couldn’t see any evidence of it although there was a slight gap between the peaks much further up so I assumed that’s the way it was heading.

The gradient was much more manageable than earlier. Still in first gear but with a higher cadence.

But much worse news was that when the road turned back on itself I saw dark grey skies over the mountains which had until that point been behind me. I carried on, hoping for the best.

The road went over a cattle grid with warning signs of cattle roaming – good – this is my sort of wild col, I thought. Still predominantly among trees I carried on for twenty minutes and at just over a mile later, I felt the first drop of rain. I immediately got off my bike to put my rain jacket and arm warmers on and pull the rain cover over my camera bag. But it started becoming heavy almost immediately. I turned around and started descending.

The descent can be summarised:

• The temperature at the point I turned around was about 24°C so that was a good thing.
• It never stopped raining the whole way back
• Shortly into the descent there were rumbles of thunder. Yes, I had made a good choice to abort – I wouldn’t fancy being at the exposed col during a thunderstorm.
• My front disc brake started squealing, so I was trying to use it gently, but then I found if you slam it on for maximum squeal, after a while it goes quiet ( as it warms up and dries out, I assume)
• My eyes were just fixed on the road ahead, which still had an uneven surface – much more significant on the descent as opposed to ascending slowly.
• Mountain tops were not visible through the heavy rain.
• I put my rear flashing light on
• Just before getting as far as Le Collet, a rider passed me going up, wearing just short-sleeved jersey. Kudos to him. Then a few minutes later another cyclist persevering against the rain. These were the only 2 riders I’d seen all day, because the big Dutch Alpe d’Huez thing was happening today.
• I thought of all the riders doing the Alpe d’Huez challenge today (just a few miles from here) and felt sorry for them
• Back on a good road surface after Le Collet, the roads had rivers running down them, which I tried to avoid – I don’t really know why as I was already as wet as I could be!
• Beyond Vaujany I noticed four road signs warning drivers of 10% sections. That reinforced my notion that it had been a steep climb earlier from the lake to Vaujany
• I stopped once on the whole ride back, for about 30 seconds at a bus stop to give my hands a break. They had been fixed in position for the previous 30 minutes solid, gripping the brakes, so I gave them a wiggle to get some circulation going.
• Back down at the lake I was glad when I had to start pedalling again – a chance to warm up a bit. I was hoping my knees were OK after being locked cold, wet and almost motionless for half an hour – they seemed alright.
• There was even a small 9% climb just past the lake, so that was good as well.
• The whole descent took 47 minutes.
• Temperature on the descent dropped quickly in the first 8 minutes to 11-12°C, then picked up a couple of degrees at lake level.
• So I got back as soaked as can be, and was glad to get back inside the warmth and dry of my van. But I was in a much better shape (by virtue of the higher air temperature) than I had been at the end of my Col de Perty ride.
• I discovered afterwards that I’d been three miles from the col when I turned around. That was good news. I wouldn’t have liked to have found out it was just round the next bend! In fact I knew I was nowhere near it just from the look of the landscape.

So the Col du Sabot remains on my wanted list, for now….