July 21 2009 – Stage 16 Tour de France – Col du Petit St Bernard

July 21 2009, Stage 16 Tour de France: Martigny > Bourg St Maurice

Today I woke VERY sore after L'Etape 2009. We had (what I thought was) a piffling little 12k climb (oops – 32km) up to the final Col of Stage 16 – the Cat 1 Col du Petite St Bernard. I decided to drag my full camera kit up – DSLR body, 1 70-200 L telephoto lense, wide angle, flash, change of clothes….see below for how ridiculous I am.

Spanning 3 countries – Switzerland, Italy and France – this stage was going to be epic.

See? I told you. Ridiculous.

After 3 ascents of the Ventoux in 3 days, and with a lot of climbing the day before, I bonked almost immediately and struggled up the whole way. It was only a 4-5% grade which I'd normally absolutely chew up, but the muscle fatigue and extra weight consigned me to the scrap heap. Once we had ascended past the villages and multiple switch backs – some beautiful scenery – we were in the high Alpine and into the teeth of the wind which made the final 6km quite honestly hellish. I was not happy. I also did some nerve damage into my shoulder and back [post script: Dec 2011 – turns out I have done serious damage to shoulder, sub scap etc – whoops – still wrecked 2 years later).

Here I am at the top, seemingly all sh!ts and giggles. Little did I know I'd be suffering nerve damage 2 years later

The top of the mountain was packed, so we decamped about 2km from the peak where there were not too many people. I chalked Schnell Cadel on the road (see below) and we set up (also see below).

Australians are utterly ridiculous. We love it.



The sponsors rolled through and we both cleaned up due the lack of lots of people around us. Pretty soon the riders came through and I reeled off some rad photos – see below.

The one of Andy Schleck, Contador and Armstrong is epic and crystal clear. I like how Contador's yellow is bathed in yellow with the shadowed mountain behind him providing extra contrast.

Cadel was dropped again, and Lance looked like the terminator. Schleck A looked like he was laughing and Contador was, well, Contador.

After the last rider passed, we headed down to town, passing what looked like a fatality caused by a head on between a female cyclist and an coming car – sad times.

You can see ALL the photos here and here.

We ended up in town for dinner again (we are idiots) at what turned out to be the worst restuarant ever – it is called the Auberge de Rochefort in the main drag of Bourg St Maurice. Avoid at ALL costs. They provided the worst service I have ever experienced in my entire life. The waitress was unengaging, unhealthy looking and barely acknowledged us. Food was slapped down and they were not interested in taking payment. Michael left his SIM card on the table, and when he realised about 20 mins later, and went back, they denied all knowledge of it.

Like I said, avoid at all costs – they are a disgrace to restaurants everywhere.