Paris Roubaix Juniors. 7 April, 2013
What is it
about this race? What is it that makes us love it so much, yet so few of us
have ever ridden on pavé? What is it?
It’s a
confounding race-a race of opposites, in a way. It’s a race with medieval
sections of cobblestones sprinkled between winding routes of glass-like asphalt
in between, and ends after one and a half laps on a smooth concrete velodrome.
It hasn’t changed much over the years. Somebody always finds a section of long
lost cobblestones, usually without the help of Google Maps-they drove their
tractor on it, called the race organizers and said, “Bonjour, il y a une
nouveau rue de pavé pour toi.” And each year another is lost to a drowning of
tar and blacktop.
It’s a sad
race, actually. So painful to watch, you cringe at the images of the riders
torn apart by wind, stones, rain, and their own shortcomings. Some just fall
down on the stones. You’re not sure exactly why, but they fall, one by one,
until there are so few remaining you forget there were hundreds that started.
I cannot
imagine the race in the wet. When its dry, like this year, the dust is
unbearable. You cannot see in the caravan until you’re almost ramming the car
in front of you. You try to stay close-a meter off his rear bumper-but your
brain tries to override you. You keep your foot on the gas, your left foot on
the brake, as if your Passat wagon were a shifter kart. Riders drift back
through the caravan, lost in the haze of red dust. Appearing. Disappearing
again, never seen again. Half the car is on the berm, inches from the fans
waiting for the Pros to come through, two hours after the junior race finishes.
You’re certain your mirrors have brushed them, or the barriers, cruelly set up
to keep the riders on the cobbles.
After the
first sections of stones you begin to discern the differences in the sections.
“These aren’t so bad” your mechanic says. Yes, but its 3km long, I reply. But
some do feel ‘not so bad’ and yet others are Roman and haven’t been fixed in
centuries. These are mayhem and wreck havoc on the riders. BAM. The plate that protects the oil sump hits and you cringe,
trying to lift yourself out of the seat. Trying to make a car, laden with
bikes, wheels, tools, bottles, fuel and two cringing people, lighter. It makes
no sense, but we do it every time.
50 riders are left, with the worst series
of sections yet to come.
Carrefour de
L’Arbre is a section that no one should ever have to ride a bicycle on, much
less after 4 previous horrible sections of pavé . The remaining riders have no
choice-the barriers funnel them onto the Roman stones. BAM. The section splits the bunch into a break, a chase and a
‘group’. Riders trail off, crash, flat, wheeze, spit, cry, and yet they still
pound the pedals.
We are behind a crash, a flat and
riders weaving, valiantly trying to find a smooth line. It isn’t here. Not on
the stones. We finally emerge and we’re flat out, trying to catch up to the
group where all our riders are. One of them is in the chase group, but I cannot
get around-we’re on another section of pavé and the road is as wide as the car.
BAM.
We hear the radio crackle.
Information is pouring in. “1 minute”, “Chase at 1:30” 3 riders bridging, 2
riders falling, 1 rider flatting. We pass the French team car. It has 2 right
side flats. They had the #1 for the caravan. We have #13. Lucky #13, we tell
ourselves. 20km to go. Just a couple of sections left, and two are paving
stones, bricks really. Only one star sections. Smooth, after the rest they’ve
done.
“USA!” the radio screams. I hit the
gas, drift around a corner in a town I’ll never see again and our rider is
lying the road. His bike is on the sidewalk and his glasses are further still.
The mechanic is out before I can stop the car, righting the rider and pushing
him forward. “He’s fine, but he’s fu*ked.” The rider is 17. He should be
playing Xbox, but here he is, grabbing a sticky bottle at 55kph and getting
back to the group he was in. He’s a hero, pounding onwards, to a decrepit
velodrome, in a forgotten corner of France.
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