Paris-Brest-Paris (PBP) is a 1228 km (762 mi) 3 1/2 day bike event, starting in late August just outside Paris and riding to Brest on the west coast of France and then returning back to Paris. There are time limits to finish the event. Riders can choose to select three different start times and finish time limits; the longest time allowed being 90 hrs and is chosen by the majority of riders. The event is held once every four years and has become very popular with over 5300 riders signing up for the event in 2007.
More information about the event is at: http://www.rusa.org/pbphistory.html and http://www.rusa.org/faq3.html
The route is mostly on minor roads through the rolling hills of the French farmlands. The French roads were excellent. I saw only one pothole the whole ride.
My Polar HR monitor indicated about 32,000 ft of climbing over the 762 mi. There were no mountains; the highest point of the route was only 1400 ft above sea level. But many sections seemed to be an unending series of small climbs. Most were quite gradual, but they didn't feel that way after several days of riding with loaded panniers.
The most unique factor in this year's PBP was the weather: RAIN. The unusually high 30% DNF rate (about 15% in most years) was attributed to the weather. The rain was hard at times, but mostly intermittent and not cold. For me that is better than a heat wave. I have DNFed on a couple of CA rides with high temperatures but I seem to tolerate wet & cold fairly well.
Unlike typical CA rain patterns, the weather was more like that of the mid-west. Instead of raining more or less uniformly over a large area, the rains were much more localized. Riders even a few miles apart could encounter very different conditions.
To qualify for PBP, you must complete a series of brevets of increasing distance in the year of PBP: a 200 km (~125mi), 300 km (~185 mi), 400 km (248 mi), & 600 km (373 mi). Each distance has a corresponding time limit. E.g., the 600 km has a 40 hr time limit.
With ACTC Anciens (previous PBP finishers) Ken Holloway's and Paul Vlasveld's encouragement, a field of ~10 ACTC members dedicated themselves this year to completing PBP. Surely this must be a record PBP turnout for ACTC members. Most ACTC members did far more than the minimum number of brevets required for qualification.
I arrived in Paris on a Friday a couple of days before my start time. Most of Friday was spent with travel logistics and uncrating/assembling my bike.
Sat. was mostly spent with a bus tour of Paris (my first time in Paris) organized by the tour company I booked my PBP travel with.
Late in the afternoon, several of us (Patty Dougherty, Art Cruz, Mark Deger, Paul Duran, & myself) set off on a short familiarization ride to follow the route outside of the start using the route sheet and maps. I was the navigator. We failed fairly spectacularly, getting confused a half dozen times over 20 miles.
On Sunday, a couple of us tried again to scout the route out of town, this time led by Ken Holloway. We did much better, only getting confused a couple of time over ~25 miles.
The problem I had was that the form of the route sheets was very different from ACTC ones. There were no left/right turns indicated. Distance on the route sheet didn't indicate where to turn, only small towns we passed through. What sort of worked was looking at road signs that would list a series of small villages that could be reached via a road with the list of small towns on the route sheet. But this was very error prone; there might be several roads leading to a town, and many of the towns on the route sheet were not on the signs, and vis versa.
This gave me a lot of concern; extrapolating this experience to a course 30X longer was intimidating. I anticipated having to add several hours to what I had planned for recovering from getting off course.
The PBP 90 hr group was the largest, with six waves of ~500 riders started 15 minutes apart; starting at 9:30 PM Monday night. The 80 hr group was next largest, with three waves starting at 8;00 PM Monday night. My 84 hr group was the smallest, with a single mass start of about 600 riders at 5:00 AM Tue morning.
For a variety of reasons, such as the prospect of shorter lines at the controls (like century rest stops but much bigger) and the hope I could start the ride after some sleep time, I committed myself to the 84 hour start group a couple of months before the event. This meant I had to finish the 762 miles in 84 hours. This caused me some self doubt about my selection up to the last day before the event. This turned out to be a lucky choice for me. I missed some heavy rain during Monday night that impacted the 80 & 90 hr riders.
I went out to a large pre-event dinner Monday night with a couple of ACTC members starting in the 90 hr group. These were by far the longest lines of the event, causing a lot of anxiety for the 90 hr riders about getting to the start in time. I rode with them to the long lines queuing up to enter the sports complex used to stage the start. After a few pictures of the crowds, I took a short cut across town to watch the first wave of 80 hr riders zoom by.
I then went back to the hotel to try to get some sleep at the ungodly early time of 9PM since I had to get up six hours later. Sleeping with the excitement and anxiety of such a big event only a few hours away was fitful at best. But it had to be better than riding a bike instead :)
I got to the start at 4 AM for check-in and queued up for the 5 AM start. Unlike the 80 hr start I watched the night before, our group got split up through town due to strength and stop lights. I also don't think we had the ambulance following us that the 80 hr group did. I can only imagine about the significance of that for what it said about the 80 hr group.
Tuesday was pretty much what I expected; I went out too fast, along with everybody else. I should know better after so many dbl centuries, but it is nearly impossible to not get caught up in the excitement of such an event. We had rain in the morning, at times very heavy. But mostly it was like CA winter rains; always threatening, occasionally rainy, but mostly getting wetter from spray from other bikes than from the rain itself.
The controls were very well organized. The volunteers were excellent, and I managed to get by with zero knowledge of French by pointing and cashiers writing down totals.
Except for the first one, controls were spaced about 50mi apart. This is typical for brevets but far apart compared to most century and dbl century rides. They typically had a small "self service" area where you could purchase sandwiches (IMO too much bread and not enough ham and cheese) and another area much like a high school or college cafeteria. Typical fare was a choice of pasta, mashed potatoes, puddings, and fruits; foods that had been proven over time to sit well with long distance riders. I always picked the cafeteria.
One thing went far better than my lowered expectations: the route signs along the course made the route sheets completely unnecessary. I had no difficulty following the route. These signs hadn't been present for my Sat & Sun practice rides. Only twice during the 762 mi was there any hesitation about the correct route. This was a vastly different experience from the first 20mi or so without signage!
The support and encouragement from people along the route was unbelievable. During the day and even into the night, the villages would have people on the streets encouraging us. Even passing remote farm houses late at night, couples would be outside cheering us on.
Many people had put together small stops, using camp stoves to brew coffee, etc. I rode past most of these; I think I only stopped for one. I was too concerned with the time limits. Next time...
I had planned on Tue being my longest day, hoping to ride 330 mi to Carhaix by 2AM or so. It was not to be. I got to Loudeac (280 mi) at 1:30AM and decided that was as far as I wanted to go. By this point I was passing the slowest 90 hr riders who had started 8 hr ahead of me. I was felling pretty good even if I wasn't quite up to my fantasy timeline.
On the way to Loudeac, the lead group of 80 hr riders (finishing in less than 45 hrs) passed me heading back to Paris. It was amazing how strong they looked. None of them had panniers; they were met at the controls by support vehicles who gave them food and water, leaving them only having to get their brevet card stamped and card swiped to confirm their passage within time limits.
Loudeac was the most popular stopping point for Tue night. There was a large high school like gym covered with cardboard (so our cleats wouldn't damage the floor) and very small mattresses and very welcome wool blankets. I took a shower (as I did every night), changed clothes from a drop bag I had paid to have sent ahead, and hit the mattress after waiting in line for earlier riders to get up and hit the road eventually making a space for me.
Wed morning turned out to be very significant for me; dominating most of the rest of my PBP experience. I ate about half my breakfast and wasn't able to keep it down. That turned out to be a pattern for the next couple of days.
Riding a couple of back to back 200+ mi days without eating properly slowed me down far beyond my expectations. Each day I was burning 7,000-10,000 kcal but was not able to eat more than a few hundred.
With no evidence to support my hypothesis, I blame the rain and manure for my stomach problems. It was common to see manure spreaders in the fields. Unavoidably as the farmers drove from their cattle pens to their fields, their equipment dripped manure onto the roads. With the rain (and my lack of fenders?) I suspect that some of this residue was transferred from the roads to my water bottles and hence to... Wed I only managed about 200 mi in a very long day.
I continued to pass 90hr riders on the way to Brest. I hit my longest lines of the event at Brest; I guess I was catching up to the main group of 90 hr riders. Eventually I got back on the road. In hindsight, I was dawdling at this control as well.
The short 50mi section from Brest back to Carhaix was the only section where I stopped for a significant amount of time outside of controls, spending about an hour. But I did find that by Wed evening I could keep some eclairs/w pudding down. A small bag of Skittles seemed to work as well. I took this as a positive sign I might finish the event.
Between Brest & Carhaix I caught up to a couple of 90 hr ACTC riders, Patrice Courtier & Art Cruz. They said Patty D. wasn't far ahead. I was looking forward to some time with familiar faces.
But my Karma must have affected Patrice. His luck ran out a few minutes after I caught up to him; his frame broke at the top tube where it is welded to the seat tube. We were able to ride (gingerly) the 20km or so to the next control at Carhaix, fearful that the rest of his triangle would fail dashing him to the ground. But he made it to Carhaix in one piece. Note; you are not allowed to receive support outside of controls. If his bike had failed, his only choices would have been to walk to the next control (surely putting him outside of the time limits) or to abandon the event. He talked to the mechanic at the control who called his store owner; they opened it at 23:00 and sold him a new bike!
When I got to Carhaix I tried McDonalds, hoping that "familiar" food would sit well with my upset stomach. Quaint hypothesis but WRONG. I can't imagine what I was thinking. I made it only half way through my Big Mac before dashing to the restroom.
After some rain between Carhaix & Loudeac around midnight Wed, I eventually got back to Loudeac about 2:30 AM Thur and again spent the remaining few hours of the night in the gym. I had planned/hoped to make it one control farther. I had only managed about 200 mi in 19 hrs, a VERY slow pace for me. Since it was raining, I hoped that the weather would be better Thur AM. I blame the lack of fuel & digestive issues for my slow pace Wed. But at least I had another shower, change of clothes and 3 hrs sleep at Loudeac :)
The next morning I tried a small breakfast of rice pudding and it seemed to be holding. As I was getting ready to depart, I found several ACTC riders: Patty, Art, Patrice, & Manny getting ready to leave as well. Patrice hadn't gotten any sleep Wed night with his time spent buying and outfitting his new bike. I left ahead of them; confusion in numbers :(
Thur is mostly a blur for me. By this point I was very "dazed and confused" from sleep deprivation and exhaustion. I recall that there was very little rain Thur. I encountered some very wet roads; obviously some heavy thunder storms had hit just before I got there. A few minutes earlier or later and it would have been far different experience.
Thur was an improvement for my stomach problems. While I couldn't eat "normal fare", rice pudding and powdered sports drinks in small quantities stayed down throughout the day.
Since the weather was good, I kept riding all Thur night in to Fri morning, getting in to the last control at Druex control about 4:30 AM. This seemed like an endless section, riding many hours so sleep deprived I dared not ride near anybody else for fear of swerving in to them. The other riders were equally unsteady. I passed many riders sleeping in small covered bus stops to keep out of the weather. I saw one guy ride off the road.
At Druex, I indicated through notes that I wanted to sleep 3 hrs until 8 AM. This communication medium failed; they woke me up at 6 AM, and again at 7 AM. So I got up, ate some rice pudding for breakfast and hit the road by 8 AM.
I had only a short distance the last day; 42 miles. The weather was good, but I had no strength left. I plodded away and eventually I finished at Fri at 11;23 AM after 78:23 elapsed time and 54 hrs on the bike. A large group of French riders got confused about 10 km from the finish due to some missing signs. But my scouting this section ahead of time paid off. I pointed and gestured the correct route, but only a Danish rider believed me. Oh well.
I savored a beer at the finish with the Dane even though we couldn't communicate much beyond a toast. I went back to the hotel and slept most of Fri afternoon. My stomach was still too upset to eat much dinner Fri night, but I did spend time with a couple of other CA riders.
Sat after the event I was felling a little better and had some real food for breakfast. I had a lot of mud (and manure?) to clean from my bike & I packed it away in the bike box.
The tour organizer had a "celebration dinner" that you could purchase as an "extra" item Sat night. There were about 200 Americans at this dinner. It was great to swap stories & experiences with other riders.
This was also the first "real" meal I managed to keep down since Wed AM; I took this as an positive sign that everything from here on out was part of the recovery :)
We left the hotel at 5AM Sunday for our return flight to the USA. Managing a couple of hundred bikes in boxes must have been a tremendous challenge for both the tour company (six large trucks) and for the airline. I can't imagine how so many bike boxes can fit on a single airplane. But after a little anxiety of missing trucks, the confusion eventually sorted itself out and we boarded the plane back to San Jose.
Friends keep asking me: would I do it again? I really haven't decided. But now that six weeks have passed it seems much better than it did at the time.