Last year I was in a bad accident breaking my pelvis and landing me in the hospital for 2.5 weeks and a wheelchair for 3 months. To keep myself motivated to get back at life again, I signed up for the hardest thing I could think of which was a 9 day trip from the Atlantic Ocean to the Mediterranean Sea across the Pyrenees.
I had a lot of concerns about how my performance was going to stack up compared to everyone else since each day would have 3-7x the elevation of a regular day’s ride and never having done any legitimate climbs, but I ended up exceeding any expectations I had and couldn’t have had a better experience (except for a random low point before Tourmalet). So… here’s Day 0 of the trip; a simple check ride to make sure the fit and feel of everything was on point.
Climb of note:
Jaizkibel. 8km @ 5.3%. Tour de France 2023, 1992, 1977. Vuelta de Espana 1963, 1960.
18.22mi/29.3km
2,008ft/614m elevation gain
13.8mph/22.3kph average
159W average power
205W normalized power
Strava PRs:
Biggest Climb (1,453ft)
30 Min Power (228 W)
#longrides #pyrenees #hondarribia #jaizkibel #bikelife #trektravel #cycling