Epic Camp France 2011 Day 2 - Embrun Oly Distance Tri

Epic Camp France 2011 - Day 2  Embrun Olympic Distance Tri

What a fantastic race.

I was fortunate to win the EmbrunMan long distance race in ’92 and also raced the Oly Distance race in ’93 or ’94 and raced OK.  Lessing took that one out fairly comfortably as I recall.  He did the 43km bike ride in 1:25 int he race and that was several minutes quicker than anyone else, so that indicates the difficulty of the course.

 The race Director did remember me and made us feel most welcome.

We had an 8:30 start and got there plenty early so had tons of time to chill out. 

In the race we all got a bit pummeled at the start as you do in all French races, but Steven, Zach and Newsom were in the main pack at the front.

Once on the bike Zach put the rest of us to shame and ended up about 4 minutes ahead of Newsom in 2nd, then Rob Palmer, Russell Cox, Steven, then me followed very shortly by our super crew Ian Wright who was doing his first race in quite a few years.  

Great to see you back in action Ian!!

   Everyone raved about the race afterwards.  It really is a fantastic venue and well-organized race with tons of enthusiastic spectators.

 After we had some lunch a few of us rode up to the main part of the city where there’s a pedestrian mall with bars and restaurants.  The marathon of the long distance race does 2 loop through there and its a fantastic atmosphere.  That was actually about the only thing I remembered from my race there 19 years ago.  Its a damn hard run and after seeing this course again I have moved up my result there to one of my 3 best performance of my career.  

 Then we had to climb back up to our mountain top chalet accom and that was a mean 10km climb.  But the sun was out, the beer and the company at the top were first rate.

Heaven.

What a great day.

Steven Lord set out for a 2.5 hour mountain run to make his bid for the Yellow jersey.

I have a feeling that by tomorrow night he will have sufficiently discouraged any one else from even chasing him. 

Tomorrow’s schedule includes 2 major climbs including the Col I’Zoard and we end up in Briancon which has to be one of the most beautiful cities in France.

Hope we get some photos posted!  Looks to be another beautiful, sunny, hot day tomorrow.

Cheers,

Scott