Thanks are due to Andy P for his account below of the Semaine Fédérale. A great time was had by all who attended:
Members of Fleet Cycling have just returned from a fabulous week of cycling in Brittany hosted by the French equivalent of Cycling UK. Spot two of our jerseys on the front page of a French newspaper!
This annual festival of cycling moves around France, and for this week it was in the town of Loudeac in the centre of Brittany (a bit like Truro in the middle of Cornwall). The organisers publish four or five road cycling routes per day well in advance with distances between 30 and 90 miles.
On arrival we were issued with a pack of beautifully prepared maps showing ride profiles. GPX files were emailed out weeks ahead. There are similar routes with maps available for off road bikes, or VTT as they say in France (Velo De Tout Terrain). There were 10 of us loosely associated with Fleet Cycling. We were all doing variations on camping; tents and motorhomes. I met others who were staying with families and in hotels and guest houses.
The rides were fabulous and largely on smooth tarmac with lightly used back roads. The routes were well marked with coloured arrows on the road marked with the day of the week. On intersections with more major roads volunteers marshalled riders across. There were literally hundreds of volunteers. I’d say it was almost impossible to get lost – although a couple of the party managed this on one ride. You could start at any time and there were always cyclists around you.
There were a lot of people on e-bikes. We even saw some e-tandems. There were bikes with dogs in baskets or in trailers as well as most generations of road bikes.
There were a couple of catered stops on each ride where coffee, pastries, sandwiches and warm meals could be bought. These stopping points varied from the grounds of a Chateau to sports halls. There were plenty of cafes in the villages where a coffee and cake could be forced down.
The event was simply massive. I think there were around 10,000 cyclists and this is about 2/3rds of previous events. The campers were spread over three camping areas – and we were in area 1. This area had its own showers, loos, fresh water provision and some catering. Everything just worked.
The organisation was a bit quirky but the positives outweighed the negatives. If this had been in the UK a big company would have run all the outlets and made a lot of money. The French had different local clubs running the bar each evening and locals running catering. This meant the profits went to the locality. We were also lucky to have an oyster stall on our site – so we were set for starters. We were warmly welcomed everywhere we went.
So much for the generalities. I vowed to do the whole thing under my own steam. I rode to
Portsmouth, caught the overnight ferry to St Malo and then rode to Loudeac. The French leg was made more difficult as my rear gear cable snapped 5km outside St Malo. I bodged the rear gears so it stayed in the third from the bottom and rode the remaining 100km using only the front triple. This was tough and a throwback to the days of yore. I had to miss the first SF day as I needed a new shifter as that had gone with the cable – and a recovery day was in order. I then rode all the remaining days. I rode as many as possible with the Fleet Cycling members – this is a social event after all. I even managed to sneak a swim in a lake on one day.
My return home was less eventful than the way out. Back to St Malo on the bike, overnight hotel, early catamaran to Poole, and then ride home, arriving just before dark. I travelled over 900km. Before you think I carried loads of stuff, Colin took a big bag for me in his camper van, so I travelled fairly lightly. Thank you Colin! The combination of a large cycling fraternity, great planning, enthusiastic supporters and great company every day made for a wonderful event.
This was my first visit to the SF and it will not be my last. The next event is in Pont-a-Mousson. Google tells me this is close to Metz just south of Luxembourg. Anybody else want to join me cycling there and back?
