Every year, the Tour de France opens up one of their stages, typically the Queen stage, for amateurs. It’s called L’Etape du Tour, and it’s run by the same people that put on the real thing. Whilst aimed at amatuers it also attracts pros and ex-pros - Greg LeMond, Raymond Poulidor and Miguel Induráin have all ridden it, with Victor Lafay winning the event in 2018. This year, L’Etape parcours was Stage 14: Annemasse to Morzine. My ride totalled 98 miles and 13.4k feet of climbing, and it was an absolutely, painstakingly brutal day. The hardest ride I have ever done, in grand part to my own poor choices. I would absolutely do it again and strongly recommend that everyone give this a shot because it is an amazing experience.

Credit where it’s due: this was my wife’s idea. Emma did L’Etape back in 2016 and loved it so much she didn’t just want to do it again with me to share the experience, but she also suggested we do this as the kickoff to our Honeymoon. Crazy? Yes. Was it a great idea? Also yes.

You might remember this as the stage where Tom Pidcock’s GC hopes vanished, Tadej Pogacar’s attack got blocked by a moto, and Carlos Rodriguez caught and passed Jonas Vingegaard and Tadej Pogacar on the Col de la Joux-Plane to descend for the win in Morzine. It was absolutely incredible to watch this stage unfold a few days after riding it myself, and it brings a whole new perspective to the insane level that the real Pros are at.

My day was about 3 hours slower than theirs and clearly much more challenging for me as a rider. It’s nice to see that Pros also suffer some in the same places you do, even if their times are multitudes faster. This was hard enough for me for one day; I cannot imagine doing this over three weeks – especially with the multiple back-to-back mountain stages in this year’s Tour. It’s also amazing to get some of the same treatment as them: people were lined up on the sides of the road through every town we went! We got a lot of cheering, and even a tunnel of people to ride through at the top of Joux-Plane, which was honestly really fun.

It’s worth noting that I approached this as a race. I was staged sub-2000 riders and I wanted to get as far forward as possible and see how long I lasted “as a racer” instead of just riding the course. As you’ll discover below, it went great until it suddenly didn’t. I put in my largest and longest effort to date, and then fell apart and crawled to the finish.

My Race Report (Presented without edits, as sent to our team slack)

Just finished L'Etape du Tour, Annemasse to Morzine. I can't believe pros do this 2 weeks into the tour, these courses are absolutely insane. We were massively jetlagged still this morning and barely slept but we were very excited. I was too excited actually, and decided to race from the gun. I was staged in the 1800s and made it up to the three digits. First three hours were super fun and I didn't realize I had made a huge mistake. I went from thinking "hey cool maybe I can grab a top 1000!" to "holy shit I might not be able to finish this" at around mile 63. I was eating and drinking and had stopped at two feeds but it was nowhere near enough. A few miles up Col de la Ramaz I had ridden 60ish miles and done 7k feet, and started to bonk. That climb is 11mi, super exposed with no shade and things got very dark very quickly. I started going backwards and my goal became to make it to the top without putting my foot down. I was absolutely dying, and just focusing on putting one foot in front of the other. I barely made it. There was a feed with about 2mi left in the climb and I just had to stop to refuel and sit in the shade. 30 something miles and another 5k of climbing to go and I realized I was BEYOND fucked. I tried to descend easy but they're so technical you still have to work your body a lot on the way down. I also realized my front brake pad was almost done, great. I made it to the feed just before the last climb up Col de la Joux Plane and sat down in the only shade I could find behind a dumpster to post on Instagram and check where Emma was. Joux Plane is I think 10km but it's almost 4k feet and I was not looking forward to it. I eventually started and felt fine at the start but darkness settled in at 8k to go. It felt like forever between the km markers and eventually I made it my goal to stop only once at every km marker in the shade. Joux Plane was absolute carnage. Riders everywhere stopped, cramping, laying by the side of the road. People walking, riding in zigzags. It was insane, everyone was completely and utterly wrecked, including a bunch of guys I was racing with at the start. It was comical. It took me fucking forever and I mostly just looked at the front tip of my front wheel and tried not to drool. Now I was getting passed by people staged in the 3-5ks but there was literally nothing I could do about it. I made it to the top, sat down for a bit and took a picture and made the gnarly descent into Morzine with a lot of caution. That was fucking awesome but also the hardest thing I've ever done I think. Holy shit I am so dead I can barely walk and everything including my hands hurt. 98miles and 13.5k feet give or take a few hundred.

Some additional breakdown

My “race” portion lasted almost 4 hours and covered two thirds of the distance of the route
Of course the hardest part of the route was the last 30 miles, after I had bonked
Those last 30 miles (including the two biggest climbs, Ramaz and Joux-Plane) took me 3 hours, almost as much as the first 60 miles
So I “lasted” 4 hours into this race, even though in retrospect I should have slept more and fed better. However, that ended up being a poor choice because I was a ghost by the hardest part of the race.

It’s not just that the climbs are hard and the course is long; there are many other, much smaller challenges that make or break you throughout the day. From taking the wrong side of a roundabout and having to go full gas to get back into the field, to the enormous amount of food you have to eat in order to not fall apart, to the very technical and steep switchbacks on the descents that require a lot of body movement. All that fatigue accumulates over time and leaves you drained by the end of the day. I ended up getting passed by what felt like everyone – so if I were to do this again I would certainly pace it much much better. However, I don’t regret finding where my limits are.

I would 100% recommend this

My goodness this was awesome. In NY, we spend so much time riding in circles around the parks that it is easy to forget the mystical awesomeness of cycling. It’s one thing to see it on TV, it’s another to get to experience it firsthand. This might not be what your ideal honeymoon looks like (as a lot of people have already said to us!) but I would strongly recommend this to anyone. There are riders of all levels and it’s a challenge worth doing – plus it’s a real course that you get to watch a few days afterwards. I already want to do it again.