#raidpyrenean

A Mariposa randonneur bicycle built in 1980 for the Raid Pyrenean. Mike Barry Sr. and his business partner, Mike Brown, built two custom randonneur bikes for the ride with similarly unique features; internal gear brake cables, generator lighting activated by a gear lever on the seat tube so that the lights could be easily turned on and off in the tunnels, a pin held handmade decalleur, a lightweight rear carrier for their rain capes and other wet weather gear....the bikes were built with lightweight Vitus tubing. Although they were building many bikes at the time with 650B wheels, these were built with 700C wheels as they rode Clement Paris - Roubaix tubulars for the Raid as they were lighter and handled better than the clinchers. Both bikes were equipped with Mafac, Simplex and Cinelli components and Ideale saddles. #randonneurbike #mariposabicycles #mariposabikes #handbuiltbicycle #handmadebicycle #stronglight #ideale #cinelli #vintagebike #vitus #clement #raidpyrenean #decalleur (at Bicycle Specialties Ltd. - Mariposa Bicycles)

Big big thanks to these guys - Ian and Julie Wright of Pyrenees Multisport who made it all happen! The organisation of the ride was brilliant, they kept us on the right route, kept us fed and watered and importantly kept us motivated. Thanks guys hope to do something with you again.

Raid Day 5

We ride pretty much as a single group as far as St Genis des Fountaines at 50 km where we take a welcome coffee break. Its then a short hop to the coast where we follow the Corniche through Argeles sur Mer, Collioure, Porte Vendres, Banyuls and then our destination Cerbere. We are all accounted for by 12.15 - mission accomplished!

Woke to sunshine - hooray! From our hotel in St Marie de Campan it was onto the first climb of the day - Col d’Aspin. This was followed by Col d’ Peyresourde, Col des Ares, Col de Buret and lastly Col de Porte d’Aspet. After that we had to ride about 60 km to the hotel. This was mostly down hill as far as the town of St Girons where we had a coffee stop and then a slog of approx 20 km to the hotel in Massat (and no wifi). All told we covered about 170 km climbed about 3,600 m. With the sun shining the views were spectacular. 

Decent from Marie-Blanque

Climbing the first col of the day

Climbing the Tourmalet in particular was hell - 18 km of climbing up to the summit of 2,083 m (6,769 ft), but we all did it and then had one hell of a decent to the hotel down in the valley. The decent was a lot faster than the climb for obvious reasons!!