The end

This time five years ago I'd never ridden a road bike and couldn't run 5km.

This time two years ago I completed my first half ironman.

This time one year ago I did my first hill climb on the bike, up Copperlode Dam in Cairns.

This time one week ago I was riding into Paris after cycling the route of the 2014 Tour de France.

There were three phases of challenge to the tour. The training, the actual tour, and now the aftermath. 

In many ways the actual tour was the least challenging bit. It was hard. I cried, I took more pain medication in a few weeks than I have in the past few years, and nearly every day was impossible. But I was surrounded by people who asked why I was doing the tour not because they thought I was mad, but because they were comparing notes. And there is some simple joy in setting out in the morning to achieve something on the peripheral of your physical and mental abilities, and sitting down to dinner (even if that's at 10pm) having achieved it.

The training was really tough, and perhaps unsurprisingly the aftermath poses it's own challenges too.

Preparing for the tour has been the biggest thing in my life for most of this year. It's a relief to have some more space, but it's also hard to have that clarity of purpose removed. Now I am left to tackle a project I've been neglecting for several months: get a life in rural England. Something a bit harder to write a training program for (although goodness knows I'll probably try).

We all have pivotal moments in our lives, even if we can only see them in hindsight. I know that the tour was definitely one such pivotal moment. I'm not sure what it will pivot to, but I look forward to finding out.

Just for the record, my three weeks in France were not a cheese and wine tasting trip. A pain au chocolat tasting trip maybe. But they were so much fun. I cried a few times, but I smiled a hundred times a day. I felt joy and exhilaration and proud every day. I extended my comfort zone so far that I'm not sure where it ends right now.

Thanks for coming along for the ride. x Dugong

Some photos

Celebrating at the top of an amazing Pyranees climb with Jess. Then time to descend and do it all again!

We made it up Col de Tourmalet!

Hazardous descent down the Tourmalet!

At the end of probably my toughest day on the bike I was awarded the chapeau (daily award to a person displaying the spirit of the tour). A great honour.

Time Triallers, Team Ovaries. Celebrating a job well done, and that Renee didn't sustain any major injuries. Yay!

The three female lifers getting ready to set out for a few extra kms in aid of clocking up the Rapha #womens100. Thanks so much to Phil for your support. Legend.

I made it to Paris.

The sun sets on my Tour de Dugong experience.

Woop woop! Message from Mum on day t+1, done and dusted, no need to ride today.

Stage 21: The End

A day that was surreal, a relief, a little sad, and an absolutely stand alone amazing experience in equal measure.

We started the day with an easy 7km extra loop to make up enough km to hit the Rapha Women's 100 Strava event that was run today. A big thank you goes out from me to Phil and all the male riders who joined us- without your help and support greater participation of women in cycling would be harder and a lot less fun.

We also managed an early coffee stop to make up for the rubbish coffee and lack of chocolate croissants at the hotel breakfast. It was nice to revel in the fact that we were less than 100km from finishing this grand tour, something that until the last week I really didn't know I would make it through.

But there was also a measure of sadness. Something I've spent over six months training for, that has been like a storm cloud on the horizon of my consciousness, is over! This period of simplicity of waking, eating, riding, eating, riding, eating (etc etc), sleeping (not enough) is over. A period of daily amazing feats of endurance, kindness, generosity and grit is over.

Surreal because we have spent three weeks cycling through the countryside of France mostly seeing fields, grapevines, and lots of mountains. And then we cycle into Paris, past Versailles, stopping for a photo at the Eiffel Tour, and then a burn out around the Champ d'Elysse (resulting in what I'm not sure was an attempt at police arrest or police escort).

This has been an epic journey, from the day I pressed the button to sign up, to rolling up at the hotel in Paris and getting off my bike. But an epic journey is just one step after another, feed stop to feed stop, Premier Class "hotel" to Premier Class "hotel". And sadly (but with a great sense of relief, especially in the BVS and quad regions) it is over.   

Stage 20: Time trial

For an amateur cyclist any grand tour (three week cycle race, of which there is the Italian Giro, French Tour and Spanish Vuelta) would be a demanding experience.

But the 2014 Tour de France route was a particular challenge. Ten days back to back with no rest day, relentless mountain stages, very cold weather, followed a few days later by very hot weather, and many sleep and energy sapping transfers.

And only one time trial. With timing that meant it could not be used as a much needed surrogate rest day. Instead on the second last day it was asking you to ride on legs that were gone.

Four of us ladies created our own division of women's team time trial, and once out of the neutralised zone of traffic lights put our heads down along with the hammer. It was so much fun, and my only regret is I didn't have more in my legs to contribute to the train.

Something that I have discovered in the past year of cycling is that I can go downhill quite fast, and faster that a lot of other people. There is some pure joy in just going fast, and I still haven't figured out why other people don't go as fast as me.

It may be a blatant disregard for my personal safety, but until today the only accidents I'd had on the bike had involved not clipping out, and usually falling over in view of as many people as possible.

So, we were about 5km from the finish line, and I was enjoying a marvellous descent, well ahead of the rest of Team Ovaries. A white car pulled out in front of me, and I was concerned about having to slow. So I didn't see the sharp turn or roundabout come out of "nowhere".

Brakes on a road bike are not designed to make stops from 60km/hr to a stop in a matter of metres (especially on slightly damp and gravelly roads, and when the bike operators handling skills aren't the best). 

It's true, time really does stand still when something like this happens. You can see everything unfolding, but you have no way to control what is happening.

I am either awesome, lucky, or I suspect, a combination of both. I somehow managed a bit of a somersault (graceful commando roll) and to be (somewhat shakily) standing by the time the rest if the team came down the hill.

The damage: a very minor graze on a knee and elbow, a chunk out if my wrist (from the bracelet I was wearing) and a small scratch on my chin. Bike damage: handlebar angle slightly modified. Thankful I didn't go into shock, and was fairly easily able to ride to the finish line.

Closer inspection and a few days have revealed some additional bruising to my arse and shoulder, but  I think I was extremely lucky to escape intact.

My descents on the following day suggest I wasn't injured enough to shake some sense into me.

Stage 19: Hurt Locker

Rookie error. Covering up the pain in your quads with a codeine and ibuprofen combination also has the effect of covering up the pain of saddle sores.

With the hills over in Stage 18 I was hoping this would be a pleasant 200km recovery day like Stage 15. Alas it wasn't to be, instead I was faced with one if my hardest days on the bike.

Sitting on the saddle was literally eye watering, and getting any power from my legs was like squeezing blood from a stone. 

As we have learnt by now rolling is not the friendly cycling conditions that the term suggests. At least when you're climbing a Cat 1 hill you know it's know it's supposed to be hard. Rolling hill after hills while you are nearly in tears is a little harder to deal with!

The only things that got me through the stage were Katrine-Mari and Robyn, who stuck with me despite the fact I barely said a word to them for 9 hours, and my beautiful German friends Ivo and Ingo, who made a coke stop and pedalled it up to me when I was at a particularly low point.

The other thing that kept me getting in the van (because I really was thinking about it, a lot), was that I was so damn close to the end.

More kindness was on show when I got back to the hotel, the lovely Caroline met me with clean washing, peanut butter M&Ms, and a hug as I tried to pull myself together (after a bit of a weep on the massage table).

Then something rather cool and unexpected happened. The chapeau award is given out daily by the previous days recipient to someone who has represented the spirit of the tour. 

I was fortunate enough to be the days recipient, and all I can say is thank you, thank you, thank you.

Thank you to Mum and Dad who told me I could do anything (even if the Tour de Dugong wasn't what they had in mind).

Thank you to my coaches Daryl and Charlotte who taught me how to believe that I am an endurance athlete.

Thank you to the amazing women of Darwin Tri Club who taught me that riding and running like a girl is a compliment.

Thank you to Cassie and Wendyn who were there for me while I trained.

Thank you Andrew for the training rides.

Thank you to everyone who donated to the William Wates Memorial Trust so I could reach my fundraising target.

And thank you to so many Tour de Forcers who have shown such support and generosity of spirit, especially but not limited to: Sarah, Phil, Gavin, Claire, Col, Kirsty, Katrine-Mari, Caroline, Florian, Matt, Ivo, Ingo.

xx

Stage 18: Pau to Hautacam

For the last six months when I've told people I'll be cycling the Tour de France route they've thought I mean I'm doing the Etape stage. 

Each year a large sportive is held on one if the tour stages. This year Stage 18 was the obvious choice as it contains the famous Col de Tourmalet. My understanding is that it is famous from the 30s and 40s when there was no tarmac and it was especially tough. I would honestly not especially hard, and not especially nice. Ditto for the Hautacam climb we finished on.

The big challenge for the day was the heat, but luckily I handle this much better than most of my British friends. Other than that it was a matter of pedalling through to a huge sense of relief at the end of the day- the mountains are over!

Stage 17: Saint Gaudens to Pla d'Atet

Oh, Stage 17, just like Stage 16 but shorter, right?!?! Not quite. A relentless day of 3x Cat 1s and a crowning HC made for an extremely tough day, sitting up there with Stages 2 and 10.

All the climbs were relentless, but the last was the hardest. Our last feedstop was on the lawn outside our hotel, and we just had to climb that last hill, and descend again to the same spot.

Aside from my mental/emotional breakdown of a few days ago and my permanent anxiety through the first three stages this was the first time I really questions what the hell I'm doing here. Head in hands, I smashed down a can of coke, found the strength to get back on the bike, and just started pedalling.

This was a day where my triathlon training was really helpful. All those hours and hours of sessions of kilometre repeats come in handy mentally when you face sign after sign saying: x kilometres to go (just ignore the average gradient for the next k). One pedal stroke at a time, one kilometre at a time, one hill at a time, it would appear that anything can be accomplished.

Suddenly you are looking down at that town or lake that you were riding past not that long ago, having accomplished for the fourth time in the day something impossible.