Day Six- Sospel to Menton
MAVIC® TRANS-PROVENCE 2013 /// DAY 6 from Trans-Provence on Vimeo.
The final day of the Mavic Trans-Provence was won by one second, Nicolas Lau took the win from Clementz during the final special stages over the 40km course.
Day six was the final battle, throwing a 1000m climb into the mix to test the legs of riders on the final day. For most, even finishing the day is a massive accomplishment, a few riders were forced to step out of the event early due to injuries sustained through the week, and for everyone else the challenge was just to see it to the end.
After six days and 300km of mountain biking and just over two hours of timed racing, there were only four seconds separating the top two riders on day five. Up until day four, Fabien Barel had been just seconds behind, but he suffered a mechanical and his time suffered. He did take first overall on day six, but it wasn’t enough to take second from Jerome Clementz and first from Nicolas Lau.
Whether racing or riding the Trans-Provence for the experience alone, it takes its toll on both body and bike, it’s not only about fitness, but a certain level of skill to be able to finish such a demanding event.
This applies to the mid-pack tussles further down the rider list with the more mortal riders that are still here to race each other. There’s almost certainly someone above you in the list that you can beat today. There’s also someone below you that can that can take back those precious seconds that you gained over them. It might only be a race between you and one other rider but after six days it seems vital.
The event takes a huge amount of effort from everyone involved, both the riders and the staff. To pull off such a huge event takes time and planning with so many people involved to make it all happen.
The drivers for the uplifts and for moving bikes.The campsite crew who make sure that when riders get to the camp at night the tents are ready, there’s chairs to sit in and the beers are on ice. An amazing team of chefs and helpers makes sure that everyone is fed three times a day. Our timing people that turn the data from the timing chips into numbers on the screen, there’s the lonely sweeper picking up every last route marker and bundling up the course tape, and the whole thing wouldn’t wouldn’t be possible without the Mastermind/Madman of it all: Ash Smith.
