Phil and Alison's European Adventure: Le Tour De France 2009

Phil has been a big fan of Lance Armstrong and the Tour de France for a long time so this year when we found out it was coming through Switzerland, it was an obvious choice to make a trip to see it. Phil says that if he were Lance Armstrong, that I would be George Hincapie (another one of Phil's favorite riders). I'll let you all figure out the analogy!

Stage 15 of the Tour brought the riders from Pontarlier to Verbier 207.5 km. The last part of the stage was climbing a huge grade 1 mountain to Verbier. Phil, Adam, and I hiked up the mountain for an hour and then ran into our Aussie friend Nick and his brother. The 5 of us watched the race just short of the 5km mark. The steepest part of the climb began at about 8.7km before the summit. The riders covered the distance to us in 5-10 minutes where it took us an hour to hike. They rode by us so close that we could have reached out and touched them.

Alberto Contodor made his break away right below us and was sprinting up the mountain as he passed us. We were all stunned by how fast these guys were all moving as they tore up the mountain. This was after riding 200km that day and 2 weeks of riding so far on the Tour.

I was going to post some video coverage from the Tour that showed us as Lance Armstrong passed by, but it has sadly been pulled from YouTube. However, we still got some good pics of the riders going by!

The view from where we watched.

We could see three switchbacks below us from where we watched. Pretty steep!

Media Helicopter.

The crew getting ready for the race to come by

Before the riders go by, there is a huge Caravan of sponsors that go by and throw various swag to the spectators. This is the road right below us.

Here come the riders!

Contodor making his break (he won the tour this year and this break away was the difference!)

Contodor passing by us - the guy was going so fast, no one had a chance to catch him

Andy Schleck following as best as he could. (he finished 2nd in this year's tour and also won the white jersey for being the best young rider)

LANCE! So cool to be that close! Phil took this photo across from where I was standing.

More guys coming by...

Here comes the yellow jersey

Astana team car

George Hincapie on team Columbia

The sprinters coming by us. The green jersey, and over the right shoulder with the white rimmed glasses is Mark Cavendish from team Columbia - he is the fastest sprinter on the Tour this year.