The series of Chasing Cancellara offered for the first time an incursion into the atmosphere of ultra-cycling last week with a round linking Zürich to Zermatt over 290km and beyond the cantons of Zürich, Aargau, Lucerne, Obwalden, Bern and Valais.
An experience to live necessarily! Especially since the start, around 2 a.m., gave an extra spice to the journey with a good part of the race taking place at night.
With an alarm clock (let's call it that…) shortly after midnight, the intrepid rolls-always of the game were immediately put in the mood: no usual landmark would come to their aid during the next hours! Neither daylight, nor bio-rhythm respected, nor constant temperature, nor indication in the language of Voltaire…that is to say that many surprises were announced as the wheels turned.
After a first hundred kilometers through the countryside of Zurich and Lucerne, dotted with small steep hills whose shoulders hinted at a rural nature so typical of this corner of the Swiss plateau, the first real obstacle of the day happened to be the Glaubenbuelen pass located in the UNESCO-labeled Entlebuch reserve.
A magnificent pass in the memories of the author of these lines. A winding road and sauvage which gambols between the century-old spruces and the rocky peaks...at night the landscape is inevitably less sexy...resuming itself to the pale beam which trembles on the bitumen beyond its front wheel.
After the winding descent shrouded in patches of fog giving the dive on Lake Sarnen an Sleepy Hollow of the most successful (Johnny Depp was still missing it's true...) and the Brünig overcome not without a quick Salu exchanged with Spartacus (his fee is probably lower than that of Johnny?), the interminable Grimsel finally showed the end of his asphalt.
The humid cold that raged all along its slopes only increased the deliverance of diving on Gletsch and what remains of the glance on the Rhone glacier. Probably one of the times when entering Valais territory gave me the most pleasure after, of course, that famous Wednesday in August 2012 when an accident in the covered trench of Saint-Maurice on the A9 had taken the time to journey between Lausanne and the Old Country equivalent to a journey undertaken by stagecoach.
From there, the tumble down the Goms valley and the final ascent towards the Matterhorn seemed nothing more than a formality that we found ourselves enjoying at times, especially as the mercury finally seemed to cross the bar of well - be the cyclist's temperature set arbitrarily at 12°C (with arm warmers).
In short, a beautiful day like every time the mileage exceeds 200 kilometers and the satisfaction of knowing that it is after all relatively easy to return from German-speaking Switzerland – even by bike!
Source: Text by Guillaume Bourgeois, veloperfection.ch
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