That world champions in my team
A few weeks ago, we set off on our first gravel adventure of the year. Fresh out of lockdown, equipped with our beautiful panniers and surrounded by a... solid team!
A look back at these few days in Italy.
Genesis
February 16, 2020, Emilien Jacquelin beats Johannes Boe at the end of an epic sprint that would put the best sprinters in the peloton to shame. Sprint at the end of which he obtained his first world champion title (and not the last).
Like many cyclists longing for sunny passes in winter, I'm in front of my TV to experience this moment. I understand that Emilien has a history with cycling and that this athlete is atypical.
A few weeks later, we exchange on Instagram and I am pleasantly surprised by his response and his enthusiasm towards MatchyHe breaks out a jersey on the slopes of Ventoux, we meet on his land in the Vercors during a gravel trip, and we debrief our last gravel trip in Italy which seems to have given him some ideas.
The idea
A biathlon season later (and a new world champion title in the bagpipes, back to back), it's time to think about the off-season. That sweet moment between confinement and getting back to the bottom, where the taste of Spritz is supposed to sweeten a long and grueling season.
In the meantime I receive a small Instagram notification: Tell me you're leaving again in May? »
Without further ado, I prepare a few tracks, once again with the help of Openrunner. The choice seems easy: "We love pizzas too much," which is good, I'm not averse to mozzarella, and neither is Martin! Oh yes, in the meantime Antonin Guigonnat and Martin Fourcade have joined the ranks. A few more watts and gold medals!
A complete team with Antoine, a good friend already present on the trip in 2020, regulated like a Swiss watch, he is at the head of Season, for your mountain biking and skiing trips.
Day before departure
After a few evenings exploring the different options and mapping out the trail, we loaded it all onto the Wahoo. We filled the Apidura panniers and chose jerseys that matched the beautiful Cannondale bike we'd borrowed for the occasion. A great way to test out the Lefty fork.
Don't forget cargo shorts, your best ally for this type of trip.
The departure
On Wednesday, May 5th, the magic bus leaves Morzine with its captain, Antoine, and takes school children to Tuscany.
A quick stop at the Italian autogrill, with fond memories of the French triangle sandwich... A first pizza at a restaurant, a return to normal life that we quickly get used to again. Anyway, a 7-hour drive later and an apartment bought along the way, here we are in Siena!
Day 1
Wake up at 6 a.m., the slight stress and excitement of leaving. The big stress even, Martin may have eaten an XXL Milka bar the day before, but his calves are bulging and Emilien is already talking about the average!
Head to Piazza del Campo, the legendary finish of the Strade Bianche, and also the Palio, a testament to Italian passion. Getting there requires some serious effort, but with panniers on the bike, you're not exactly a MVDP on the 18% gradients.
Not much time to lose, we have 120km and more than 2000m to go, plus a ferry that we can't miss.
The route out of Siena takes us through a few small, flat sections of Strade Bianche before quickly finding ourselves on slightly more technical single tracks. While we're looking for our route in a dense forest, we get a quick call from the hotel to say we have to come back and bring the keys, even though we've already been gone for 2 hours. A bit of a stressful moment, the keys were in the room...!
We come out of a long path of more than 10kms on gravel, the return to the asphalt feels good, the time to realize that Martin's GoPro mount has broken, and that it has therefore remained on a path for the pleasure of a walker or a wild boar.
A bit of road, a sign to mark the entrance to the only village we've passed all day. Given the pace I've been going since the beginning, I'm watching this sprint from afar because it's going to be a long day. A small restaurant to refuel. Cherry tomatoes, gnocchi, and strawberries for dessert, simple, basic, enough to get me going for another 60 kilometers!
We set off again on small, bucolic roads, the paths are steep and the single tracks sometimes technical. We pass motocross bikes going the other way on the way, I tell myself that I'm not scoring points on the track... It must be said that the intense rain of the last few weeks hasn't helped make the terrain rolling.
We finish the trail section and we have 20km left to reach Piombino. I regret a little having put pressure on the timing, and also a little being in 650x47, Emilien wants to take advantage of this flat asphalt to raise the average. It doesn't take much to excite the other racehorses, we swallow all this in 40 minutes and we arrive at 5 p.m. in Piombino for a ferry at 6:30 p.m. This gives us time to eat a good ice cream and discover the rather pretty city center.
We board and enjoy a little peace and quiet to prepare for the next day. From the boat, the island of Elba looks as pretty as it is rugged.
Day 2
So here we are on the island of Elba, on this bicentenary of Napoleon's death! Emilien is to Napoleon what Martin is to Mozzarella, a big fan!
The advantage of this day is that we return to the same hotel in the evening, the opportunity to wash our things and unburden ourselves a little. Except for me, who takes everyone's swimsuits and towels; after all, we'll be cruising along the island's coasts and coves all day, so we'll have plenty of opportunity to take a dip.
105km and 2100m of elevation gain are on the agenda. The start is very nice, we stay on the road longer than expected, a short coffee stop at the " sweet life " to appreciate the view after this first climb. I take the opportunity to win what will be my only sign of the trip, that's a given, I can now concentrate on the prize of combativeness.
At the top of Monte Perone (the island's highest road), we find a beautiful gravel track that will take us back down to the south coast. Antoine's chance to show off his technical prowess with some well-aimed front wheelies.
Restaurant break in a small seaside village, just to taste the Italian culinary pleasures and the charming welcome, once again. We set off again and the road doesn't last long, the gravel path is pretty, but it climbs at 20% and it's hot. We're not going to complain, it's nice at the beginning of May to enjoy ourselves in short-sleeved cycling shorts without worrying about the temperature.We quickly set ourselves a small mission to follow the trail, having to carry and find ourselves in the segment " brutal salita »: 1.3 km at an average of 19% with a maximum passage at 36%… Brutal then!
We switch and the gravel descent is rather nice, a bit of road along the coast, there is worse, we find ourselves at a crossroads where the port (and therefore the hotel) are 10kms to the left or we follow the track (to the right) for a bit more gravel (and elevation). I feel that it doesn't take much for us to turn left, if I didn't know what awaited us I would surely have done the same, but I knew that this loop on the southern peninsula of the island was worth it. No no guys, it's American gravel, you have to go for it ". Basically, I'm keeping my fingers crossed, hoping that Google View hadn't misled me. I have to say that I'm getting a bit of teasing about the track; the question that we find on all the gravel forums is coming up here too with insistence." Is this gravel? " Half joke, half truth, I still haven't found anyone who can answer this question. That's probably what's fun about gravel after all!
The path is in any case really nice, we can describe it as " American gravel ", but I quickly start to break out in a cold sweat again when I see the track going in the same direction as a DH track sign...
Martin's warning: "I don't think this is the best choice." ", I think it's time to feign blind confidence in my track and put a little pressure back on to pique the pride of the champion who will descend all this easily. More fear than harm, here we are back on a beautiful seaside track. The opportunity to go and enjoy a small cove and take a dip.
A fifty-year-old Italian woman takes the opportunity to feast her eyes, and it's not the sidelong glance with the sunglasses that will fool us.
Back in the saddle, last little bakery break and express return to Porto Ferraio, the opportunity to please Emilien who wants to improve his stats, by finishing the last 10 km at an average of 36.
Gelato on arrival, a shower, a pizza, and a new gelato (obviously).
Day 3
Early morning wake-up call to take the ferry and start a new day approaching Siena.
As we leave the ferry, we quickly hit a nice gravel section. We only see guys on enduro bikes with full-face helmets and protective gear. It feels like Morzine, which freaks me out a bit on the trail. It turns out that the Italians must not be the best mountain bikers in the world after all, because we're staying 200m above sea level, and the gravel trails were very cool.
Back on a bit of road, a little break for fresh strawberries at the edge of a field (Antoine's great excuse to go and meet a natural need in the groves), Martin's second puncture a few kilometers further on, I had told him to put on the Hutchinson Touaregs... Luckily we have a great mechanic duo with Antonin and Antoine! The guys from Chablais are resourceful!
We find ourselves a few kilometers further on again in a pretty cool gravel section (where we come across a turtle, a tribute to my level during this trip)! The gravel section is quite long and wild, we find the road again, our stomachs are hollow but there's not much on the route, so we make a detour towards Severeto to eat.
A village that turns out to be very typical and very pretty. (Very good indeed). Unfortunately, oWe leave the choice of restaurant to Martin. 4 people to serve water, we start to think that the sign " Michelin " on the window it wasn't a nod to these punctures...
Very nice plates, not very full, gourmet cuisine is great but after 3 days on the bike, I think we could have eaten a 5th pizza!
We set off again, and we can still see Piombino in the distance, like the impression that on gravel the distances are not covered as quickly.
Especially since the road is steep heading inland, a day with more elevation gain than loss is always a bit harder on the mind. To get to Monterotondo, there are 17km of gradual climbs, with another 1.6km at an average of 13%. On a gravel bike with panniers on, it's a different story.
Around us, for once, it's not great, we're a bit like the Italian Springfield. The good news, as Antonin would say, is that the road is beautiful and the lines are perfectly white. The opportunity for a little number (with an Italian accent): " In exchange for 45 steam and nuclear power plants, we will, along the entire route, make you white lines, perfectly white. " Sometimes you have to be there to understand it. In any case, those are the times when you need to laugh!
A coke at the top and we're off again, we cut part of the track that made us climb 400m in 5km to head towards Monteri, our stop for the evening. It's an Airbnb so we do some shopping for the evening and breakfast.
The village is tiny, one restaurant, one bar, we couldn't ask for more. The pizzas are excellent and at €7 each, you might as well get two! A bit like Spritz. When you start to believe that a guy is walking around with a crow on his shoulder when it's a surgical mask hanging from his ear, maybe you should stop drinking. In reality, the guy was far away and his black mask...
They have a good business sense in any case, 5 Kinder Bueno offered to finish, Émilien is in heaven!
Day 4
Not the longest day, but with its share of surprises to end on a high note!
Homemade breakfast by Chef Antoine. Egg, bacon, homemade fruit salad... a true breakfast fit for a champion, world-class (or not).
From the start, we were on the verge of witnessing an OTB* (over the bar) from Emilien, followed by Antonin who almost rolled over his beautiful glasses, what a shame for this concentrate of Jura technology… The steps with a gravel bike and the weight of the panniers are technical. We set off gently, the track is gravel almost from the start, and we even find ourselves on a ridge line surrounded by cypresses, we can see it from afar, we are in a remix between gladiator and the final of Imola where Alaphilippe flew towards his title. Little pleasure!
We find ourselves crossing rivers, which adds to its charm, and in the middle of a path we witness the passage of deer and a family of wild boars one after the other, bucolic! If there weren't all these watchtowers around, we could say that it's paradise for these animals.
We don't stop there, the path continues and runs alongside a long fenced priority where around 50 deer live, quite strange, it doesn't really look like a nature reserve.(It feels a bit like " on the forehead » on the parks in Sologne). It doesn't miss since a big, hot 4x4 catches up with us. I don't speak Italian but I quickly understand that we won't be going on vacation together and that he wishes not too sure we're going any further. Private road or not, we weren't in the right place, and despite the outnumbering we preferred to play it cool and turn back rather than make an enemy (the finesse of the hunters seems international).
A bit of extra road, we find our gravel path a few kilometers further. The opportunity for a new encounter, we are first chased by two guard dogs that the owner of the place calls back as best he can, before arriving in a field where I see lots of sheep, and not a single power line, this story stinks of patou (for the record we already met one the first day that almost ate our calf, the opportunity to learn that Emilien is afraid of dogs).
Not missed, I see a first patou in the distance, and in fact he has a friend, or a girlfriend. Two big patous in the middle of the path, no time to brake or doubt, I admit that I am happy that we are a little grouped at the time, Antonin imitates the sheep perfectly, I still haven't understood the technique, while I have one foot out ready to draw.
We recover from our emotions by enjoying the last few pretty cool singles, which are becoming increasingly rare as we approach the city. On the final climb, I let the tough guys explain themselves, and I burst like a popcorn at the bottom of the hill (which I climb by bike, not by escalator like some others...).
One last photo at Piazza Del Campo, it was nicer on Thursday morning at 8am than on Sunday at 1pm. We found a nice little restaurant (apparently the best carbonara in town), with good memories of these 4 days, difficult, sunny, discovering a charming region, as Italy knows how to do. 
A small fine on the windshield, we change, and head home. Another 7 hours of driving to debrief and think about our next trip. A destination already seems to be emerging, so ready to go again?
For my part, the Dolomites are waiting for me soon and I can't wait to tell you more. Thanks to everyone for following us, and thanks to the amazing team who gave me a hard time on the trail and on the bike!
Special mention to Emilien who continued to make me sweat on the way back. I have to say that the guy spends more time looking at the co-pilot than the road when he's driving ;)
