On Thursday of this week I made the trip from our base in Bourg d’Oisans to Sault at the base of Mont Ventoux. I took the beautiful ride a long the gorge to Bedoin – where I turned right and started the long climb up to Mont Ventoux. I chose this route as its meant to be the hardest acsent of Mont Ventoux. The climb is just over 1600 metres over 21 km with an average gradient of 7.5% – although its a lot steeper in the forest section at 10-12 percent. It was a tough climb (probably harder than Alpe d’Huez) mainly because there are not that many swithbacks. Onec through the forest the whole mountain side opens up and you can see the big building at the top. The exposed area of Mont Ventoux was a little windy but none the less pleasant.
Once at the top I took a few photos and then descended down to Sault. In total it was an 85KM route that took me 3:45 hrs without stopping.
We will be running our Alpe d’Huez to Mont Ventoux week in May 2011. For more details click here