Riccitello

The Tour de France is the most prestigious bike race in the world. I’ve watched the exciting live coverage on OLN and marveled at the throngs of fans lining the edges of some of the steepest roads in France, waiting all day in terrible weather for a mere five-second glimpse of their heroes. I’ve often wondered what it would be like to watch in person, rather than on TV. Last year, as fate would have it, a friend of my father’s happened to have business in Paris on the final weekend of the Tour. He knew my father was a cycling fan and invited him to come along. My father said he would only go if I went. My father’s friend really wanted my dad to go, so he invited me along as well. Don’t you hate it when things like that happen? That’s how I came to be at the Tour de France last July.

Let me do a bit of name-dropping before I continue. I met Lance Armstrong through the sport of triathlon. Our love of cycling and Texas gave us common interests that helped forge a friendship that continues to exist despite the facts that Lance ultimately chose cycling over triathlon and is now one of the most famous sports figures in the world (and I’m just a mostly retired tri geek who occasionally writes articles for Slowtwitch.com and stoops to mentioning that he knows Lance Armstrong so that maybe a few more people will read his trivial stories).

So Lance and I hook up every so often for a little bike riding and storytelling. Last year I trained with Lance for most of February. The majority of the time we talked about stuff unrelated to sports when we were riding, but one day I asked him what the Tour was like. He told me it was amazing. He told me about the incredible mountaintop finishes, the crowds, and the media. He said it was hard to describe how huge an event the Tour is. He told me I wouldn’t believe it if I saw it. I have to say, now that I’ve seen it, it really is hard to describe. Until I observed in person the last two days of the 2001 Tour de France, I didn’t know Lance the famous cyclist, or Lance the business man, or Lance the idol--I just knew Lance the ex-triathlete and occasional training partner. Obviously, I knew he was famous, I just had no idea how much of a star he was.

Lance always told me to let him know if I was ever in France during the Tour and he’d take care of me--make sure I was in the right places and got to see the real Tour. This trip came up so suddenly that I didn’t have a chance to let him know I was going to be in Paris for the last two days of the race. I received an email from him before the start of the Tour that stated he would not be able to answer email or his cell phone once the Tour started. Therefore I proceeded to call my connections so that I might be able to slide my way into a decent "seat" for the finale on the Champs Elysees in downtown Paris. I called Steve Hed who was there to tend to the wheels (his) that everyone who wanted to ride fast, including Lance, were using. No luck with Hed. He told me he was leaving before the last stage, and I was crazy to try and watch. He told me the last stage was a total zoo. Then I called John Cobb who was there to dial in the aero position of Lance and numerous other fast dudes. No luck with Cobb. He was also leaving early to avoid the craziness of the last stage of the tour. I was slightly disappointed that I was going to have to be "just another fan," but fired up, nonetheless, that I was going to have a chance to see the Tour in person.

We decided to head down to the start town of Corbiel-Essone early in the morning, thinking that we might be able to get a better feel for the Tour at the slightly less hectic start line. I was also hoping that I might bump into Lance and have a few words with him before he raced off towards Paris. When we arrived at the train station, it became apparent that about a million other people had the same idea. Having been to France and Paris many times and never even seeing or hearing another American the whole trip, I was immediately struck by the amount of English speaking people trying to figure out which train traveled to Corbiel-Essone. There were lots of Texan and American flags and a lot of talk about Lance Armstrong and the US Postal Service Team. There were lots of Americans. I was starting to get the feeling that it might have been very naïve of me to think that I would bump into Lance.

On the other hand, the odds were pretty good that I was one of only a few people there on a first name basis with Lance (despite the numerous conversations I overheard which seemed to indicate that a least half the people on the train knew Lance personally), I thought it still might be possible for me to talk to him before the start of the stage, but I was beginning to have reservations. My reservations escalated to just plain doubt when I viewed the chaos around the staging area. Much to my dismay, it seemed that at least half of the one million people there were, in fact, on a first name basis with Lance. They lined the fences, fifteen deep, as far as the eye could see, screaming his name at every rider who rode by to sign in prior to the start of the race.

The sign-in is a big part of the start of the race. Every rider must sign his name on a sheet before starting the race. The announcer calls the rider’s name as he approaches the sign-in table. This gives the fans an up-close encounter with individual riders before they line up to form a big giant colorful clump and race away. Of course most of the crowd eagerly await the arrival of the stars of the Tour to the sign-in table, and this day it was Lance in particular they awaited. As soon as a speck of a rider appeared in the distance and made his way from the team area, towards the sign-in table, Lance’s name would be screamed by thousands of people. The screams would fade as the crowd eventually discovered that the speck was "just another racer."

So I’m standing there, and I have some 20-something girl screaming Lance’s name in my left ear, and some 40-something man screaming his name in my right ear, and one million others screaming "Lance!" from every possible angle and the next thing I know, I’m screaming, "You people don’t even know him!" Seeing as I can’t even hear my own self scream, I quickly realized that my own screams for Lance would blend in with the masses, and that I had no chance of catching Lance’s attention at this particular area. I hadn’t really thought of myself as "just another fan," until this very moment. It didn’t matter how well I knew Lance, these people loved him just as much as I did, maybe even more, and in their minds, he was their friend too.

I decided to make my way towards the team vehicles in hope that the crowds would be a little thinner, and Lance might hear my scream... and maybe even recognize it. I can’t believe I’m actually writing that I was thinking Lance would recognize my scream from the thousands of other people, or that I was actually going to scream his name, but I was kind of swept up in the moment. The crowd at the team area was a little thinner, but still massive, and I found myself starting to get impressed with the amount of attention the ex trigeek from Texas was generating.

Shortly after my arrival at the team area, I realized that my desire to congratulate Lance and wish him good luck on the final stage was not going to happen, so I stepped back and stood up on a short wall to get a good view of the spectacle. I parked myself within view of the US Postal Team RV. Every team had a massive RV. The RV’s were lined up behind the caravan that followed the race. It was an impressive motorcade. There was a huge amount of people crowding the fence in front of the Postal Team RV, which was the first in line, waiting for Lance to come out and sign-in. Just as I arrived, there was a huge wave of noise. From my perch on the wall, I watched Lance step out of the RV door, grab his bike, and make his way to the sign-in table. A sea of journalists and photographers immediately engulfed Lance. The crowd went nuts. Everyone was screaming his name, trying to get him to acknowledge their screams. When he would look towards the crowd, they would go nuts. I saw a huge smile on his face as he slowly rode towards the sign-in table face and I could tell he was loving the last day of the Tour.

When he was gone, I made my way to the fence, which cleared out as most of the crowd ran along the fence, following Lance towards the sign-in table. As I stood there amazed at the spectacle I had just witnessed, I noticed Tyler Hamilton riding back towards the US Postal RV. I felt bad that no one was left to scream his name. As he got closer, I yelled, "Hey Tyler." He immediately looked over. When he recognized me, he rode right over. He asked me what I was doing here, and I briefly told him the story. I asked him how the race was going and he told me it was great. I asked him if it was as hard as it looked and he told me it was harder than it looked. When people noticed that a real live US Postal rider was talking to someone by the fence, they slowly swarmed the area, begging Tyler for autographs, water bottles, cycling caps, the shirt off his back . . . these people were crazed. If he stood talking to me for a couple minutes more, he would’ve had to ride back to the RV half naked. I apologized for causing Tyler to get swarmed and he told me it was no big deal. I was very impressed with his patience and temperament in such a hectic situation. He asked me if Lance knew I was here and I told him no. He told me to go wait by the RV, and when Lance got back, he’d let him know I was out there. He rode away, and I made my way back towards the RV, hoping I could at least shout good luck to Lance, and he would know it was me who shouted, and not just another fan.

By the time I made my way back to the RV, it was too crowded to get very close. I watched in amazement as Lance rode back from the sign-in accompanied by his sea of photographers, and a gaggle of fans outside the fence. He waved a couple of times and ducked into the RV. I waited a couple of minutes, then just as I was about to head back to where my father and his friend were hanging out, I hear this huge roar from the crowd by the RV. I looked over to see Lance with his head out the window. I waved my hand and luckily caught his attention. He said, "What’re you doing on that side of the fence? Get over here."

I wondered how in the hell I was going to get through those people and over the fence. There were dudes with machine guns standing guard. I pushed past the people and hopped the fence, which provoked an unwanted reaction from the guards. Just before they cracked me over the head with a big stick, Lance yelled something in French, and the guards hurried me over to the RV. I looked back and noticed that I had started a mini riot, and the guards were busy keeping others from storming the fence.

Once in the RV, the first thing out of Lance’s mouth was, "Is this crazy, or what?" I said, "Dude, you’re like one of the Back Street Boys." He laughed and I could tell he loved the whole scene. I asked him how he felt and he told me he couldn’t believe how great he felt. It made me feel good to see how genuinely happy he was.

The whole team was in the RV, and they shared his happiness. I couldn’t imagine the feeling of satisfaction derived from winning a race that lasts the better part of a month and contains so many unknowns and obstacles.

Lance asked me if I was going to watch the finish in Paris, and I told him that I would be there somewhere. He gave me some passes that allowed us to watch from the grandstand. We had a prime spot to view the most awesome sporting spectacle I had ever seen. I can’t really describe the level of fanaticism people in Europe have for cycling. It easily rivals that seen in any American sport. People stand for hours on the road to catch a brief glimpse of their heroes. For some reason, they feel close to the heroes of cycling. I think this may be because cycling is one of the few sports where the fans are actually on the field of play. I imagine baseball would be much more popular if fans could line the base lines and high five the players as they rounded the bases. Basically, you can cheer from the base lines in cycling.

It would require a whole other article to describe the post race pandemonium. I’ll just say it was crazy. In fact, the whole thing was crazy, and huge, and unbelievable . . . just like Lance told me it was. I learned one thing while I was there watching. I learned that I am, in fact, just another fan. There’s no way to be anything else. Millions of people feel like they know Lance as well as I do. In fact, they know Lance the cycling star as well or better than I do. I only know Lance the ex triathlete, my friend and occasional training partner. I got to meet Lance the cycling star though, and I must say that it was truly amazing and impressive.