This month Alison and I decided to go to South Australia for the Tour Down Under (TDU). The trip offered me the chance to experience the event firsthand and ride a pro tour stage, as well as to catch up with my cousin Roger in Adelaide, visit some of the winegrowing areas of the state, and watch cricket at the Adelaide Oval.
The 20th edition of the TDU was notable for the heat and the result.
We flew in to Adelaide on Monday 15 January. The weather was fine, the sky cloudless, with temperatures in the mid to late 20s, very much like the Auckland we had left. After assembling the bike, I headed into the Adelaide Hills on Tuesday morning to familiarise myself with the final kilometres of the fourth stage of the tour which doubled as the course of the Bupa Challenge, the recreational event for amateurs. The final 13.2 km were uphill from a north-western suburb of Adelaide to the village of Uraidla, the stage’s finishing point. For the first time in the history of the race, the route included the Norton Summit Road, a 5.8 km climb. With just a 5% gradient, I found it a comfortable tempo ride on a pleasantly warm morning. The panorama from the upper sections of the climb back over the city and out to sea were splendid.
On both Tuesday and Wednesday temperatures rose steadily toward the upper 30s as a large mass of hot air moved south over the state from the centre of the continent. On Thursday morning we took a bus out to the beach at Glenelg to watch the start of the third stage and have a swim. Temperatures had reached 40° by mid-morning, though the heat did not stop hundreds of weekend warriors riding the stage in advance of the professionals – we watched them stream out of Glenelg heading for Victor Harbor before the 11 am stage start. The race organisers, however, were sufficiently concerned for the pros to shorten the stage by 40 km. This did not bode well for the following two stages when temperatures were forecast to reach 41°.
Those fears were soon realised: later that day the Bupa Challenge scheduled for Friday morning was cancelled. The start time for Friday’s fourth stage was also rescheduled an hour earlier.
On that Friday morning we left Adelaide early in a camper van and drove to the finish line in Uraidla. I then rode a 50 km circuit through the grapevines, orchards and attractive German-influenced villages in the Adelaide Hills. Even though the circuit was at an altitude of 400-500 metres and it was early morning, the heat was nonetheless fearsome. The temperature off the asphalt was clocked at 49.5°. Interestingly, it took me about 48 hours to fully recover from this ride. I was glad that I had not ridden the 137 km of the Bupa Challenge in conditions that hospitalised Joe Root during the Sydney cricket test and Simona Halep after the women’s tennis final in Melbourne.
The professional peleton did, however. The riders took precautions too: additional ‘hydration stations’, ice packs around necks before the start, water poured over heads, and the roadside littered with empty water bottles. Even in such conditions the best still perform: Peter Sagan won the stage and took over the tour leader’s ochre jersey.
There was a congenial atmosphere at the stage finish: the local sports oval had excellent food and drink outlets circled around tables and chairs in the shade of mature trees, a misty spray system at the entrance, water freely available, and the conviviality and good humour that typifies the cycling world. We were able to watch the presentations close up too. At the TDU tour followers are able to get close to tour riders, officialdom is never obvious, and helpful when present. It feels like being part of a large cycling community that is respected, making security minimally apparent.
In the evening we drove south to the McLaren Vale for the fifth stage and on Saturday based ourselves in the village of Willunga at the foot of the famous hill. This stage is ideally designed for the cycling public, consisting of three laps in the Vale followed by two climbs of the Old Willunga Hill road. Before the start I was able to ride from Willunga back to McLaren Vale, watch the start, then ride back behind the peleton. Many hundreds of cyclists rode the entire lap during the morning, stopped in Willunga to watch the peleton pass through three times, then dashed up the hill to find a suitable vantage point for the two ascents. The Old Willunga Hill has a gradient of 7.5%, but is just three kilometres long. The locals are an encouraging crowd: as I was riding up at a gentle pace, a young man shouted: “Come on, mate, get a move on, you look like shit!”
They were just as encouraging of Richie Porte, the national favourite to win the tour. He started the stage 14 seconds behind Peter Sagan and the other main contenders and was expected to make his move on the second ascent. He sprinted up amid huge home support. Three hundred metres from the finishing line I timed him 12 seconds ahead of the pursuing bunch. At the finish he had exactly a 14 second lead, thus finishing the stage with the same time as Daryl Impey, who took over the tour lead as a result of higher placings across the five stages. Impey was able to defend the jersey in the street race on the final day in Adelaide.
The TDU took us to other attractions in South Australia. We had a cooling swim on a beautiful sandy beach at Port Willunga, visited some of the greatest winegrowing areas in the world, and enjoyed the birdlife and natural beauty of the Cooyong. In the words of the Michelin guide: “Vaut le voyage” – Worth the trip!
