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First club run with La Pédale des Eaux-Vives

Club member Ian Collins recently moved to Geneva. Since then, he's ridden some of the sport's greatest routes. This time, Ian joins up with a local club and finds a different type of club run.

As soon as I arrived in Geneva, I was keen to find a club to join. I wanted to be able to train with other riders and also make a few Swiss friends rather than stick firmly with the ex-pats who work with my wife. I’ve found the Swiss friendly but very reserved and it’s been said to me a few times that they are seldom interested in striking up friendships with the foreigners living in the city as too often they find the ex-pats move on to other countries within a few years.

So I got a list of clubs from my local bike shop and started checking them out for the most suitable and/or convenient one. As an aside, Geneva has the most incredible bike shops. My local one is run by an ex pro whose son until recently rode for the French team Ag2r and before that Cofidis. The walls are covered with messages from the current stars of the pro peloton as well as signed photos from the stars of yesteryear. Just a bit further down the road is Vifian Cycles, run by Bernard Vifian who raced in the Tour (22nd in 1970) and the Giro. His “dossards” from the various races in the 60s hang on the walls together with a load of signed photos etc. It is great to chat with guys who have really done it, if a bit humbling.

Anyway, I found a club that looked suitable and sent an email about joining them. Before I knew it, I was accompanying them on a jaunt into the Swiss countryside. The organised training runs have finished for the season but there are still ad hoc rides that members organise to keep their legs turning over. However, the idea of a UK-style club run doesn’t seem to exist for them. Therefore the winter rides don’t seem to attract riders of all abilities. You still see loads of groups out on a Sunday morning but they are usually not in clubs, just friends riding together.

So I ended up with 6 of La Pédale des Eaux-Vives's best - these guys were all hardcore racers. The pace was fairly gentle but when I started asking them about racing etc it became clear I was in way over my head. One of the guys was an elite rider, another had finished 18th in the Marmotte this year, while another had been 55th in the same race. In fact, they all seemed to be regularly finishing in the top 50 of the European cyclo-sportifs, amongst fields of often thousands with a fair smattering of ex pros and elite riders thrown in. I’m looking forward to getting stuck into plenty of these next season but my ambitions will be just to finish!

The chasm (this doesn’t really do justice to the difference) in class showed every time we went up hill – without seeming to break sweat or change rhythm in any way, they went up the hills as though they weren’t there and I found myself getting shelled out the back within metres. They were more than happy to wait at the top (this was, after all, just a gentle off season leg spinner for them) but things may be different when the proper training starts again. I just pray there are riders of my standard when the time comes...

That said, they were all extremely friendly and interested in the scene in the UK. In Switzerland, the racing scene is relatively small and as a consequence, the standard is pretty high. It was clear there will be few if any races I’ll be able to enter without embarrassing myself. Fortunately, however, with France literally 5 minutes from my doorstep, I’m hoping I can get some racing in there – the guys all said there were far more races in France of all standards. I suspect not UK Cat 4 standard though! Unless I can blag my way into the under 5s.

As I try to integrate further, I may try to introduce the concept of a cakestop, which seemed to create much amusement when I explained it to the “Péevistes” with whom I was riding. After all, they might drop me with ease but nobody is going to out-eat me.