I already knew how special a ride this had been, but what was happening right now hammered it home. We were riding in a 350-rider convoy making a 50km beeline for Paris from the town of Menucourt; this was a closed-road peloton with motorbike outriders speeding ahead to close all junctions for us, to keep us safe and, theoretically at least, in constant movement deep into the French capital. It’s how Hotchillee, the Surrey-based cycling events company, always ends its London-Paris ride, bringing together several groups separated by speed and ability into one for a memorable mass finish under the Eiffel Tower.
One of these groups, with whom I had pedalled, hadn’t even made the journey to Menucourt, via Folkstone and Calais, on tarmac, instead taking a totally different, more direct route, via Newhaven and Dieppe, on gravel. And now, after three days and over 300km of relaxed solitude, slowly making our way through the thickets and forests of Normandy, we had been pitched into an altogether higheroctane world of bunch road riding. Hotchillee’s ‘Ride Captains’, whose task within the road groups is to control the riders, keep them together and get them working as one, were particularly vocal here, urging the convoy to stick together and avoid being strung out. Sirens blared and
