Ventoux is one of those climbs that left a lasting impression; for me road cycling Mont Ventoux and the summer is what road cycling is about. I was 19 years old and in my first year as a pro, riding the Dauphiné. The Ventoux was my first experience of a …

Mountains. When I heard that word in my childhood, it made me think of snow, of inaccessible places. Then I heard about these cols, the tough, narrow roads where the most significant dramas of the Tour de France play out. There are no big climbs in my native Bourgogne, just …

Nobody prepares you for it, you can’t even try to be ready. But once it arrives, you realise that you’ve spent your whole life preparing. Not long ago I was re-reading Paul Auster’s book New York Trilogy: “I didn’t die there, but I wasn’t far off, and there was a …

North Dakota is absolutely flat – flat like, Holland-flat. It’s in the Upper Midwest, a state of the Great Plains and formed from a glacial lake, which creates a two-dimensional landscape; there’s length and breath and a tonne of wind but no depth, no mountains. I started cycling in North …

Heath Robinson approach nets high end results. Behind the scenes of a recent photo shoot for Le Col x McLaren, seeing what goes in to making a finished shot for the launch of their Aero clothing range. With so much technology at our fingertips it’s easy to get too carried …

It’s only my opinion but the Passo dello Spluga appearance in the Giro is long, long overdue. I’m not sure why the race hasn’t featured this beautiful climb before – maybe it’s too far off the beaten track on the border with Switzerland or maybe it just didn’t register on …

It’s probably the most embarrassing moment of my career. It was during one of those hard mountain stages in the Tour of Italy when it was freezing cold and snowing really, really hard. The day before we’d been over the Marmolada and on this stage we went back up the …

Here we showcase some of the climbs the riders would have faced today during the Queen stage of the Giro d’Italia, most notably the Passo Fedaia, Passo Pordoi & Passo Giau, all of which top over 2000m.

One of the earliest memories I have of riding a bike is climbing the Stelvio with my Dad at the age of eight. There’s a great picture of me on the climb – it was a bright summer day, warm enough for a short-sleeved jersey, and I was riding my …

I saw my first mountain range when I rode my first Tour de France. I grew up in East Africa and we had had mountains but they seemed far, far away in a distant place at the end of the plains. Seeing the mountains for the first time was a …

I was in pretty good shape that year but I was always got sick in the spring, so I went to the 88 Giro just ‘hunting’ – to see if I could win but if not, I’d go for stages. There were a lot of mountain days but the Gavia …

Training on Mount Teide is what made the difference between Brad [Wiggins] winning and losing the 2012 Tour de France. After he broke his collarbone in 2011 I thought he’d missed his chance but standing at the top of that mountain, in the months before the race, I changed my …

Your genes are what determine if you are a good climber and that’s something that you simply can’t change; the natural climbers are lightweight little fellers, the ones who weigh less than 60Kg. And whilst it’s true to say that everyone can improve their climbing ability through training, if you’re …

They chatted as they smoked in a language that was undecipherable. The air in the car was thick with diesel fuel and strong cigarettes. It was a Lada, or Skoda, or something from the East; I didn’t pay attention, or I can’t remember. My memories are spotty, as if the …

There are no mountains in Minneapolis, so it’s odd that I live there because mountains have always been a big part of my life. At the age of eight I moved from Los Angeles to Washoe Valley, near Reno. I remember the car drive up there from LA into the …

There’s a hint of smoke in the distance and it’s a subtle clue to what awaits the unwary. Moments later, a few reflected flashes of sunlight confirm it’s definitively today’s challenge that’s sending out signals, even if they turn out to be via a self-contained barbecue.  As we get nearer …

Wow, what a topsy turvy year! Twenty-twenty started so promisingly with plans for great adventures and new projects, but like most people, these soon unravelled as COVID-19 took hold and the world battened down the hatches. Despite all the turmoil the global pandemic brought, it was still a very successful …

The fourth instalment of my mountains showcase, and this week we take a look at a giant of the French Alps, the Col du Galibier, a climb inextricably linked to the Tour de France and its founder Henri Desgrande. It’s the most frequented climb in the Tour with 59 visits …

The third instalment of a series showcasing some of my favourite climbs features a triumph of Italian engineering, the Passo dello Stelvio. Books and Prints from the mountains series are available here. At 2758 metres, the Passo dello Stelvio is the highest paved pass in Italy and only 12m shy …

Next in the Mountains series is the mighty Mont Ventoux in the Vaucluse region of France. It’s hard to compile a list of great cycling climbs without including Mont Ventoux, such is its status. It’s one of those mountains that ticks all the boxes – it’s a brute to cycle …

With 2020 close to an end, it’s time to look forward to next year and the real possibility of European travel again. Like many people, all the trips I had planned to the Mountains this year were dashed but the outlook for 2021 is looking more positive so maybe it’s …