Tour de France: Côte de Buttertubs
Unless you’ve been hibernating a bit too long or living under a rock you’re sure to know that its that time of year again when all the eyes of cycling turn towards France. This year though the fans eyes will have to drift a little north to England. For 2014 the peloton and the whole circus that follows the 3 weeks of madness is kicking off in the Yorkshire.
Yorkshire for many will be famous for a few things, namely good quality strong tea, Yorkshire puddings -them golden yet fatty crusts of pastry that go so well with a roast dinner- and maybe then theirs the white rose. Yorkshire is a pretty spectacular place when the weathers not the typical drizzle of rain, this though helps with keeping the place a lovely lush green.
Cycling in the area is tough, narrow and lumpy roads litter the landscape, drystone walls hem you in and sheep run from field to field. A minor hazard to avoid when taking in the great cycling territory.
I’m pretty luck as I live just a short ride from where the peloton will be passing on stage one. One climb that will be making its mark on the race and one that I’m sure a few sprinters will be hoping that the climbing whippets wont be tackling too hard is that of Buttertubs, or Le Côte du Buttertubs as it is known on the TDF official route. They have to sneak a little French in to the Northern English lexicon.
Due to the local area being dense with small meandering roads in all directions, roads that link up all over the place and then shoot off in a multiple choice of directions its quite easy to go years without using certain roads, either by forgetting they are there or choosing equally as exciting roads, for myself it’d been a couple of years since Buttertubs had featured on a club run out, so I decided to head over to the climb and remind myself of how hard it is and why the route organisers decided to put it in the itinerary.
The climb itself is roughly half way through stage one, at 526m elevation its no huge european pass. The hill isn’t savage or overly tough, it is though windy in places and narrow all the way up. The view- which I’m sure the riders wont have time to take in- is a stunning panorama of rolling green hills split up in to fields by endless drystone walls that have stood up against innumerable harsh winters of the area.
With some very steep sections in places and a gradient that is constantly changing I feel this may cause a few riders to mismanage efforts, catching guys out, gears will be crunched and it could be a simple mistake like this that could see a rider drift quickly backwards through the peloton. Read a detailed review about the Buttertubs Climb here.
But the one factor that may be a challenge is the crowds. The north of England has never seen anything like this, and with the huge growth in cycling in the UK over the past few years due to Olympic and Tour success plus the Sky effect it’s going to be one huge party on the hill side. With the expected crowd numbers on this climb lined up and caging the riders in will make for a climb that the riders wont be able to see coming, it’ll just open up before them, revealing the gradient at the very last moment-Well, thats what I’m expecting/hoping for, anyway.
The only other thing about this climb is the fact that the descent could be a bit tricky, its a steep and twitchy drop down the other side, on one side a wired fence will keep the rider from hopefully not plummeting over the edge. Its narrow and nothing like Alpine roads, and if its even a slight bit wet we could see some serious action on the tight corners.
One thing that I think i can predict correctly though without fear is that the people of Yorkshire and the surrounding counties will put a celebration of cycling on that they’ll be able to be proud of for years to come.
