Not much riding, more about the history of PBP.
In January 2011 we went to Paris to attend the launch of the Paris Brest Paris cycling event. We’d arranged to interview on the organisers about it, and we also wanted to explore some of its history. It’s a 1,200 km ride, to be done within 90 hours and can be said to have a charm and fascination all of its own.
We went from Liverpool John Lennon Airport to Paris Charles de Gaulle, (Did they ever meet I wonder?) and then on to the Etap Hotel in Bercy. This involved a walk from the metro station down by the Seine, with its parked-up concrete wagons,
and across a motorway interchange on foot, to arrive at a grim blockhouse of a building attached to a five storey shopping centre and a concert venue fashioned from a former velodrome.
That’s what I love about France, its capacity to confound your expectations. We tried to find a local bar for a nightcap, but we couldn’t find a way out of the interchange, we settled for the bar in the Hotel, which closed early without warning.
Breakfast was fairly good actually, we’d expected the hotel to be on a windswept industrial estate, so we’d booked it. The attached shopping centre Bercy 2 had lots of places you could have eaten though. We made our way to the Espace Charenton, a conference centre, where the presentation took place.
We met Jean-Gualbert Faburel of the Audax Club Parisien and sorted out a time for our interview, during the ACP prize presentations. There was a big collection of trophies on display, all conforming to a very French aesthetic.
It was nice to see the ACP on their home turf, I recognised Sophie Mutter, who I’d filmed on a ride from London to Edinburgh and back, so I felt like less of a stranger, more of a comrade. We went back to Bercy 2 for lunch and to get my clothes ironed, out of respect for the club, as I looked a bit of a sight otherwise.
Our home in Lancashire lies between a motorway junction and a railway line, so it was reassuringly familiar to pass over a siding full of TGV trains between conference centre and hotel, there was a rather jolly yellow one which was run by the Post Office, and later, some double deckers.
Back at the Espace Charenton we waited for our chance to interview Jean-Gualbert. I wanted to experiment with more sophisticated sound recording than my usual hurried filming allows, so there was a bit of fiddling, which Jean-Gualbert was very patient with.
The presentation itself was very French, it was comprehensive and paid due respect to all the partners in the enterprise and lasted for two hours of continuous presentation. During this time the caterers were putting out lots of rather fine canapés, which were now slowly drying out.
We met the well known organiser of the Boston Montreal Boston ride, Jennifer Wise, and interviewed her as well, before we got too heavily stuck into the rather fine wines on offer.
After the formalities we tried to find out where the PBP had started from in the distant past. There was no definite answer, some felt that it might be the Point Zero, the origin of all road distances from Paris, which is just next to the Notre Dame Cathedral, there was mention of the brasserie Au Pied de Cochon, in Les Halles, where the Fleche rides set off from. We also knew about Porte Maillot, which has also been the start of the Tour de France and the Paris Roubaix, a pub in Pont de Suresnes and the Aux Trois Obus Brasserie at the Porte de St Cloud. We decided we would visit all these points on the following day.
