New Tour de France Trip

We will be announcing in the coming days a 2nd trip during the Tour de France that includes the Alpes and Mont Ventoux. We are going to cancel our Pyrenees+Ventoux trip where there has been very little interest in favor of this 2nd program where all the interest is.

If you want to be informed, please send an email.

This trip is now posted at: http://www.cyclingclassics.com/grand_tour05.php

This will be a small group of either 8 persons or max 12 persons and it will sell out. info@cyclingclassics.com

Look 566 - The New Road Rental

If you happen to be on our print newsletter distribution, then you should have received the latest edition recently. In there, we introduced our new road bike for 2009. Look really went on the offensive last fall and gave their sales people great tools to lock up team and fleet deals. We couldn't resist! In fact, as treasurer for a USA based amateur racing on the National Racing Calendar, our team even bought the same bike!! While we put DA on the amateur team bikes and added ultra light Ritchey wheels, stems, bars, and seat posts, we didn't have that luxury for our rental fleet. Nonetheless, the rental comes with a triple chainring, 105 groupo, that still weighs very little. As a rental, we believe we have about the best thing going! Here is a description from our rental page:

The Look 566 carbon road bike is featured on all of the Cycling Classics tours. They are brand new in 2009. Of note: the 566 is an entry level yet high quality carbon frame bike. From the Look website, you can read about the high quality carbon used in this model as well as the geometry and design features. The frame weighs in at 1100 grams and the carbon fork is another 350 grams! Total 1450 grams or 1.45kg (about 3 lbs!) The geometry as described by Look offers a taller head tube and shorter sloping top tube - a compact design to allow for more comfort for going longer and faster. We have all sizes: S, M, L, XL for people comfortably up to 1m93 (about 6ft-4in) See The Look website for more info.
http://www.cyclingclassics.com/rental_bike01.php

Bike rental only can be booked from the link above as well. But, we prefer to rent you this bike on one of our tours! Rental rates for tour clients are less than rental only. If you plan to rent in July then we encourage you to book it fast!

L

Tour de France Tours

We have our first sell out situation! Our Alpes-Ventoux guided trip from July 19-26 is full. Not surprisingly really, we expected it to go first. So, there is some good news for readers who might thinking to go:

1. We have a hotel on Lake Annecy that we can offer on a "hotel booking" only basis. 3 Nights, 2 star hotel, 90 euros/person per night including breakfast and dinner daily. It sits about 15km from Annecy center and is directly on the beautiful lake of Annecy. Perfect for viewing the TDF time trial and also riding up to Grand Bornand for the stage finish. Contact me if interested. This will go out in an enews to other subscribers in a few days so not likely to last!

2. Pyrenees to Ventoux: I like this trip and we put it in knowing that it would not sell before the Alpes. It is wide open, but now it is likely to get more attention. I like this trip because it offers challenging cycling in the famous cols of the Pyrenees just after the 09 TDF passes, so the crowds are gone but you can test yourself on the same routes. Then, you can go join the madness at Mont VEntoux for the big finish. Best of both worlds!

3. Provence-Cote d'Azur: We only blocked space for up to 8 persons. It is guided, and is possible for people a little less strong to join and have fun. We will see the opening stages, the team time trial, and of course enjoy the beach and Provencale lifestyle. The price is right too!

Here is the link to the tour options: http://www.cyclingclassics.com/grand_tour.php