Tale of the Mountain Goat: CCC Cantabrico Stage 9 and 10: The Basque Climbs

It’s taken a while to get sorted after CCC Cantabrico ended, but I wanted to capture some thoughts about Stages 9 and 10 before moving on to the next adventure in the Cevennes.

Stage 9 was deemed the princess stage, not quite the queen stage (Stage 5) but presenting an array of shorter steeper climbs which dot the Basque region. The stage itself had been designed with the help of a local rider; Antonio; who we saw during the ride and at dinner the evening after the stage.

The forecast had been rain showers in the morning and clearing in the afternoon. Well, there was clearing in the afternoon but the morning was much much more than showers. It was showers for the first 5 kilometers, but then it was full on rain for the next 4-5 hours with some let up in between. So not only were there steep climbs and descents, the temps were somewhat lower with what felt like never-ending rain.

For the first couple hours I was thinking it could not get worse, only better, but my positive mental attitude started to wear thin. After making it to feed stop #1, I was starting to get asked where Jen was and the fact was no one had seen her. I kept waiting and each rider that came through had not seen her. At that point, Craig (back marker and mechanic) and I decided we would head back in the van to try and see if she was still on route. At this point, I had been standing around in wet gear for nearly an hour, so I got in the van and we started to backtrack and in 2-3 km we found Jen - smiling of course and wondering where the feed was. That was quite a relief considering the weather. She had missed a turn during the pouring rain and had traveled about 10 km out of the way and had to double back and follow the route without CCC arrows, just using the Garmin course.

At that point, we were heading to lunch in the van and making a plan for the rest of the afternoon from there. We saw a lot of courage and fortitude in each rider we saw that day as conditions were pretty grim that morning and riders were soldiering on.

At lunch I decided I would get a ride to the bottom of the lunch climb and start over from there. I donned the hard shell jacket and took on the second half of the day. I’d missed a few cols, maybe 3 and about 50 km, but was happy Jen was safe and there was still plenty of time left to tackle the next 90 km.

I was glad I got back on the bike for the afternoon, because the weather did get better. But the biggest treat of the day was the Puerto de Aitolazar loop. It was a 15 km loop including a wet cement road climb which was slick at times followed by a perfect single lane tarmac descent. The climb felt more like a gravel road climb where balancing weight on my rear wheel and keeping traction was key as I made my way up the mostly 14-15% gradient climb which was 8 km or so in length.

The rest of the day consisted of much shorter steeper climbs of the 200-300 m variety. As the route neared its end, we approached the waterfront town of Leikieto. It was a long day though and my final descent was in the dark - thank goodness for ambient daylight and bright white lines.

Dinner at a local fish house was the final treat of the day in this seaside village.

Final part of the Aitolazar descent, the whole road was like this

Finally, the sea...

Next up was Stage 10. The weather had improved and there was only some cool early morning fog to contend with. A gradual climb to get us warmed up started the day off, but soon we were back at the Basque climbs and 20% was the order of the morning in many places. Not for long, but enough to let bodies that had endured 10 challenging days know the grades were steep. Some of the descents that followed were beautiful single lane roads which continued to make me wonder why they were there at all.

As the morning rolled on, we were again greeted by seaside views and lunch was atop a col where we had a view of the sea and local town below. Some CCC rest stops are just too good to put into words.

The rest of the day consisted of what Phil would deem as rolling roads. More like shorter punchier climbs and descents. My afternoon was made more challenging as my Mavic free hub started to go and made a horrible howl on descents. So I wound up riding my brakes and pedaling for most of the final descents. Not fun as there was no reward after a climb. It worsened throughout the afternoon.

A highlight of the afternoon was seeing Phil’s wife Claire roadside. She had flown in for the weekend and seeing her made it feel like old times where she ruled the roadside feed stops.

Eventually we reached the final climb. Jen and I had done this one when we first arrived so we knew what was in store. But nearly 2,000 km ridden and 46,000 m of climbing later made it feel much harder. This cement road treat kicked up to 18-20% in places and drug on for what seemed like much longer than it really was, but once it was done, it was on to the final celebratory feed stop overlooking Bilbao where Aimar was waiting with Speculoos sandwiches galore - my favorite treat later in the trip was the Speculoos double decker, consisting of Speculoos on two slices of bread with Speculoos cookies added as well.

After getting a wheel change for the final descent it was down to Bilbao and back to the hotel where we all started for a celebration cerveza!

Without a doubt this was the hardest CCC event Jen and I have ever done. Most if not all would have agreed. Phil and Aimar aimed to create the hardest CCC and they hit their mark. All that took on this event, deserve massive kudos and a chapeau. CCC Dolomites was steep and hard - but the gradients here in Spain were of another variety altogether. If you didn’t have a 32 cassette, you were hurting and standing even more. I don’t think I will even take mine off again.

Next up, rest and a drive over to Montpellier where we will tackle the other new CCC event of the year, CCC Cevennes.