The Mercure hotel in Troyes was a class above the usual Ibis hotels this week, Fred’s house of pain was set-up and I guess residents on the first floor wondered what was going on what with frequent comings and goings of strange men in their underwear, cries of agony and shouts of ‘yeah baby’ echoing through the corridor.   We also got some strange looks this morning at the Mercure in Troyes, 13 cyclists in full gear doing stretches on the reception floor!  The bacon and eggs was a welcome change from the usual ‘continental’ breakfast though.

A bit colder this morning (especially for the Singapore contingent – Chris and Murli), but the fast and racy first 2hrs soon got the blood running again.  Before we had rubbed the sleep out of our eyes – 70k had been knocked off the total for the day.  The roads, however, were constructed from real heavy gravel, so heavy that the saddle sores were punished more than anticipated!  After a quick refuelling (well done support team) we pressed on towards the hills, lots and lots of them.

Lunch was taken on top of one of those huge hills, in amongst the numerous wind turbines that made such interesting scenery.  This time the boys had gone one further and purchased three roast chickens which when ‘ripped and mauled apart’ by Fred (that’s what he does to our aching limbs at the end of the day) and stuffed into fresh baguettes was devoured in seconds.

I’ll leave you to ask James how he managed to fall into a ditch while having a pee during one of our pit stops.

We finally arrived in Metz after 8hrs and 10mins in the saddle, clocking up 130miles / 208km.

Here’s a good one.  We have just found out that there is more than one Marburg in Germany!!  At this point, we don’t know if we are heading for the right one .  Pete D’Amery is in control and spoke to the official team in Marburg  (the real one) before we left – is that supposed to make us feel better, or not?  Not to worry though, we have a big black marker pen and if the Marburg we get to on Saturday isn’t the right one – it soon will be!

Tomorrow is probably our hardest day – not because of the distance (117 miles) but because of the gradient – just a couple of Pastis tonight then!

Well done Dave Everett, excellent hill climbing from all the TTC riders

TTC Riders start yet another climb!!!!