TOUR DE BEIJING

• Source: Global Times
• [14:11 July 09 2010]
• Comments

Burbs-eye view: Cyclists get out of the city. Photo: Courtesy of the Peloton

GAO FUMAO

Now that the World Cup is being superseded by the Tour de France, it may be time to put away the football and take out the bike. The world's top cycle race, which runs from July 3 to 25, will pit nearly 22 teams of professional cyclists against each other on a 3,600 kilometer course.

While most of us will be watching the action on CCTV5 there are others in Beijing who actually ride Tour-length stages every weekend in the mountains around the city. Anyone who's flown out of Beijing on a clear day will appreciate there are some awesome mountains and hills ringing this city.

That's exactly what Tom Lanhove thinks too. The Belgian cyclist behind the Beijing Peloton explained how the club rides in all mountain districts around the city: Pinggu, Huairou, Miyun, Changping, Yanqing and Mentougou. "We see, literally, every nook and cranny of Beijing's mountains. We see lots of non-disclosed parts of the Great Wall and countless remote temples and scenic parks."

Scenery

Beijing has seen a flowering of bicycle clubs and shops catering to mountain and road bicycle enthusiasts since the world's elite riders came here for the 2008 Olympics cycling competitions yet clubs of riders remain limited and few are as organized as the Peloton (the name comes from the term to describe a formation of riders in a road bike race like the Tour de France.)

On weekly Saturday rides the Peloton crew covers anything from 50 to 120 kilometers, depending on the group, "so you get to see a tremendous amount of scenery along the 30-odd rides each year." While the club doesn't travel to the mountains in winter, club Peloton members do shorter spins nearer to the city all winter long.

Riders gather at 6:30 on Saturday mornings outside a Trek bike store near Chaoyang Park. Loading bicycles carefully onto the club minibus, riders can catch an hour or so of sleep before the bus reaches an arranged starting point and it's time to ride. On a recent Saturday ride the Peloton was dropped at the Ming Tombs, from where they progressed over the Huanghua section of the Great Wall before swinging over to the Mutianyu and Jiankou sections of the wall.

A route worthy of any Tour de France stage, the ride costs riders 200 yuan ($28) for the trip but encourage would-be riders to buy cards for several rides: 500 yuan gets you five trips while for 1,000 yuan you'll get the rest of the club's 2010 season - 15 rides. "We are a sports club, not a company," stressed Lanhove. "We don't make profits and we do require people to be committed to using the bike as sport. Beyond that everyone is welcome and we have a big spread in ages and levels."