Finding the tour
I arrived extremely underprepared
for the Tour; I didn't really know where exactly the race would be routed
or when the racers would arrive. Fortunately, my sister Amber (aka
my personal travel agent) had selected a hotel in the heart of downtown
Bordeaux. I got up in the morning and began wandering around,
hoping to stumble upon the race route. Fortunately, across the street
from my hotel, there was a traffic information board indicating road closures
due to the tour. I found a map in the hotel lobby and was able to
bias my random search in the vicinity of the roads displayed on the traffic
board.
After about a kilometer of walking I arrived at the finish line, though it was still under construction. It was on the Cours De Verdun, a grand, tree-line boulevard reminiscient of the Champs Elysees in Paris, though it was a bit narrower. There wasn't much of a crowd present yet, but the area was filled with workers painting the finish line (and the signature FIAT logos) and erecting the clocks and banners.
Finding the prime spot
I must have arrived just before
the early birds, because within about five minutes of finding the finish
line, I noticed that people were starting to steak out real estate along
the barriers near the finish line. Without realizing it, I too had
staked my claim on some prime viewing territory. During my initial
indecisive phase, I had been standing on a small (6 foot triangle) traffic
island in the middle of a closed intersection. The crowd barriers
were right in front of me and I was about 3 - 4 meters behind the finish
line. I didn't realize the primeness of this spot until an american
couple commented on it.
Making the strategic alliance
I made quick friends with them by
letting them join me on the island. I was quite fortunate to make
this strategic alliance because, when I left my hotel, I was expecting
to do a bit more traveling before finding the race route. I was planning
to pickup some more water and lunch along the way, but I hadn't stopped
before arriving at the finish line. This presented a major problem
because I was alone, and I would have to forfeit my spot if I needed to
leave. My fellow countrymen offered to hold my spot if I needed to
leave to get food or use the restroom during the next four hours of waiting.
As it turned out, they went to a bakery and brought back a bunch of sandwiches
for us. When the advertising caravan arrived, there was plenty of
free food and, more importantly, water. At the tour concession truck,
a 0.5 L bottle of water was selling for 2 euro! There caravan sponsors
also brough alot of other junk that I wasn't interested in, but I did take
a yellow Credit Lyonnaise baseball cap. They apparently wanted the
finish lines to be filled with yellow and the Credit Lyonnaise logo.
Enduring the elements
The weather was a little bit erratic
while we were waiting for the race to arrive. In the morning it was
sunny and beautiful, but in the mid afternoon it began to rain. I
was very happy I had brought along a rain jacket! The guy painting
the finish line continued to work in the rain, erecting a makeshift canopy
and using propane blow torches to dry the pavement. The rain lasted
for about an hour or so and then it cleared up briefly, becoming very muggy.
By the time the race arrived, it was overcast and I was worried that I
would have to use a low shutter speed and my pictures would be blurred.
Capturing the action
Fortunately, my camera (Sony DSC-F707)
had a low enough f-stop, allowing me to shoot in sutter priority at 1/1000th
sec. (The pictures of the award ceremony are blurry because it was
extremely crowded and I had a very hard time holding the camera steady
enough for the autofocus to work.) Shooting moving subjects, such
as cyclists crossing the finish line at 60 kph, is problematic even when
high shutter speeds are used. Unless you're using a super high-end
professional camera, autofocus algorithms are too slow to catch the action.
Therefore, you have to focus the best you can before the riders arrive
(One of my only complaints about the F707 is the lack of an optical viewfinder
for focusing. Its difficult to focus using a 320x240 LCD.) , and
then you have to be careful to take the picture at the right time.
This latter task is problematic with digital cameras. Ask just about
anyone who owns one and they'll complain about the long delay between pressing
the shutter button when the camera actually takes the picture. This
time is shortened, but not eliminated, by putting the camera in manual
focus mode. I decided to use the F707's burst mode to help capture
the action. I thought it worked pretty well, but check out the photos
to judge for yourself.
Finding the tour...again
Just like the day before,
I didn't know where the race would be routed. I began my search near
the finish line. The tour organizers run a pretty tight operation.
If I hadn't been there the day before, I wouldn't have known that the race
had passed through; there was nothing left. I guessed that they might
start near the Garrone river and started walking in that direction.
Once I got to the river, I could see the starting area because of all of
the brightly-colored caravan vehicles. By the time I had crossed
the river, the place was quite crowded. I was able to find a decent
spot near the starting line and staked my claim. Fortunately, I didn't
have to wait all day again; the race began in after about an hour or so.
The pre-start
Each stage of the tour has two starting
points. The first occurs at a traditional starting line (this is
what I witnessed). The clock isn't actually started here. Instead
the riders slowly roll away. The real start is a rolling start that
is signalled by the race director once the riders have reached the first
major highway outside of the start city.
Le prix orange
I didn't realize it at the time,
but I managed to get a picture of Lance holding le prix orange-a crate
of oranges that the tour journalists and photographers award to the most
coopertive rider. In 2002, Lance was given le prix citron-a crate
of lemons given to the most uncoopertive rider. Quite a turn around...
Finding the tour
It wasn't very difficult to find
the race in Paris. The race ends with 11 laps of the most famous
Parisen boulevard, the Champs Elysees. My hotel was only a few blocks
from the Louvre and the Place de la Concorde (at the top of the Champs
Elysees). I arrived in Paris the night before the race. That
evening, I strolled down to the Champs Elysees to find a good spot for
the next day.
Finding the prime spot
Unlike in Bordeaux, I found that it would be impossible to get a spot
at the finish line (or for that matter, a spot within 250 meters of the
finish line). There were large temporary seating areas erected near
the finish line and it was pretty apparent that they weren't available
on a first-come-first-served basis. I realized that I would have
to get up early the next day to find a good spot. I arrived at the
Champs Elysees at about 7:30 AM the following morning and found that the
good spots were going fast. In Bordeaux, the crowd barriers were
right on the curb and it was possible to get a relatively unobstructed
view down the road. However, in Paris. the barriers were arranged
in such a way that nobody could get within 3 meters of the road.
This made even the best spots somewhat mediocre because the Champs Elysees
is lined with large trees which obscured the view down the road.
I eventually settled on a spot at the intersection of the Champs Elysees
and Avenue Winston Churchill. I was on the Southwest side of the
intersection and on the northeast side there was a large video board so
I could watch the race until it arrived in Paris. This also happened
to be the intersection where they kept the 'yellow brick road' awards stage.
I could see it on the north side of the intersection. As it turned
out, I was right behind the stage and was able to get some pretty good
shots of the awards ceremony.
Enduring the elements
The weather was typical of Paris (or so I'm told). It rained
off and on all day. By the time the race arrived it had dried up
and the sun was coming out intermittently. Though it was somewhat
muggy all day, I'm glad that the sun wasn't out all day because when it
did come out things got pretty uncomfortable.
Capturing the action
Again, I was shooting in shutter priority (1/1000th sec) and using
a manual preset focus. It was still very difficult to get pictures
that were not blurred because of the crappy crowd barrier setup.
I couldn't get much of angle on the riders as they passed. Luckily,
the riders made 11 laps of the Champs Elysees, giving me some time to work
things out. Eventually, I decided to rotate the camera to track the
riders as they passed. This worked suprisingly well.
The riders were no longer motion blurred, but there was no guarantee that
they would be centered in the frame. Oh well, I did the best I could.