Legs felt really tired but got better going up the hill. I thought about stopping at le Baure and should have listened to myself.

I took the back route into the Madeleine via the lacets de Montvernier Col du Chaussy and the lac du Loup. There are some sections of 13% above Montvernier on a balcony road.

DescriptionIt is a fairly logical loop.

Very hard climb due to bad back and a top gear that didn't engage properly. The road to the power station has been resurfaced for some reason, very smooth now.

It has been 7 years since I rode up this side of Mount Mottarone. This time I was just doing a return trip from Orta.

Back to see if I could get a bit further up the road. In the end I made it to the top section although didn't have time to ride over to the village, next time. There is a segment of 17% over 0.5km.

The Cormet d'Arêches are how Grand Tour cols used to be: nasty, long and brutish and the cherry on the cake, the top 6 to 7km are unsurfaced.

I'd spotted the Alpe Loccia while searching for new routes around lake Orta in Italy. According to the mountain bikers it is an uber steep climb with sections over 20%.

Seriously, I'd vowed not to come back after last year but here I was, struggling up the first killer wall out of Monte Buglio cheered on by the usual assortment of deranged Italian cani.

There is a heatwave at the moment and many people on Strava were complaining about the temperatures. At the same time the weather service predicted afternoon storms.