The HTC Gravy Train I Mean Tour

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jethro's picture

What a fortnight! I have spent most of the last 2 weeks overseas, largely in France, for the last week of the Tour de France, courtesy of the phone company HTC.

2011-07-22 Col de Galibier 032And what a jam packed tour it was. I was required to write a blog post everyday - and I think I succeeded. some days were just so jam packed I fell asleep at the PC at night, or got up stupidly early to edit photos and write an article. Not only was I there to see the tour but I also had the chance to ride thanks to BikeStyle Tours. I was riding a Cannondale Synapse bike and man it was fun. So many times I pinched myself to see if I was dreaming as I rode down and then back up the Col de Manse (including crossing Lance Armstrong's legendary wheat field), riding up the Alpe d'Huez on the morning of the day the race finished there and part of the time trial course in Grenoble.

Then of course there were the other opportunities, I was able to go to the HTC Highroad team bus and meet and hang out with Mark Cavendish, Danny Pate, Matt Goss. Lars Bak, Bernie Eisel and Mark Renshaw.

I also spent the last day in Paris on the Champs Elysee in a hospitality marquee with road side seating 220 metres from the finish line. Wow - that was a fast last 8 laps!

I was given the trip by HTC because I fit the following criteria, loved HTC phones (we have 5), heavily into social media, and into cycling and the tour specifically. This blog of course shows all three clearly as I have written about my numerous HTC phones, cycling and social media a lot. My Tour de France Diaries blog for HTC can be seen publicly on Facebook.

HTC provided an HTC Desire S phone to take away with me and Telstra gave me a huge international roaming account. Even on the Col de Galibier I was able to connect and tweet the race. While in Grenoble I videoed Mark Cavendish and Cadel Evans doing their warm ups and shared them online from the phone. The phone proved invaluable numerous other times (when I got lost in Paris) sending text messages to other riders and friends, unified email management to keep up with all my email accounts, lots of smart apps including two tour trackers, my trip itinerary and making sure a French cabbie didn't rip me off (I got a discount).

All in all it was a fantastic tour.

The following links are where all the media (photos and videos) I took during the tour de France can be found. Note none of these are edited at all. Feel free to copy the small versions off Flickr for your personal use. If however you want to print and frame any or use for any commercial reasons please contact me.

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eva888's picture

Very useful analyze, I’ve

Very useful analyze, I’ve made some bets on them this season! Thanks for helping me too see the situation objective. And hey, don’t be sad for the results, it could be worse anytime!