Bike Tours in the Alps

[Jim Braley]

Does anyone have any experience with Breaking Away Bike Tours? I am specifically looking at doing the Alps tour with them which includes watching the start or finish of two days of the tour. I am soimewhat concerned about climbing for day after day at the ripe age of 63. I do have a strong desire to both see and ride the Alps and I figure it will get harder and harder with each year of age but I don't want to try something and end up in the back of the sag van for half of the climbs. Speed is not an issue to me at all. Any input on this tour or any other similar ones would be appreciated

[2LeftCleats]

I went with their group during the 2004 Tour de France and felt it was an excellent trip. Good support and nice people. This trip included several difficult climbs but they were optional. Also, at that time, there were two options: fully supported with a following van and ride leader, and semi-supported. I did the second option which was cheaper and which basically provided hotel, maps, attentive staff, and phone support but the rides were done on our own or with small groups of our own choosing. We were responsible for renting a car and traveling from town to town. It gave us a little more autonomy but also caused a little frustration dealing with unexpected detours that would not have been an issue had we done the fully supported approach. As mentioned, some of the rides included difficult mountains. I live in a vertically challenged part of the country but was able to find some hills in southern Indiana to do hill repeats and was able to manage with a 12-27. You might want to look at a triple. Some of the people on our trip used mountain bike gearing effectively.