Pré Richard

I know, I often go on about how great almost every climb is. Well here you go. I didn’t love this ride.

My first cycling climbs “bible” was the Atlas des Col des Alpes Volume 5. This simple black and white book listed a bunch of climbs near where I live providing a climb profile and meagre route instructions. I’d climbed every road in the book some years ago, except one: Pré Richard. The basic issue being it’s a pain to get to the start: Evian-les-Bains.

But finally, I decided to check this box. The Spa town of Evian sits on the south shore of Lac Léman (Lake Geneva). It’s a traffic nightmare of a place. I started from the centre of town and headed up. There are a few ways to get above town, and on the map below I took a steeper route initially than the above profile. But it soon settles into a not-too-steep road. But it is never quiet. In fact, until at least Bernex, there was more traffic than I enjoy. But nothing terrible. Fine.

The last three kilometres take a tiny road to the top of a little ski lift. This stretch is very steep. The paved road goes to just above 1300 metres. I continued to the end of the “good” gravel stretch at 1400 metres – and the best views of the day. There are some ferocious looking “roads/trails” that go higher. But I wasn’t feeling it, and no desire to push today. See? I can get grouchy occasionally too. 🙂

I am perhaps making this sound worse than it is, but definitely not my favourite. For more interesting roads just south of Lac Léman head into the Aulpe or Abondance valleys or ride a bunch of the Cols in the Vallée Verte.