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Video: The madness of l'Alpe d'Huez's Dutch Corner

Fans from the Netherlands turn the mountain into a multi-day party

Dutch Corner on l’Alpe d’Huez is an institution of the Tour de France. Global Cycling Network went to meet some of the fans from the Netherlands who take over a section of the mountain whenever the Tour de France comes this way.

In years when the Tour de France ascends l’Alpe d’Huez, turn 7 becomes the highest point in the Netherlands as orange-clad fans gather for a multi-day party.

This year, Dutch fans had arrived as early as Monday to stake a spot on the mountain, and brought with them staggering amounts of refreshment. Well, it’s thirsty work cheering on the riders in the hot sun for several hours, and you obviously have to spend a few days preparing for it.

In this video GCN’s Simon Richardson, meets the fans on Dutch Corner, including the guys whose camper van contained 120 litres of beer. It’s a hell of a party.

John has been writing about bikes and cycling for over 30 years since discovering that people were mug enough to pay him for it rather than expecting him to do an honest day's work.

He was heavily involved in the mountain bike boom of the late 1980s as a racer, team manager and race promoter, and that led to writing for Mountain Biking UK magazine shortly after its inception. He got the gig by phoning up the editor and telling him the magazine was rubbish and he could do better. Rather than telling him to get lost, MBUK editor Tym Manley called John’s bluff and the rest is history.

Since then he has worked on MTB Pro magazine and was editor of Maximum Mountain Bike and Australian Mountain Bike magazines, before switching to the web in 2000 to work for CyclingNews.com. Along with road.cc founder Tony Farrelly, John was on the launch team for BikeRadar.com and subsequently became editor in chief of Future Publishing’s group of cycling magazines and websites, including Cycling Plus, MBUK, What Mountain Bike and Procycling.

John has also written for Cyclist magazine, edited the BikeMagic website and was founding editor of TotalWomensCycling.com before handing over to someone far more representative of the site's main audience.

He joined road.cc in 2013. He lives in Cambridge where the lack of hills is more than made up for by the headwinds.

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3 comments

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VecchioJo | 10 years ago
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when i rode the Alpe the day before the Tour went up they gave me a beer hand-up, classy

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SteppenHerring | 10 years ago
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When I stopped there on the way up a few weeks ago, someone had altered the flush on the urinal at that turn to come straight out at you. Good job I don't go in for white shorts. Anyway, watch out for that.

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Skylark | 10 years ago
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Het is zeer goed.

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