Tourmalet from Sainte-Marie-de-Campan – climb map

by Sidney van den Boogaard

The eastern side of the Tourmalet begins in Sainte-Marie-de-Campan, in a green valley that gives little away. Some seventeen kilometres later you stand at 2,115 metres, and in between the landscape grows steadily wilder. The road winds up through avalanche galleries and past the ski slopes of La Mongie, where lifts and apartment blocks make an odd backdrop for a few minutes. Above the resort come the last bare kilometres to the col, with the Géant statue of Octave Lapize and the memorial to Jacques Goddet waiting at the top. A worthy companion to the Luz-Saint-Sauveur print, and just as hard-earned.

This work is part of the Legendary Climbs collection: the most famous climbs in road cycling, from the Alps and the Pyrenees to the short, steep hills of Flanders and Limburg. Each climb is drawn from the real road, with the elevation profile coloured per kilometre and, along the bottom, the length, elevation gain, average and maximum gradient and the summit.

The road is drawn from OpenStreetMap data (© OpenStreetMap contributors) and the profile from Copernicus elevation data (EU-DEM). A great gift for any cyclist, to hang next to the bike or as a goal for next season.