My buddy and i are wanting to do the P/R sportive next year. Looking at best/cheapest options for this as some of the packages are quite expensive. we are able to drive to france so just need entry and accommodation etc – any advice form the STW group brain would be good
cheers

i did it 2015.

I stayed as close to the start as possible (Cambrai).

Friday: I dropped my stuff at the hotel. Drove to Roubaix and parked near the velodrome and took the train back to Cambrai.

Saturday: rode to the start. in the dark, without lights, partially on cobbles/ through fields. If you’re riding to the start plan your route better than i did! feed stations are very sugary/ sweet. you may want to take some food with you.

Sunday: Spectated at Arenburg. They had food/ beer and big screens at one end of the forest. Was a brilliant party atmosphere.

I was supposed to be with the GF and we would have been tempted to chase the race, as it was just me i went to Arenburg and stayed there. I reckon chasing wouldn’t have been worth the hassle.

As an aside from that.

biggest tyres you can. saw plenty of people on cross bikes/ 32mm slicks i reckon this is the best option. Don’t worry about tops/ drops only; 50% of the pros were on the hoods when i saw them. Work on your grip strength and core strength. this is easily as important as bike strength. start NOW.

I have done the Velo Roubaix one a few times. We do the car shuffle thing (the old U2/bridge question from microsoft) to get the cars in the right places. Campenile in Compagne and there is a really nice hotel (4*) in Roubaix central (i think its the Mecure) which we got a deal on. cant remember the name off hand but it is right round the corner from the main square.

One time we drove from Roubaix after the ride to Kortrijk (about 30 mins away) and stayed in the IBIS in the centre. we did that becuase: Roubaix is horrible and all the restaurants are shut on Sunday evening (not so for Kortrijk). Wise to book something wherever you are though.

In the IBIS you can take your bikes to the room Or they sort out some storage.

WRT the ride (i always say this): Dont wear a watch.

training one year i trained for it by doing ALL my rides for about 6 months using 8minute intervals with 6 minutes off. this is basically paris roubaix. but P-R is more bumpy. I faired pretty well that year. I got a puncture just before Hem. i rode the veledrome on the rim. beat all my mates by over 30 minutes.

Can’t help with the logistics as I went with a big group from Belgium…
But I thoroughly recommend the cycling museum in Roeselare. I have heard good things about the one in Oudenaarde too.

If the dates are out, its probably almost too late to book to stay in Roubaix – we’ve stayed variously at the Roubaix Campanile – pretty good, Hem Campanile – avoid at all costs – seriously, and the Mercure Lille Roubaix on Avenue Jean-Baptiste Lebas – very nice, but quite expensive. This year we stayed in Hem – they decided not to open the restaurant even though it was completely full. We stayed at the Hôtel Les Tourelles in Le Crotoy on the Sunday night which was fantastic.
Over the years we’ve gradually gone bigger in tyres – from 28, to 32, to 35, then this year to 38.
We won’t be riding it next year as we’ve decided to ride Tro Bro Leon instead.

Sadly, you can no longer rider the full 270km VC Roubaix event – the ‘official’ ASO event is the ‘shandy drinkers’ version 😉

Used to simply drive over on the Saturday, steak, frites and beer along the way. Park at the velodrome and kip for a few hours. Jump on bus at 2am – start at 5:00am in the dark and ride back to the velodrome – awesome day out! Drive back on Sunday evening. First time I rode it there were less than a 1,000 riders.

Big tyres, 25mm+ at lower pressures, double-wrap handlebar tape and decent shorts and mitts. Strong bottle cages and make sure everything screwed-down firmly. Practice riding long draggy hills in the big ring whilst seated at maximum effort.

DeRonde museum in Oudenaarde is good, but it’s nowhere near Roubaix! You can take in a few WW1 battlefields on the way there.

thanks for this, food for thought….

We booked a beautiful central apartment through Airbnb late in the year. Perhaps we were lucky but seemed as if nobody else had thought of that. We definitely had a better time than our mates in a chain hotel off the motorway…
Tip 2 – afterwards we had lots of beer and meat at Le Fer a Cheval.

We stayed in some terrible cheap hotel in Roubaix, drove to start, then got train back early next morning.

As others have said, double wrap bar tape (Specialized phat tape was really good), decent 28c tyres (i used Vittoria Pave tyres) and strong wheels with decent spoke count, plus make sure everything is attached well to bike, i found these bottle cages were ace:

https://www.tredz.co.uk/.Elite-Pria-Pave-Bottle-Cage_58153.htm?sku=165503&utm_source=google&utm_medium=cpc&utm_campaign=google_shopping&gclid=EAIaIQobChMIgoT1qqC21QIVDRHTCh2QzATiEAQYASABEgJHzfD_BwE

Plus if you use things like a saddle bag, make sure it is really solid.

The first few sections of cobbles are littered with bidons and saddle bags.

Enjoy, it is a unique experience where towards the end you’ll worry you’ve lost all the fillings from your teeth and that your vertebra will never be aligned again!

Plus if you use things like a saddle bag, make sure it is really solid.

ziptie it on

Which of the three routes would be doing? I rode across to Roubaix from Dunkirk and had a cheapish hotel for three days in 2015, I did the middle route – 140 odd km but your first taste of the cobbles is Arenberg!
There was about 4,000 riders across all three routes (against 15,000 for Flanders…).
Work on your wrist strength, and don’t get too close to the rider in front. I think on Carrefour the chap in front of me touched wheels with the rider in front of him and both came down hard. People will move about at will to find the smoother bits without a shoulder check.

Did the short which rides out from roubaix and picks up the course at the arenberg so do 99% of the famous bits. It’s still about 80miles. Fit biggest tyres you can and do double tape. You will need to alternate hoods drops tops IME to give your hands a rest. If I were to do it again I’d stay somewhere nice in Belgium and drive over for the day. That part of France really is shit. You can get in the velodrome for free at the race and there’s a big tv to watch.

Roubaix is a grim, industrial suburb and best avoided – Lille is better. Lots of nicer towns over the Belgian border like Ypres, Poperinge or Kortrijk

Roubaix is a grim, industrial suburb and best avoided –

Ok there is a fantastic art gallery in Roubaix which has great touring exhibitions and also a really great changing collection including the most interesting pattern books of fabrics dating back to the 1860s – it really is worth a visit. We go every time we go to Roubaix.
There is also an interesting fashion scene in Roubaix, small emergent clothing such as Rock is Passion – who are great people.

going for the bad boy 170km route. Airbnb’s looking cheapest / nicest options. Driving over with mate as he has friends who lives outside calais that will put us up whenever.

An alternative idea….

As the P-R Sportive is logistically tricky, meaning car shuttling, or a long drive, or getting up at ‘stupid-o-clock’ for the bus, or staying in a dump like Roubaix itself, my top tip is:

The best parts of Paris-Roubaix are the cobbled sectors from the Arenberg onwards. Therefore, I have ridden it twice, staying in Valenciennes, which is a nice town with good restaurants, cafes etc.. ridden from there into Roubaix following the race route and taking in all the very best cobbled sectors, then heading back out from Roubaix to Valenciennes in a round trip along some really nice, quiet country roads through Cysoing, Mouchin, Aix, etc..

OK, it’s not the *actual* race route itself, but neither is the Sportive, and logistically it’s one heck of a lot easier and just as much fun.

We didn’t find the logistics much of an issue. Got up early for the bus, bikes loaded without a problem, had a snooze on the bus, offloaded in a light drizzle. Standard conditions.
I would add that the fastest riders were the huge Dutch blokes on 29ers – was tough holding their wheels on the cobbles (and on the road to be honest) but they made great windbreaks.