Pedal in Armstrong's slipstream
Photo © Beth Schneider (courtesy Outside Online's exclusive 2004 Tour de France coverage)

Even if the man who owns this race—a certain L. Armstrong—decides not to sign up for the 2005 event, the Tour de France is one of the world's great sporting occasions. So imagine how cool it'd be to be there and pedal those atmospheric streets, mountain passes, and sunflower-flanked country roads only hours before the speeding peloton.

The well-regarded Backroads (510-527-1555, www.backroads.com), a Berkeley-based tour operator specializing in biking as well as hiking and other adventurous trips, is organizing seven separate trips to France (and Germany's Baden-Wurttemberg region, into which the race will dip during the early stages) to shadow the 2005 event. The Tour takes place July 2-24 over a brutal up, down, and full-steam-ahead 2,200-mile course, and Backroads promises that its riders can "cycle hand-picked sections of classic stages only hours ahead of the pros."

You can choose from itineraries that range from epic slogs—think the high passes of the Tour's grueling mountain stages in the Massif Central and classic L'Alpe d'Huez section—to bucolic rides through the atmospheric (and, yes, mostly flat) countryside of France's central Haut Pays du Velay. Whichever your preference, you should be willing to put in some serious legwork to reach your day's destination, be it a relaxing country auberge or a roadside perch from which to cheer on the jostling peloton.

Yes, prices are steep for your shot at simulated Tour de France glory—in the $3,000 to $4,000 range for weeklong, all-inclusive tours—but the experience and the exercise are unmatched. Just ask Lance.

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