From Paris to Beijing, a 12,000-km cycle tour to see the Olympic Games !

Two members of CERN’s cycling club have taken up an incredible challenge - that of travelling to the Chinese capital for the inauguration of the Olympic Games this summer by pedal power alone!

Peter Dreesen (on the left) and Raymond Cambarrat training in 2007, with the CERN Velo Club.

Peter Dreesen, an engineer in CERN’s AB-PO Group, and Raymond Cambarrat, a safety officer in TS-AS3, set off "on their own two wheels" from the esplanade of the Trocadéro in Paris, on 16 March.

Although approaching retirement, both these members of CERN’s Velo Club are well-trained athletes and have the ambition of completing the 12,000-km journey on their bikes from start to finish, crossing twelve countries on their way and arriving in Beijing five days before the start of the Games.

At the Moldova-Ukraine border, on 18 April.

It would all seem a rather hair-brained scheme if it were not for the meticulous preparation. As it happens, this remarkable event is being organised by the French cycle-touring federation, attracting a total of 118 riders (97 French) and involving over 3,000 clubs. "Despite the heavy medical and logistical support, it’s still a massive sporting challenge," admits CERN engineer and Velo Club President Henrik Nissen.

By the end of April, Peter and Raymond should have left the huge expanse of the Ukraine behind them and embarked upon the long trek across Russia. To date, they have already clocked up over 5,000 km. They are due to follow the river Volga down to Astrakhan before taking on the vast, open steppes of Kazakhstan and heading for the former-Soviet space centre of Baikonur.

With between 80 and 130 km to be covered per day, it’s no Sunday afternoon ride in the park. But Peter Dreesen and Raymond Cambarrat, both seasoned athletes, know this well. Peter, who has been President of the CERN Velo Club on several occasions, trains regularly at the Geneva velodrome during winter and is no stranger to this kind of outing; former rugby player Raymond has a number of years of cycle touring under his belt too. But during the trip, they’ll both need to be "Kings of the Mountains", with a number of mighty passes higher than 3,000 metres standing in their way.

In the famous city of Xi’an, renowned for its buried Terracotta Army, the two companions will be joined by a number of friends, including fellow Velo Club member Sylvia Knoepfel, and together they will complete the remaining 1,300 km. "What’s great about this trip is that the physical challenge isn’t all that counts," says Henrik Nissen. "The riders in the Paris-Beijing are also acting as social and cultural ambassadors, assisting for example in the development of educational projects for young people in the twelve countries they will be crossing." They will thus be using their great adventure to promote the values held dear by all aficionados of cycle touring, namely friendship, solidarity through sport and respect for nature as well as the values of the Olympic movement and cultural exchange between peoples.