{"id":46,"date":"2016-06-17T08:44:26","date_gmt":"2016-06-17T08:44:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/tour-de-france\/wide\/?p=46"},"modified":"2017-02-14T14:47:58","modified_gmt":"2017-02-14T14:47:58","slug":"personal-experience-like-win-trip-see-tour-de-france","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/2016\/06\/17\/personal-experience-like-win-trip-see-tour-de-france\/","title":{"rendered":"Personal Experience: What It\u2019s Like to Win a Trip to See the Tour de France"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>\u201cYou\u2019ve just won a place in the \u0160koda Hospitality Programme on the Tour de France.\u201d Infinite time is not long enough to let the information fully sink in because you can never imagine the storm of awesomeness that is about to follow after you found this simple sentence in your mailbox. As the Chief Editor of We Love Cycling, I spent three days on the Tour de France with our winners last year, and in the following lines you\u2019ll find multiple reasons to enter our contest for the chance to be a part of something extraordinary.<\/strong><!--more--><\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-81\" src=\"http:\/\/skoda-tdf.s3.amazonaws.com\/2\/2016\/06\/341_TDF_150717_KLM_3836.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1000\" height=\"500\" \/><\/p>\n<p>For a change of pace, I\u2019m going to start at the end. Right after I dropped off the last of the winners, I got the following message on my phone:\u00a0\u201cThank you for unforgettable memories. I still didn\u2019t wholly process the experience, but you made my dream come true\u201d. Which pretty much sums up the feelings of the rest of the group, as they reassured me repeatedly. I personally spent several hours talking my significant other to death after returning home, until I was gently silenced.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone wp-image-74 size-full\" src=\"http:\/\/skoda-tdf.s3.amazonaws.com\/2\/2016\/06\/043_TDF_150717_KLN_6110.jpg\" width=\"1000\" height=\"518\" \/><\/p>\n<p>But the main credit for this has to go to the people behind the \u0160koda Hospitality Programme, who went above and beyond to make everyone in the group feel like they were kings of Le Tour for the day.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-84\" src=\"http:\/\/skoda-tdf.s3.amazonaws.com\/2\/2016\/06\/302_TDF_150717_KLM_3652.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1000\" height=\"581\" \/><\/p>\n<p>I could use a thousand words just to describe the convivial atmosphere and excitement at the welcome dinner. But things really got going the next morning when everyone pulled on the cycling clothes \u0160koda provided for us for our 1-hour ride with cycling legend\u00a0Stephen Roche. And when I say legend I mean THE LEGEND! As you probably know, he is one of two riders\u00a0in history who won Le Tour, Giro and World Championships in one year (Triple Crown of Cycling).<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-79\" src=\"http:\/\/skoda-tdf.s3.amazonaws.com\/2\/2016\/06\/152_TDF_150717_OLA_4668.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1000\" height=\"490\" \/><\/p>\n<p>After the ride it was time to leave for a Village D\u00e9part in the \u0160koda Superbs assigned to us for the day. The cars even had our names printed on them to make us feel like true VIPs. On top of that, every one of our drivers was somehow connected to professional cycling, so our drivers included the likes of former British pro road race champion (and really funny guy) Tim Harris and John Robertson, who gave Chris Froome his first professional contract.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-77\" src=\"http:\/\/skoda-tdf.s3.amazonaws.com\/2\/2016\/06\/IMG_0243.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1000\" height=\"750\" \/><\/p>\n<p>By this point the group was really starting to feel the pre-race atmosphere as we walked through the \u201cpit lane.\u201d It was the first time everyone could finally get close up to the bikes and team cars. Before the starting gun, however, we were on our way to the true highlight of the day. The HELICOPTER FLYOVER!<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-83\" src=\"http:\/\/skoda-tdf.s3.amazonaws.com\/2\/2016\/06\/241_TDF_150717_KLN_6652.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1000\" height=\"471\" \/><\/p>\n<p>As soon as the peloton passed, we lifted off and soared over the countryside. We made one pass, then another pass above the peloton, swooping past the riders. From the expressions on the faces of our winners, it was obvious that this was something truly special for every one of us. (By the way, how do you know you\u2019re definitely in France? When the female helicopter pilot wears open-toed shoes to make her nail polish peep out.)<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-78\" src=\"http:\/\/skoda-tdf.s3.amazonaws.com\/2\/2016\/06\/286_TDF_150717_KLN_6759.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1000\" height=\"515\" \/><\/p>\n<p>After the flyover, our faithful cars and drivers took us to a prepared road-side barbeque before making our way along the rest of the course to the Club Tour de France right next to the 100-metre mark. By the time we got there, our arms were sunburned and tired from waving at the cheering crowds lining the road. But it was worth it to see the thrilling finish of the stage.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-86\" src=\"http:\/\/skoda-tdf.s3.amazonaws.com\/2\/2016\/06\/315_TDF_150717_KLN_6829.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1000\" height=\"511\" \/><\/p>\n<p>What else is there to say? Everyone had the time of their lives, met their heroes, experienced unbounded hospitality from the whole team, and enjoyed local cuisine in two luxury hotels. This year we are running a contest to win 5 spots in this awesome programme, so what are you waiting for? Enter it now!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>\u201cYou\u2019ve just won a place in the \u0160koda Hospitality Programme on the Tour de France.\u201d Infinite time is not long [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":27,"featured_media":146476,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[329],"tags":[845,846,433,844],"global-categories":[],"class_list":["post-46","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-road-cycling","tag-tdf","tag-tdf-2016","tag-tour-de-france","tag-tour-de-france-2016"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v25.3 (Yoast SEO v25.9) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Personal Experience: What It\u2019s Like to Win a Trip to See the Tour de France - \u0160koda We Love Cycling<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"\u201cYou\u2019ve just won a place in the \u0160koda Hospitality Programme on the Tour de France.\u201d Infinite time is not long enough to let the information fully sink in\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/2016\/06\/17\/personal-experience-like-win-trip-see-tour-de-france\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Personal Experience: What It\u2019s Like to Win a Trip to See the Tour de France\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"\u201cYou\u2019ve just won a place in the \u0160koda Hospitality Programme on the Tour de France.\u201d Infinite time is not long enough to let the information fully sink in\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/2016\/06\/17\/personal-experience-like-win-trip-see-tour-de-france\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"\u0160koda We Love Cycling\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2016-06-17T08:44:26+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2017-02-14T14:47:58+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/d2p6e6u75xmxt8.cloudfront.net\/2\/2016\/06\/TDF1.webp\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"900\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"600\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/webp\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"jakubstepanek\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"jakubstepanek\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"3 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/2016\/06\/17\/personal-experience-like-win-trip-see-tour-de-france\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.welovecycling.com\/wide\/2016\/06\/17\/personal-experience-like-win-trip-see-tour-de-france\/\",\"name\":\"Personal Experience: What It\u2019s Like to Win a Trip to See the Tour de France - 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