Alex grew up in the French Alps and spent his youth exploring the mountains with his father. Climbing his local cols, Alex would imagine he was in the Tour, soaring into the thinning air off the front of the peloton. He honed his climbing skills on mountains around France and developed an encyclopedic knowledge of his country’s alpine passes.

“The thing I enjoy the most about discovering climbs on the bike is that you are just alone in your thoughts and you can hear your breath and enjoy the nature,” Alex says. “You don’t go too fast like you do in a car, so you can enjoy every moment, even though it is hard. You really connect with nature and the landscape around you. Even though you suffer, it is worth it, because you deserve that view on top.”

We asked Alex to tell us about his favorite climbs in France. He included some of the Tour’s most iconic cols and some hidden Alpine tracks.

This summer, before Alex races up some of his favorite climbs at full speed at Tour de France, a band of EF Adventurers will climb them ahead of the peloton. Join them next summer on an EF Adventures Tour de France or Tour de France Femmes cycling trip.

What makes Ventoux a special climb is the landscape. The first part is all in the forest and then you go out and there's nothing. You can just see the top, and it looks like it is right there, but there are still, like, 10 kilometers to go. You have an amazing view on top. It is often super windy, so sometimes you can’t even climb it. The whole way up is super hard. It is super steep at the start and there is never any break. Watching the Tour, it is always a special stage when Mont Ventoux is in the finale. It is a mythical climb in the history of the Tour de France. It is a really steady, hard climb, one of the hardest climbs I have ever done.

The Col de la Loze is special, because it is very steep and unsteady. You have crazy, crazy steep parts, more than 20 percent, and then it's flat again, and then there are another 200 meters at more than 20 percent. That is what makes it super hard. You can't really choose a pace and keep it for the whole climb. It is just brutal. I have done both sides a few times and every time you need to push 300 watts just to go up, but it is also super nice, because at the top there is a very beautiful view. It’s over 2300 meters and you can really enjoy it when you are up there.

The best moment is when you arrive on top and you can enjoy the view and the descent. Racing up it at the Tour is going to be brutal. With the Col du Glandon and Col de la Madeleine already in the legs, it is going to be hard just to get up there.

I first discovered this climb when Romain Bardet took his first win at the Tour de France in 2015. It is a mythical climb. It is quite short, but it's also spectacular. You can see how beautiful it is when they film with the helicopter from above. When you are there, it almost feels flat, because it's so twisty. It is not so fun when you race up it in a bunch, because you always have to brake, then sprint again and brake and then sprint again to stay in position, but if you are alone, it's really nice. It is not actually very steep, so you can ride it fast.

The Col de la Madeleine was my favorite climb when I was a kid. It is near to where I live and is a mythical climb from the Tour de France. Now, it’s the one I like least to race up, because every time I have done it in a race, I’ve completely blown up. It is so hard every time and super long from both sides. It is one of the longest climbs you can do. It's about 26 kilometers with a smaller downhill in the middle, so you can't really trust the average gradients. It is about 6.5 percent total, but the first part is actually about 9 percent and then you have the downhill and the last three kilometers are also 9 percent to 10 percent. So, it is a really hard climb. The other side is steady, 19 or 20 kilometers at 7 percent. It is super hard, because there are not so many trees to get a bit of shadow on the climb, and in the summer it's cooking. I always enjoyed watching the race go up it when I was a kid, watching from the side of the road and seeing the riders pass super fast.

The Col du Chaussy is a very nice one. It's not very famous, but it is very nice up there. It is a small road. You feel closer to nature compared to the Col de la Madeleine, which is right next to it and is a ski resort in the winter, so you have more buildings and everything. Chaussy is wilder. When you go up there with your bike, there are rarely any cars on the road. It’s really quiet. I love riding easy up the climb with my father and just enjoying nature.

The Col de l’Arpettaz is not very famous, but it's one of my favorite climbs. We will pass by the bottom of it on stage 19 of this year’s Tour. From Ugine, it's a super small road. There's also a gravel road that joins l’Arpettaz to the Col des Aravis. There is a small refuge on top. You can have a Coke there and enjoy the view. It is super, super calm up there. I knew when I did it the first time with my father I wanted to come back again the day after. It is so quiet and calm.

This one is not a col. It is road up to a ski resort, a super nice place to ski in the winter. I used to ski Valmorel a lot when I was a kid. It is quite nice, because you can climb from two or three roads to go up there and it's a nice steady climb. It is maybe 13 kilometers and not too steep with nice views on top.

I really like the Izoard. It is spectacular. Once you are on top, you feel like you are on the moon. There are no trees. It is only rocks. It is really amazing there. The first time I did it was when I was a kid with my father. That was a great memory. I loved discovering new climbs with him. They don’t do the Izoard too often in the Tour de France, but I think they should include it in the route more. It is a mythical climb.

The Col Agnel is an amazing climb, which is not so well known and very underestimated. It is really high, over 2,700 meters, and if you had to describe it with one word, it is just nature. There's nothing up there, just wild animals and no cars. The landscape is amazing. I really like this one.

I’ve actually only visited Montmartre in Paris in tourist mode. We just did a weekend there and took a few pictures, but I have never ridden it on my bike. So I'm really looking forward to climbing it, especially in the Tour. Seeing the images from the Olympics, it was crazy up there with the public and the awesome atmosphere. I am glad that they added it to the Paris circuit to add a little bit of spice to the last stage. I hope that it won’t be too stressful, but for me, as a climber, it is always in my interest to add a hill. It is not in the interest of the sprinters, but I am going to enjoy it.

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