A day at the races at the Circuit Paul Richard at Le Castellet, between Marseille and Toulon. Pascal and I went for the final hours of the 2021 Bol d’Or, the 24-hour endurance motorcycle race.
The sound of screaming engines first hits you in the checks at the gates - passe sanitaire required as well as ticket - and then becomes the soundtrack to the day, with the sunshine and the breeze of the Mistral.
The bike of each team rides the whole race, it’s the riders who switch, mostly they are teams of four riders. The racing continues through the night so the bikes have headlights although this was also a nearly full moon.

More photos: Bol d’Or 2021

Barjols

Earlyish start from Marseille to ride through vineyards of the Coteaux Varois-en-Provence, through to Aups, then high above the Lac de Sainte Croix and on to the South Rim Road of the Grand Canyon of the Verdon.
The South Rim Road is the more sportsbiker of the rim roads and it’s possible to get past the traffic reasonably. As well as the Red Mist opportunities on the access roads, there are the tunnels, the classic views down to the rivers far below, the bridge that sometimes gets used for bungee jumping. And plenty of hard straight runs down towards a rock face and a hairpin turn or a catastrophic overshoot into oblivion. Maybe it would be good to still fear those. I’m reminded this instinct is also triggered by the famous Aragón Wall at the Ciudad del Motor de Aragón, visited by MotoGP last weekend.

More phone: Grand Canyon du Verdon - South Rim Road

Riding around the Alpilles, the little limestone ridge hills that border the Camargue, the delta of the River Rhône. Pines, olives and the midday heat of Provence. Landscapes here have inspired Vincent van Gogh, Paul Cézanne and others.
Just as you have to get your eye in to ride a sportsbike to its potential, you have to get your eye in to see the all the colours in the rocks and vegetations here, as those artists did. My photos are usually intended to be clean and sharp but that style underplays these particular landscapes so I have used some distortions and filters to highlight how I see and feel about these scenes I’ve seen today; these are my views, I’m not intending to mimic anyone else’s style
And great to be riding somewhere that Barcelona is signposted! Why not ride on?

Read more: Les Alpilles

First ride on my RR for more than a year. It had to be the Col de l’Espigoulier (723 m.), my favourite ride local to Marseille with quite enough challenges over its 14 km ascent of over 600 metres of altitude from the Provençal village of Gémenos. All the gear of course - AGATT safety principles - even for a short session to practise skills.
Riding my CBR600RR after so long wasn’t quite like riding a new bike, but after a few rides on my Ninja Z250 in Keswick that’s great for little Lakeland lanes, my RR just rides fantastic. So tight on the curves, stable on the braking and very much point and shoot in terms of forward power; the red line on the RR is up at an almost unimaginable 15000 revs. And it’s easy to adore the physicality of Honda’s engineering on the RR, it is so elegant and efficient and sounds so sweet.
My RR being “in jail” in my garage here and not running for over a year did cost a new battery, the rejuvenation programme on my charger couldn’t bring the old battery back. The new battery charged up slowly overnight and was ready with another colourful Marseille dawn - crimson before the sunrise then blinding orange.
Noticeable also that, despite plenty of mildly obsessive time in the gym in the meantime, actually riding a sportsbike on challenging roads is still a noticeable physical effort.

More photos: Jailbreak ride RR