Subscribe options

Select your newsletters:

Please enter your email address:

@

Your email address will only be used for the purpose of sending you the ITER Organization publication(s) that you have requested. ITER Organization will not transfer your email address or other personal data to any other party or use it for commercial purposes.

If you change your mind, you can easily unsubscribe by clicking the unsubscribe option at the bottom of an email you've received from ITER Organization.

For more information, see our Privacy policy.

News & Media

Latest ITER Newsline

  • Test facility | How do electronics react to magnetic fields?

    A tokamak is basically a magnetic cage designed to confine, shape and control the super-hot plasmas that make fusion reactions possible. Inside the ITER Tokamak [...]

    Read more

  • ITER Robots | No two alike

    More than 500 students took part in the latest ITER Robots challenge. Working from the same instructions and technical specifications, they had worked in teams [...]

    Read more

  • Data archiving | Operating in quasi real time

    To accommodate the first real-time system integrated with the ITER control system, new components of the data archiving system have been deployed. Data archivi [...]

    Read more

  • Repairs | Setting the stage for a critical task

    Like in a game of musical chairs—albeit in slow motion and at a massive scale—components in the Assembly Hall are being transferred from one location to another [...]

    Read more

  • Image of the week | There is life on Planet ITER

    Dated April 2023, this new image of the ITER "planet" places the construction site squarely in the middle. One kilometre long, 400 metres wide, the IT [...]

    Read more

Of Interest

See archived entries

Ascending the "Beast"

Mont Ventoux, the ''windy mountain,'' towers over the plain of Vaucluse halfway between the Rhône and Durance rivers valleys. The climb to the summit (alt. 2,000 m) is one the toughest and most gruelling in professional cycling. (Click to view larger version...)
Mont Ventoux, the ''windy mountain,'' towers over the plain of Vaucluse halfway between the Rhône and Durance rivers valleys. The climb to the summit (alt. 2,000 m) is one the toughest and most gruelling in professional cycling.
On maps and in geography books its name is the Mont Ventoux—the "Windy Mountain" of Provence—that towers over the plain of Vaucluse halfway between the Rhône and Durance rivers valleys. However to many people, and especially to Tour de France racers, it is known as the "Beast of Provence."

The climb to the summit at an altitude of nearly 2,000 metres is one the toughest and most gruelling in professional cycling. The 21-kilometre road that leads from the village of Bédoin to the finish line has an average gradient of 7.5 percent, with peaks above 10 percent—meaning that for every kilometre covered, the rise in altitude can be as high as 100 metres.

The Tour de France has ascended the Beast 14 times since 1951. Everyone here, bicycle aficionado or not, remembers the tragic date of 13 July 1967 when British champion Tom Simpson collapsed and died during the climb at age 29.

The mountain, which appears perpetually snow-capped even in the hottest days of summer (bare, white limestone creates the illusion) acts as a magnet for cyclists around the world.

The impressive ITER climbers (from left to right): Hyun-Sik Chang, Russell Eaton, Benoît Giraud, Edward Daly, Joo-Shik Bak and René Raffray. (Click to view larger version...)
The impressive ITER climbers (from left to right): Hyun-Sik Chang, Russell Eaton, Benoît Giraud, Edward Daly, Joo-Shik Bak and René Raffray.
Ascending the Mount Ventoux is a ritual of passage: no one can pretend to be a real cyclist who hasn't suffered through the torments of the climb, preferably in July when temperatures can reach 35 °C.

The first cycling champion to challenge the mountain was a Frenchman named Jacques Gabriel: in July 1908, by way of the Bédoin route, it took him 2 hours and 29 minutes to reach the summit. The present record (55 minutes and 51 seconds ... with a much lighter bicycle) was established in 2004 by Spanish cyclist Iban Mayo Diez.

On Sunday 2 June, after a couple of months of training, six ITER staff members (Hyun-Sik Chang, Russell Eaton, Benoît Giraud, Edward Daly, Joo-Shik Bak and René Raffray) decided they were ready for the trial. Starting from the village of Sault, which makes for a longer 26-kilometre climb but one that is relatively easier, they reached the summit in 2 hours and 45 minutes.

One century ago, they would have been hailed as champions; in 2013, they can be considered impressive climbers ...


return to the latest published articles