| Description |
Encyclopedie Cotacol is one of the best books on biking and cycling of the last decades. It has been published in 1990 by Les Presses de l'Avenir in Arlon. The authors are two cyclists from the Namur region in Belgium: Daniel Gobert and Jean-Pierre Legros. The book describes in great detail the 1000 main paved road climbs in Belgium. This is a French language cycling book.
Every description of a paved road climb contains the following information:
•name
•cotacol-points : indication of overall difficulty of the climb
•location on Michelin-map
•average time it takes to climb the hill for a cycling tourist and for a professional cyclist
•graphical profile of the climb for every 100 m (!)
•altitude (in m) of foot and top
•difference in altitude between foot and top
•steepness rate (gradient) for every 100 m
•location and rate for the steepest decameter
•total lenght (in m) of the climb
•avarage steepness rate (gradient) for the whole climb
•condition of the road
•description of the route to reach the foot
•short description of the climb
•some anecdotes and/or additional information
In its detail, its richness of information and its scientific approach there exists no comparable publication in other countries. However, nobody is perfect. For 900 of 1000 climbs there is no discussion on the selection of the climbs. For the last 100 climbs selection is always subjective.
31 x 22 cms, hardback, 620 pages.
1990
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