Paris-Roubaix Challenge, live.

The pavé, the day before the professionals

Six thousand amateurs ride the cobbles of Paris-Roubaix on the Saturday, and finish on the same velodrome banking.

The Paris-Roubaix Challenge puts ordinary riders on the most brutal road surface in cycling twenty-four hours before the professionals get there. Three distances — 170, 145 and 70 kilometres — take in the numbered pavé sectors of northern France: the Trouée d’Arenberg through the forest, Mons-en-Pévèle, the Carrefour de l’Arbre, and the run into Roubaix. All three finish on the concrete banking of the Vélodrome André-Pétrieux, on the same line the winner will cross the next day.

Cobbles break bikes and separate groups, and a rider can go from a bunch to alone in the space of a single sector. Livebib puts the whole route on the map with the rider on it, the sectors in order, distance covered and an arrival estimate for the velodrome that keeps updating — one link for whoever is waiting in the stands with a spare wheel and a coffee.