La Mongie

The Lonely French Church

May 4, 2011 by Justin Balog 14 Comments

French Church HDR

This was the first image I made during a trip to France last year. Possibly one of my favorites. We were rushing to meet up with our group, but that didn’t stop us from making a couple images along the way. When you pass a scene like this, it’s impossible to pass it up. Always better to stop, then crash your car ‘gocking’. This little church sat on the hillside of small French town at the base of the Pyrenees. Behind those clouds is one of the great climbs of the Tour de France, the Col du Tourmalet.

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Tip: There is actually a small parking lot in front of this church, and at the time, there were a couple tourists parked there. I can’t blame them. However, the small Fiat kind of ruined the image for me. To solve this problem, I got down real low on the hillside below the church, and shot up at it.

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Filed Under: France, Gitzo Traveler, HDR, La Mongie, My Favorites, News, Nikon 80-200 D 2.8, Nikon D700, Tips, Travel

When I dream, I often dream in Pyrenean

March 27, 2011 by Justin Balog 2 Comments

I hope everyone had a great weekend. I sure did! I had a couple nice long inspirational bike rides through the foothills of Colorado. I do my best thinking out on the bike. I call it endorphin induced creativity. I have been doing a lot of that lately. I get on the bike, load my favorite playlist, hit the first hard effort and just let the emotions, dreams, and ideas wash over me. Once they are all in order, I hope to share them with you. They are just too fragile and ephemeral right now to share.

Here in today’s photo, we are watching the moon as it rises over the Pyrenees in a little town called La Mongie. In the winter it is a renowned French ski town. In the summer it occasionally hosts stages of the Tour de France. Lance Armstrong won an decisive stage here in 2002. The town also boasts the incredible observatory, Pic du Midi. As much as it pains me to say it, due to poor weather conditions, I missed the opportunity to visit the summit. I find comfort in the fact that I will return again someday. It is such a beautiful place to ride your bike, I have to return. My favorite road in the world, D26, traverses the base of these mountains. More about that on a later date. You will find some footage of La Mongie in my most recent movie ‘Chasing The Tour’.

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Filed Under: France, HDR, La Mongie, Nik Software, Nikon 50mm 1.4 AFS, Nikon D700, Processing Notes, Travel

The Greatest Stadium

February 2, 2011 by Justin Balog 0 Comments

The world of cycling has been under some serious scrutiny lately so I decided to post this image as a way of promoting the brighter side of the sport. I promise to not get on my soap box and go into the details of all the allegations, I just want to show you what the Tour de France means to a small town in the French Pyrenees. About 10 minutes before I shot this photo, there were hundreds of thousands people (no kidding) lining the road that leads to the summit of the Col du Tourmalet. Friends and families from around the world joined together to cheer on their favorite cyclists. Even it was for only a couple seconds. After the peloton had passed, everyone gathered to watch the remaining hours of the race on the big screen in the center of town. Say what you will about cycling, but I don’t know many other sports where the political and religious differences of thousands of people around the world are dissolved on the side of a remote mountain. Yes, it is the greatest sporting event on earth that also takes place in the greatest stadium.

Filed Under: France, La Mongie, Tour De France, Travel

Atom Heart Mother

January 26, 2011 by Justin Balog 2 Comments

What good is a blog if you can’t have some fun? I shot this image while riding my bike down the back side of the Col de Tourmalet. It was a long hot ride, I drank about 19 bottles of water over the course of a 5 hour ride. As I descended I caught a glimpse of this lone bull grazing on the hillside. Delirious from heat exhaustion because of ‘The Fat Old Sun’, I asked myself if I was riding through a Pink Floyd album cover. Kind of, the Atom Heart Mother album cover is slightly different but not too far off, so I decided to try my hand and capturing the same vibe in post processing. Question to the Pink Floyd fans other there, did I get close?

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Filed Under: Album Covers, Canon G11, France, La Mongie, Processing Notes, Travel

A New Season Begins

January 17, 2011 by Justin Balog 1 Comment

If you are a regular visitor here, you know I am a big cycling fan. I grew up as a bike racer, raced for a collegiate team, and now try my hand at the occasional 50-100 mile mountain bike race. It is a great sport and something you can do your entire life. I don’t see many quarterbacks in their 70s taking snaps and going deep to their receivers. But I do see quite a few cyclists out training together then trying to hammer (cycling word for kicking butt) each other on the weekends. Cycling is a lifestyle that will last a lifetime. Yeah, I guess there’s golf…but that ain’t the same as dropping your buddy like a bad habit on the local climb. Enough of me trying to convince the non-cyclist to go buy a bike. This week the Pro Tour kicks off with the Tour Down Under and I thought it would be a great time to sneak in a photo I shot at the 2010 Tour de France of Andreas Kloden getting it done up the La Mongie side of the Tourmalet.

You can follow me here on Twiiter if you want to catch the occasional iPhone photo from a training ride like this one.

Photographer’s Note: I made this image using my trusty Nikon 80-200 AF D. Sure, it has been replaced by several new and improved Nikon models, but I still love my 80-200. Why? It is a sharp, contrasty, quick focusing piece of glass that is lighter, smaller, and a helluva lot cheaper than the current model.

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Filed Under: Cycling, France, La Mongie, Nikon 80-200 D 2.8, Nikon D700, Processing Notes, Tour De France, Travel