In Defence Of: Running With Riders

Aside from their disastrous/cataclysmic failure to spot and remove a bollard from in front of a garage door on Stage 5, it’s hard to deny that, when it comes to road management, the organisers of La Vuelta did all they could to keep the riders from coming a cropper. On the steeper climbs especially, burly, boiler-suited young men kept crowds at bay, deterring any behaviour more energetic than polite applause as the riders grind past.

One effect of this was that the sight of “runners” - fans scampering alongside, behind or just ahead of riders - became a rare one, certainly more so than at either of this year’s other grand tours.

While many armchair/Twitter spectators and pundits, applauded the fans being kept in their place, not all did. The Cycling Podcast’s Richard Moore observed that the police were “slightly heavy-handed in dealing with spectators who encroached into riders racing line.”

I’d go even further. From the comfort of my living room, the Spanish Guardia Civil seemed, at times, to have more in common with American college campus police at a civil rights sit-in, than stewards of a simple sporting event. 

Of course, I understand where it came from. The French laissez-faire approach to crowd management came in for a lot of criticism in July, particularly on Ventoux and in the incident that saw Chris Froome lamp a Carlos Valderama lookalike waving a flag perilously close to the lead group’s front wheels.

But as high profile as they might be, in reality these occasions are so rare, and the risk of incident so small as to be negligible. In my experience, the supporters that decide to run, rather than being inconsiderate idiots, do so having put a good amount of thought into how to do so without interfering with the race. 

My single favourite memory of this year’s tour was watching a group of Irish chaps, wearing either Etixx jerseys or football kits, conducting a relay between themselves as Dan Martin went past on the second time trial. I spent a wonderful day in their company and while they had, indeed, partaken of a couple of Heineken while waiting for their hero, they had nonetheless planned the run with military precision. They watched as the other racers passed through our corner, carefully measuring how much room and time they would need so there would be not the slightest chance of getting in Martin’s way. They pulled it off to perfection, having bought themselves a few extra moments of entertainment and given me my favourite photo of the week (above). At no point was the rider in danger. Despite what many believe, this was not an act of narcissism, but one motivated by love for the sport and adoration for “yer man”.

One anecdote does not make a summer, of course, and this is not meant as a blanket defence of all who run. It is, however, intended to remind those who will unequivocally condemn that cycling fans are, on the whole, a good sort. Of course the racing must come first and be allowed to proceed without interruption but you're crazy if you think those on the roadside don't realise that too.

It can be easy to lose sight of how important the fans are to bike races but we are occasionally reminded when we see vacant roadsides, devoid of atmosphere or excitement. To crack down on fan behaviour risks deterring ordinary fans who, having spent who knows how many hours, travelled countless miles and spent god knows how much money, just want to have a bit of fun. They've waited for hours by the side of the road only for the race to pass by in a matter of seconds. Who would begrudge them a couple more?

Man to child

It’s no massive revelation becoming a father. It’s been happening since the beginning of mankind but its impact on individual’s lives is quite frankly, as we’re constantly being told, a life changing event. On one level it’s like having a permanent guest coming to stay. Everything that you once held sacred and which had a value greater than material wealth, has now been cast aside, downgraded, your life becomes an altered state, one that is occupied by a plus one. Your time is no longer your own and spare time just doesn’t exist.

During the early stages of parenthood very few can honestly say that cycling as an activity can truly exist in their lives. What once had its place in your routine will now be taken over by a new presence, a new demand on your time. But with this comes other non-cycle friendly factors - things that destroy your concentration, your eating patterns and ultimately the way you function on a daily basis.

By far the worst casualty with the most impact with the arrival of any newborn is lack of sleep. It doesn’t matter what age you are, although older parents will suffer worst, the effects of sleep deprivation will reduce anyone to a zombiefied half-life state: an existence in the shadow of your former self. Sleep becomes a thing of the past and you have to re-educate both mind, body (and life) to accommodate for it - or lack of it. You’ll learn to survive on three hours of undisturbed slumber instead of the recommended eight.

For the next few months the front room sofa becomes your bed - it’s the only way you’re going to reasonably function at work. The term ‘Baby Brain’ does exist and has a massive effect on all new parents. Your physical environment also gets violated. What was once unused floor space has now become home to playpen or an infant rocking chair. Where you once were able to leave kit out for an early morning ride, that space has now gone - it just doesn’t exist anymore.

When Ian Curtis wrote ‘When routine bites hard and ambitions are low’, the lyrics from Joy Division’s ‘Love will tear us apart’, he could have been describing the early days of parenthood. Any routine you have will disappear for several months until you establish a new baby-friendly one. Timescales will totally alter, you'll find yourself becoming nocturnal in order to fit everything into a day.

But what in effect is happening is the cycle of life. In the not-to-distant future you’re be teaching your son or daughter how to ride a bike in the same fashion your father handed that skill on to you. The rotation of life, generation on generation, this ritual is at the very core of what we do - how we get introduced to cycling. What you’ve temporarily lost will blossom again but this time round you won’t be alone, you’ll have your own flesh and blood cycling buddy. For Eddy think Axel, for Stephen think Nico, the list is endless but who will your son or daughter become? 

It’s the past looking back at you. You’ll experience for yourself the joy and pride your father felt when he handed on the gift of balance and movement called cycling. Now you’re in charge of that next generation of cyclists in your family but remember we’re all individuals, don’t force your passion and addiction on a youngster who’s growing up in a totally different world to the one you experienced as a child. Cycling may come later in life for them or not figure in it at all. Your mission is to plant the seed and then step back and see what happens next. You may be nurturing the next Froome, Cavendish, Wiggins, Armistead, Trott or Barnes.

What you may lose today will be repaid ten fold in the years to come so you should embrace and enjoy every aspect of it while you can.

TdF 2016: now the dust has settled

Image courtesy of @BrakeThrough Media and @TDWsport

Image courtesy of @BrakeThrough Media and @TDWsport

'All the world's a stage,' or so it seems every July as the Tour de France barges into our consciousness for 23 days. The race gathers together the finest teams and riders to do battle across the backdrop of France and its bordering countries. For these first three weeks in July the world is treated to all the drama, comedy and farce that professional cycling has to offer. Every stage can be considered as a scene, complete with its heroes and villains, as the plot twists and turns (like stage 15's descent of Grand Colombier) culminating in its own unique finale. 

The sheer scale of this Grand Tour never ceases to amaze us – the organisation required is epic. Year on year, issues like security become more demanding as political unrest fosters extremist violence. Crowd control (or the lack of it) gave this Tour one of its key moments when on stage 12 - the shortened Ventoux stage - a group of three chasing riders were brought down by the sudden braking of a camera bike having to avoid spectators in the road. What followed was farcical - Chris Froome, the yellow jersey holder, running sans bicycle up the road towards the finish line, desperately radioing for assistance and another bike. And who could forget the collapse, on stage 7, of the 1km inflatable banner that caused Adam Yates and (yet another) camera bike to crash?

Here come the men in black. The dominance of a single team remains bitter-sweet for us. For a while it's a mesmeric spectacle to watch, like a spider eating a fly, but ultimately it reduces the GC race to a battle for second position. As with so many other sporting super teams with big budgets it tends to dampen enjoyment and removes some of the unpredictability of the competition. At times it felt like we were back in 2002/3 watching US Postal suffocate the opposition in order for their team leader to win. Of course we acknowledge that this time round there are no drugs involved, just sheer hard work and natural ability, but that doesn't make the spectacle any better to watch.

One aspect of this year’s race that has remained with us is the fragility of cycling when pitted against the changeable nature of the elements. On stage 19 the overall standings were thrown in the air as wind and rain turned the race and the peloton on its head. To see two previous Tour winners taking each other out in a single crash highlights just how fragile cycling can be. The elements and the terrain give any bike race a delicious uncertainty, levelling out the racing and introducing a certain randomness that we all love. It reflects the human condition and exposes each racer’s depths of determination.

We relate directly to the suffering involved in pro cycling. When we witness two riders out in front on a 100+ km break battling not only a head wind but the chasing peloton we know, at least in part, how this must feel. Chapeau to the sufferers.

TdF 2016: the Simpson verdict

Best team: Movistar

Best rider: Adam Yates/Jarlinson Pantano/Romain Bardet

Best kit: Cannondale Drapac

Best stage win: Mark Cavendish x 4

Best breakaway rider: Ion Izagirre of Movistar stage 20

Best crowd chant: Bardet, Bardet, Bardet

Worst kit: Bora-Argon 18

Worst weather: Hailstones on stage 9

Worst haircut: Peter Sagan

Worst wheel/bike exchange:  Etixx-Quick Step/Marcel Kittel on stage 21

Luckiest rider: Nairo Quintana

The art of crashing

Of the many abiding memories of this year’s Giro d’Italia, none will likely linger longer than that of Steven Kruijswijk careering into a bank of packed snow just a few turns down the Colle dell’Agnello. Heartbreaking arse over proverbial tit.

Fortunately the pink jersey came away from it with nothing worse - nor better - than a fractured rib, was able to start the next day and ended up finishing a creditable fourth overall. Nonetheless it was, in all probability, the moment he lost the race. Whether he would have lost it later that day or at some point on the next anyway I’m not inclined to speculate. If you want an analysis of the racing there are a better places for you to turn: the neighbours’ cat, for example.

Still, while I might not call myself an expert on the sport of cycling, one thing about which I am increasingly becoming an authority is crashing.

Partly because I’ve watched a lot of them. While many decry the replays and would prefer the broadcasters didn’t show them at all, I must confess - to borrow a phrase from the Cycling Podcast’s Ciro Scognamiglio - to putting them on repeat.

Don’t get me wrong, I don’t enjoy them. While sadism-slash-voyeurism perhaps, subconsciously, comes into it, consciously the fascination has more to do with the desire to analyse - to detect - precisely what happened and why. A crash, like a sprint finish, is a moment of drama in a bike race where so much happens in such a short a time that a true understanding can only be reached through slow-motion study.

In Kruijswijk’s case it took me as many at least fifteen replays to spot the split-second when it all goes wrong: a wobble of the rear wheel your only clue to his inability to decide how to deliver himself through the bend. Once you see that you can imagine that he neither had enough confidence in his brakes or braking ability to permit him to take it tightly, nor in his tyres or bike handling to carry the extra speed, turn more aggressively and go wider. Either option, had he taken it, might have led him to crash anyway, but the failure to take any at all meant a powdery wipeout was all but inevitable.

Of course it’s much simpler to get to the bottom of an accident with no other party involved than even the middle of one which takes place within a fast, furious fleet of racing cyclists. A bunch crash is, if you’ll forgive the over-the-top analogy (but cycling not-so-secretly likes those, doesn’t it?), like a nuclear explosion: if you’re on top of it there’s no hope at all but, depending on the magnitude, even someone on its periphery can end up being impacted by the shockwave. Take the one which occurred on stage three of last year’s Tour de France which ended up taking out about thirty-five riders including the yellow jersey-wearing Fabian Cancellara. The carnage continues for about seven seconds with means that, given they’re travelling at approximately 55kph, the last rider to fall could have been as far as 107 metres back when the chain reaction of calamity began. Try untangling that on a single viewing at normal speed.

Harder still is when you’re actually involved in the incident and don’t have the benefit of front, rear and overhead television angles. The closest thing to actual evidence is any damage to your bike and the location and nature of any injuries. How many riders are caught up in it versus how many escape will give you an idea of where (on the road and in the bunch) it happened. Beyond that you’re reliant on an unreliable memory severely tainted by the certainty that it could not possibly have been your fault.

Although I’ve never been at the centre of such a crash, or responsible for a detonation, on more than one occasion I’ve found myself peripherally impacted. One memorable close call came in a category four criterium at the Lee Valley road circuit last summer. Hot days seem to bring out the mad dogs and I spotted this guy as early as the neutralised first lap. Riding right in the middle, he was twitching all over the place, taking about twelve different lines through every corner, completely oblivious of all around. I was very conscious of him, though, and committed to keeping as much lateral distance as possible between us while trying to push up the pack ahead of him.

I didn’t make it far enough up, though. Out of the corner of my eye I glimpse a flash of wheel being clipped, which is when, as the saying goes, all hell breaks loose. Visually and audibly it’s chaos, as riders go down left and right, ahead and behind. Metal scrapes carbon hits tarmac. I feel myself shunted from the right rear, a domino effect three or four long, but manage to stay upright. The next thing I’m aware of is the taste of adrenalin, as some semblance of survival instinct kicks in and almost immediately all I’m concerned with is not losing touch with the bunch. On the road concern for your fellow rider is paramount but in a race, even one as insignificant as this, with the riders ahead speeding away I don’t even look around. Feeling no resistance in the pedal it quickly becomes apparent that the light t-boning I received was enough to take my chain off and while I get it back on again fairly swiftly, it’s not enough. By the time I’m up to speed the pack of thirty-ish is half a lap - six hundred metres or so - ahead, and while I’m able to keep them there, on my own I’m unable to claw my way back. On the way back round I pass the four or five riders worst affected by the crash limping away from the scene, shooting daggers at the one I think - I know - caused it.

At least, I think that’s what happened.

Slaying The Dragon

In issue 10 we look at sportive rides, focusing on two in particular: the small and family-run Puncheur in Sussex and the really rather large and corporately managed Dragon Ride in Wales.

We’ve ridden the Puncheur before so it seemed only fair to balance things out by tackling the Dragon Ride last weekend. It’s one thing to speak to a ride organiser but you can’t get a true flavour of an event without actually taking part. Well, that was our excuse anyway.

Having interviewed ride organiser Rob Hillman, we knew the Dragon was a complicated logistical operation that costs £200,000 and requires year-round effort to stage successfully. So we expected a slick, well-organised event with ample food, good signage and excellent mechanical and medical support. We were confident that the event team would manage to send all 5,000 riders in the right direction without too much delay and that the route would be challenging but picturesque.

We weren’t disappointed on any of those fronts. But these are all practical details. What they don’t tell you is how beautiful the Rhondda Valley looks on a sunny Sunday morning as you make your way north from the start at Margam Country Park near Port Talbot, how uplifting it feels to crest the first climb of the day at Bwlch and then soar down the other side with hundreds of other grinning riders. They don’t tell you about the little flutter you feel in your stomach as you start the Devil’s Elbow, a tough climb made all the more tough by the fact that you can see riders winding up the hill high over your head as you approach the first hairpin. They don’t prepare you for the breath-taking views from the top of the hill near Trecastle, nor for the kindness and encouragement expressed by pretty much everyone whose paths you cross – from motorists held up by the ride to horse riders to the little kids handing out plastic cups of water in Neath, just when you start to think the ride – and the climbing – will never end.

The Gran Fondo route is 230km long and involves 3,600 metres of climbing and if that’s not tough enough for you (and it was more than tough enough for us) there’s the Dragon Devil route that takes the distance past the 300km mark and the climbing up to 4,800 metres. It’s an epic ride, whichever route you choose, but it’s this successful marriage of hard, efficient management work and the much less manageable, less definable delights of the region that make it something really special. We will be back.