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

Into the heart of darkness

“My undercarriage is ruined, my hands are numb and I can’t remember my own name.” So says one of the riders in the London-Edinburgh-London ultra-Audax from 2013 in a new film about the ride due for release on 1 June.

Why would anyone want to cycle 1400km in five days? It’s a very odd thing to do. The pain, exhaustion and jeopardy these riders put themselves through is pretty extreme. It’s the kind of ride that any cyclist would love to be able to say they’d done but very few would actually want to go through it.

Every cycling breed is represented in this excellent documentary, from Strava segment bashers on their carbon race bikes to innocent newbies who have no idea what they’ve taken on, and wizened old ultra-distance riders with steely eyed determination and trusty tourers.

Every rider has their own reason for attempting this ridiculous distance. Some are raising money for charities close to their heart. Some are negotiating mid-life crises. One was simply celebrating the fact that he was still alive following a quadruple bypass operation.

Together they go off rather too quickly in high spirits under sunny skies. And together they cycle into the heart of darkness, losing their sense of time and place and even self as they push deeper and deeper into their reserves to beat the broom wagon.

They pedal relentlessly on through breath-taking scenery and dreary cityscapes, trying to snatch minutes of sleep before they slip into unconsciousness in the saddle through sheer exhaustion.

It’s a great watch – and made all the more fun because the 2017 event is already fully booked up so there’s no danger of being sucked into the madness, however inspired you might be by it (and you will be inspired, trust us on that one).

You can see a trailer for the London Edinburgh London official documentary here https://vimeo.com/ondemand/londonedinburghlondon/137386687. The kind folk at MadeGood.films, who produced the documentary, have offered Simpson readers a 10% discount code. All you have to do is enter the code 'lelpresale' at checkout, or follow this link https://vimeo.com/r/1HL2/x/QXBFY1ljM3 before 1 June.

Chalk lines and village halls

It was all very British. Sat in a village hall car park at an hour when most folk were still in bed sleeping off the excesses of a good Saturday night, two bikes wrapped in blankets on the folded seats behind us as we watched other competitors arrive. Outside the hall stood two men, one with a clipboard the other measuring the distance of a complete crank rotation between two chalked lines. Any bike travelling more than 18 feet 8 1/4 inches was instantly disqualified. We had entered the world of medium geared time trialling. It felt like a mysterious closed society - the stuff of secret handshakes and whispered conversations.

This is the underbelly of British club cycling - an honest down-to-earth, grass roots event that sits a million light years from the glamour of televised Grand Tours. The fundamental principles might have been the same but the execution was very different.

Having passed the measurement requirement we signed on. Now we had passed the point of no return. We were committed. Our countdown with destiny (and the stopwatch) had begun.

However well you prepare, there's always those unknown factors, those niggly little things that float around in your head before the off. We lined up in a narrow lane leading to a farmer's field, everyone in sequence with the numbers pinned to our backs. No digital LED countdown, no start ramp just a line chalked on the road and man with a clipboard and stopwatch. A 25 mile TT had seemed a good idea at the time of entering. It didn't anymore. Having refused the starter's push in favour of a self-propelled start, the race of truth had begun.

You soon reach top speed on a single speed bike; the secret, as in any time trial, is maintaining it. It took eight painful miles to regulate breathing, settle down and find a rhythm. As soon as the halfway roundabout came into view we knew we were homeward bound. This elation was immediately soured by a sequence of repeated mechanical failures - on three separate occasions the chain jumped the rear sprocket. Without a team car in sight (dream on punter!) it was time to get our hands dirty. The ignoble sight of a cyclist, bike upturned by the side of the road wrestling a jammed chain signified us kissing goodbye to any semblance of a decent finishing time.

Needless to say we completed the event way down the field but we weren't last and our appetite to give it another go is keen. We have unfinished business.

Do You Remember The First Time?

I don’t remember the first time I ever rode a bicycle, sadly, but I do remember the first time I ever rode a bicycle in London. My trusty teenage steed had been heartbreakingly stolen from outside a pub in Brighton, where I was at university, but fortunately my mum’s contents insurance had come through with a replacement.

My destination was Angel, to meet a girl. The exact date escapes me but it must have been around this time of year because it was the middle of term, and she was struggling with a seasonal cold. In what remains, probably, the most romantic gesture I have ever made I carried with me a sachet of Lemsip, intending to present her with a steaming, medicinal mug of it when she arrived.  

But this isn’t about her - although maybe it is a bit - so back to biking.

In the age of GPS we take that little flashing dot for granted, but this was a simpler time so stowed in my back pocket, alongside the Lemsip, was an A to Z. Until that day I had only ever needed a few of its pages, covering five or six square miles at most, always pretty central, around tourist traps and taverns. Yet barely a few pedal revolutions into my journey I recall revelling in how much more of the map I was marking, as the unfathomably expansive urban landscape shrank to nothing beneath my wheels.

My mind’s eye can still make out the facades of stations as I zipped by: in the leafy west Warwick Avenue, Maida Vale and St John’s Wood, all disappearing into my dust no sooner than they were stumbled upon. A miniature Leslie Green architectural tour was next as I sailed by the oxblood red facades of Chalk Farm, parks Belsize and Tufnell, then Archway before turning south along Holloway Road. I surely took the wrong exit off Highbury Corner at least once before finishing with a triumphant dash down Upper Street.

Although it didn’t work out with the girl, boy did me and cycling make a good couple. In less than an hour I had seen more of London than in twenty years and, no longer confined by bus routes, tube maps and timetables, my sense of this city was completely transformed. I could go where I wanted, when I wanted, for nothing.

In the decade since I have built up my own mental map of London, filling in gaps one trip at a time. As such, although I don’t think I know this city better than anyone else but I do know it better than I otherwise would. I have crossed the river a thousand joyful times over every bridge from Putney to the Tower. I have broken a wrist, a leg, suffered cuts and scrapes, and survived more near misses than I can count. I have texted my mum approximately 376 times to reassure her that I’ve made it home in one piece.

The point, of this unforgivably London-centric ramble, is that with construction seemingly everywhere forcing road users big and small into an ever narrower space - plus y’know Winter - many a by-bike commuter seems to be of the view that this is as hard as it’s ever been. Even the most “half full” of you might feel like London is, at best, going through an “always darkest before the dawn” period. Tough it out, you tell yourself, keep calm and... some old bollocks.

And to a certain extent I agree: It's not always easy, at times it’s downright grim. But it's always, ALWAYS, better than the alternative. Battling through the cold and rain is always better than facing the soot, sweat and invisible horrors carried by other people on the tube. The odd hop on the pavement or swerve for safety is always better than staring down from the top deck of the bus at an endless traffic jam, knowing the best you can do is email into work to say you'll be late. Getting into furious swearing matches with cab drivers who don’t feel obliged to acknowledge that yes, you do in fact have a right to physical mass, is better than being forcing your way onto a train that was designed for a tenth of the people on it.

Every time I feel like giving up on this city I think back to the first day I rode a bike here. As a child I had only ever seen them as playthings, but that was the day I awoke to their potential to liberate and empower, to allow a country boy like me not just to live here, but to truly feel alive.

The Italian Job

We were lucky enough to visit Italy last week, researching an article for the next issue of the magazine. We won't spoil the surprise by telling you exactly where we went or who we met but we will tell you that we were in the north east of the country, in Veneto, a region that's about as steeped in cycling history and culture as it's possible to be. 

Between epic mealtimes, during which we made serious inroads into the Italian calzone mountain, we met sprightly septuagenarians and energetic 20-somethings; we visited small family businesses and huge conglomerates; we watched all sorts of manufacturing processes and wandered around awe-inspiring cycling museums; we discussed the past, present and future of the cycling industry. But one thing remained constant: everyone we met shared such a deep passion for all things cycling that we couldn't help but be inspired and energised. 

Our love for what we do rarely wavers but it doesn't hurt every once in a while to give ourselves a fresh little espresso shot of enthusiasm. Grazie Italia e arrivederci a presto!