steelbikeguy

I've been sharing the Cycling Plus magazine series of articles called Design Classics.
I've finished that series, and since those articles seemed to be enjoyed by some folks, I thought I'd share another series of articles with a C&V theme.

This is a series of short articles written by Roger St. Pierre for Cycling Plus magazine. Each article looks back at aspects of cycling culture and history. A lot of it predates my experience with cycling, which I found to be interesting. I'm hoping that others will too.

The first of this series is Bashing the Clock, which is a look at Britain's time trial races back in the day.







Steve in Peoria

darkmoon

Thanks, Steve.

Anquetil, yep, time trial specialst, winning Tour de France five times with devastating speed in the time trials.
This thread reminds me of Pierre Chany.

He wrote articles, Le Pelton de Cyclisme, for Japan's New Cycling, 1977 to 1978, 15 articles.

French bike journalist's articles, we could read in Japanese!
And they are original for Japan's cycling fans!
Not L'equipe articles taranslation!
We were surprised, excited, and very happy.

This is the first page about Gran Prix des Nations and Anquetil, Aug 1978.

steelbikeguy

In 1975, I only knew about the Tour de France from an article in Bicycling magazine..



The magazines dedicated to racing probably provided much more detail, but this was still interesting. Some years later, the big sports shows on TV might provide a half hour of update on the last week of the TdF. Now, to be able to watch hours of coverage every day is quite a luxury by comparison!
Too bad we'll never be able to go back and watch video of Merckx climbing mountains and all of the small battles along the way.

Steve in Peoria

darkmoon

1975, it was a surprising year.

I started cycling that year, but didn't know there were surprises.
I would know them some years later.

Tour de France

While Eddy Merckx was climbing Puy de Dome with other cyclists, he was punched on the stomach by one of thousands spectators.
It was a real hard blow, devastating blow.
We might say his decline started by it.
When I saw this pic, 1983 I think, I was surprised indeed.

the fabulous world of cycling by Aldo Tonnoir and Eddy Merckx



Giro d'Italia

I didn't know a word "summit finish".
When I bought Kennedy Brothers booklet Giro 1975, which I don't have now,
I was surprised again.
A pic showed how hard Grand Tour was.
One glance was enough.
The last stage finish was the summit of Passo dell Stelvio.
Ordinary Gran Tours' last stage is just a lap of honor.
But Giro 1975, the cyclists, and hard-core fans too, had to climb the mighty pass!
And it was covered with snow.

Years later, I bought La Veridique Histoire des Geants de la Route, by Jean Durry.
I found the same pic.

Graham Watson would take the same pic.

Yep, this is the real summit finish.

steelbikeguy

Those are some great photos!
The shot of Eddy is not the typical bike race photo, but certainly shows the pain and the unusual situation. Boy.. not even Lance motivated a bystander to punch him! (maybe some of his team mates were thinking of punching him, though)

The scenic shots of the race impress me, partly because I try to get nice shots of bike rides and such, and know how difficult it can be to predict where the view will be impressive, or the light will be good. A lot of experience and planning goes into it.

Owen Mulholland was one of the writers producing great articles in Bicycling magazine here at that time, and he did great work. His article (in the Oct 1975 issue of Bicycling) on the 1975 TdF does mention Eddy getting punched, and includes a photo (but not as dramatic as the one you showed)....



Mr. Mulholland also covered the Vuelta d'Espana. The fact that he had to explain that the Tour of Spain was not a bicycle tour does show how unfamiliar the readers are with European bike racing. It was a good article, and Mr. Mulholland did a good job of creating a story of the race.



Steve in Peoria

darkmoon

Another guy likes AldoTonnoir's pic.

Pierre Chany's cycling history book, La Fabuleuse Histoire du Tour de France.

steelbikeguy

Beat The Clock
The riders who have managed to set a new Hour Record include the greats such as Merckx, Coppi, Anquetil, and Indurain, as well as names less familiar. More than a few have experimented with new tech or ideas to set a new record.







Steve in Peoria

darkmoon

Hi Steve!

Do you know this?

steelbikeguy

The Race Across America is well known and has been going for a number of decades.
Some of the early riders, such as John Howard, were well known national racers, while others, such as Lon Haldeman, were people that had taken part in "ultramarathons", or just very long rides.
It's very hard on the body, as Michael Shermer demonstrated, but it's also mentally difficult. This is partly due to the small amount of sleep the riders get, and there are many stories about riders hallucinating due to the lack of sleep.

There was an interview with Lon Haldeman in Rivendell Reader #17 that covered some of his experience with ultramarathon riding and RAAM....









There are quite a few more pages taken up by the interview.

Steve in Peoria

RCMoeur 

Great to see these articles.

I remember at the start of the 1981 Arizona Challenge a rider gave me a very useful tip on improving my riding form (back then I was a 17-year-old who'd just done his first century 8 months prior). Turns out it was John Marino who gave me that tip, and it's served me well in the ensuing 4 decades.

The 1982 Arizona Challenge had stiff headwinds through the middle third, and Lon Haldeman went on record saying it was to that point the hardest one-day ride he'd ever done. I was hours behind Lon, but I clearly recall having to pedal hard down a 7% grade into that wind wasn't at all fun.

I've gotten to meet Elaine Mariolle since those days, and she was very helpful at the 2007 LAB Rally / El Tour de Tucson. Nice person.

I ran into Tom Baker (the winner of every Arizona Challenge, IIRC) at the GABA Tucson bike swap a week ago, and we spent a while reminiscing of the days of mega-miles and sleep deprivation, and recalling old mutual friends (some of which are no longer with us). My times and speeds were never even close to Tom's, but the shared experiences are indeed unforgettable.

John E

Thank you for the RAAM article about Pete Penseyres, who, at age 79, remains very active in the local north San Diego County bicycling scene.

bikingshearer 

Roger St. Pierre and Owen Mullholland in one thread, and Hilary Stone in another related thread. Awfully hard to beat. That interview with Lon Haldeman is also very cool.

I learned a lot from Owen Mulholand's pieces over many years, Informative, well-informed, straightforward, with a style utterly lacking in pretension or flowery hyperbole. (Henri Desgrange and Jacques Goddet would have hated him.) Reading his articles, I always felt as though he was sharing info he found interesting and thought I would, too. I never felt like he was lecturing me or that he was condescending to the great unwashed. Sadly, he is no longer with us.

52telecaster

Love the Lon haldeman interview. He was selling a paramount tandem at a swap meet in Wisconsin I almost bought. Would have been cool to just have something he owned.

steelbikeguy

is there some sort of "hat trick" achieved by posting an article by Sheldon Brown too? I should give credit to John Allen too, since he has been maintaining Sheldon's web site since his death.
Let's see!

Steve in Peoria

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darkmoon

How many times should, or will, I say Bike Forums surprise me?, ha,ha,ha, ha,ha.

Far away form the States, Pete Penseyres is another historical person, like Laura Ingalls Wilder and Jimmy Dean.
Penseyres is a person in a cycling history book, for me.
He is still active in cycling San Diego County... I just can't believe it.

Well, I'm very happy to hear Penseyres is still fine and active in cycling scene.

Thanks for info, John E!

52telecaster

I've read this before but lots of good info here.

RCMoeur 

Back when Bicycling had really useful articles. Even 40+ years later, there's a lot of information that's still applicable, although one could quibble on details.

I still have copies of Frank Berto's 1981 Bicycling article on gearing with the logarithmic charts that introduced me to the idea of half-step and really low climbing gears. Although in those pre Aero Tour days there were few options in cranks that would accommodate such gears, it was still great info and drove me to buy my first sets of TA and Stronglight cranks (all long-gone).

I only knew these authors as names in Important Publications until the 1990s, when I got to meet and work with Mr. Allen on LAW/LAB issues. Since then, I've had the privilege of becoming friends with him, recruiting him for national traffic standards development and working on many other issues. And through John and others I was able to meet Sheldon, Frank Berto, and other invaluable pioneers and contributors to cycling knowledge.

Thanks for posting these!

Added:

And those Bicycling ads bring back so many memories. Putting a big bright Belt Beacon (a local product!) on the back of my touring bike, ordering from Campmor and waiting for weeks as the mail went east and the boxes went west, wanting some of those hard-to-pronounce and harder-to-afford foreign frames and components - those were the days. Although I do really like my Hyperglide or Accushift freewheels.

darkmoon

I've read over 500 paperbacks of America.
Favorite authors are Stephen King, Richard North Patterson, Michael Crichton, Robin Cook, etc.
And Frederick Forsyth, oh, he's a Brit, hahaha.
I knew Hemingway liked cycling, he was hooked when he stayed in Paris 1920's.
He didn't write a cycling novel, because cycling terms were French, he wrote.

I didn't find description of cycling except 2 novels.
A matte of honor and The Dark Tower V Wolves of the Calla.

A matter of honor Jeffrey Archer

Once he had cleared the outskirts of the French capital, he was confident that he could average seventy kilometers an hour the rest of the way.
but what he hadn't anticipated was running into a hundred or more cyclists, garbed in their various stripes of reds, greens, blues, blacks, and golds, bobbing along ahead of him.

...unfortunately Archer's description of cycling is not good...



The Dark Tower V Wolves of the Calla Stephen King

Eddie spoke up in his head, Eddie with his wise-ass Brooklyn accent in full flower.
Yeah, and if fish had bicycles, every ******g river'd be the Tour de France.

When I read it, I was surprised.
King is a typical American, who like rock'n'roll and baseball.
A typical American, King, knows Tour de France?, no way!
The book's copyright year is 2003.
Hmmm, Armstrong days, I see.

52telecaster

The campmor ads tug at my heart.

steelbikeguy

Belt Beacon?
For some reason, I still have mine.
The circuit always intrigued me, and a few years back, I reverse engineered it (not hard) and made a little low power LED version... just for the heck of it.



the Belt Beacon circuit:


and a modern-ish version.
for scale, the LED is 5mm in diameter.
I power it with two AAA alkaline batteries.


Steve in Peoria
(anyone need a lightly used Belt Beacon?)

steelbikeguy

good heavens... I don't think I've read 500 paperbacks!
Not sure who I've read the most of, but I have been going back through some Asimov books again, especially the robot series. Still love "I Robot".

heck, we already have an invasive species of carp that are knocking people out of their boats here on the Illinois River.
Giving them bikes would only make things worse... especially if they figured out how to pedal and got onto the roads!

Steve in Peoria

RCMoeur 

As I recall, it's adapted from a 1970s-era Type A traffic control barricade flashing lamp circuit.

I was thinking about this the other day when I salvaged an original US-made VistaLite VL-300 rear light from an old bicycle. The VL-300 was revolutionary in its time (early 1990s) in terms of brightness vs. power consumption. And even though now there are LED lights that are so bright that you feel the photons pushing you along, the ol' VL-300 (or a Belt Beacon too) is still reasonably adequate for nighttime rear conspicuity under most conditions.

A couple years ago, I also salvaged a Belt Beacon in very god condition, and it waits patiently for a 9 volt battery and its next assignment.

RCMoeur 

I'm catching up on recent e-mail messages, and I just read that Elaine Mariolle was recently appointed as the manager of active transportation for Arizona DOT (my old employer). That should keep her busy.

steelbikeguy

Behind the Teams
So who provides the funds to keep the small teams running? Even the bigger riders have had to worry about team sponsorship. Roger St. Pierre looks at a couple of cases of these folks with the deep pockets and the hopes of a team win.







Steve in Peoria

merziac