Hot, hot, hot... for an entire week Germany melted under seriously summery temperatures although it was still a week to go before the season officially started. En route to Austria, I found myself staying with my friends in Lenggries, south of Munich, in the beautiful region of Upper Bavaria. The area is much more notable for winter sports than for cycling but having persuaded my friend Uwe of the joys of riding a racing bike and loaned him my Basso for as long as he likes, we had clearly no choice but to go for a ride together even if it was 34C under very sunny skies.
The plan was to ride to Jachenau and then proceed to the Walchensee before turning back, perhaps a ride of 50 kms. We rolled out onto the main road and began the 18 km stretch to Jaschau. Beautiful clouds, no traffic to speak of and superb scenery. And as we gently rolled along (the combined ages of our two steel bikes is 65 years, to say nothing of us) we were rapidly overtaken by a gorgeous blonde woman who hammered past us on a high-end carbon bike. She had a fantastic tan and superb muscles, making me wonder again why more women don't ride to get fit. I caught up to her fairly easily but stayed back as we had begun to climb and I did not want to hear my heavy breathing and get the wrong idea!
Passing through some little clusters of picturesque houses, we stopped momentarily at a bus shelter for a drink and noticed that there was going to be a butter-making demonstration the next day at a local farmhouse and Uwe thought he would take his older daughter there (the younger one is just three weeks old!).
"Make butter they way they used to..."
We reached Jachenau 19 kms into our ride. There was a fancy hotel with lots of customers in the beer garden and the volunteer fire department across the street had a painting of St. Florian, the patron saint of firefighters, and I was to see this image many times in Bavaria and Austria. Apparently there is a prayer that runs something like: "Oh, St. Florian, send the fire to burn down my neighbour's house and not mine. Amen." Apparently.
St. Florian with his water bucket
We rode past a charming onion-domed village church and soon found ourselves on a pleasant descent that brought us to down to the shore of the Walchensee. We had considered turning right to track the eastern shore but the path deteriorated immediately into dirt so we decided to continue onwards. This turned out to be wise as we had an excellent road to enjoy. Soon we came to the beach at the south end of the lake and stopped to enjoy the beautiful views. The lake, one of the largest and deepest (maximum depth 193 m) in the German Alps, is a popular destination for visitors.
Our route along the western shore brought us past a little cabin where a gentleman was collecting tolls. Bicycles were free but the road itself was private. It was also excellent and we enjoying spinning along in the sunshine on the smooth asphalt.
We left the toll street at Einsiedel, where some of the reserves of the Reichsbank were hidden and eventually handed over to the occupying Americans (minus 100 gold bars and a lot of foreign currency!) and now rolled northwards up the first of our big climbs for the day as we came over a ridge and then quickly zoomed downhill into the village of Walchensee proper. Time for an Eiskaffee!
We started to realize that this trip was going to take us somewhat longer than we had planned as heading back east over the mountains would require some brutal climbing, even if we had suitable roads. The decision was made to continue north and around Bad Tölz before backtracking to Lenggries. So having fortified ourselves with refreshment, we continued along the lakeshore until we reached Urfeld.
Here we reached the biggest climb of the trip and it brought us to around 845 m ASL before we plunging down a twisty road, hairpin turn after turn, dropping 250 m in only 6 kms until we found ourselves riding along the Kochelsee, a much smaller lake. We passed a museum that had once been the summer home of famed Blue Rider artist Franz Marc and leaving the village of Kochelsee found ourselves on a long boring straight road and straight into a nasty headwind.
Uwe vs. Headwind
This brought us to Benediktbeuren, where a famous abbey is located. Established in 739 AD, the abbey is noted for being the location of the discovery of the manuscript of Carmina Burana in 1803, subsequently set to music by composer Carl Orff in 1935/36.
We soon found ourselves in the nearby village of Bichl but were confronted with some very heavy traffic on the main B472 road. I convinced Uwe there had to be a bikepath nearby and, sure enough, the Germans did not let me down. We headed east now, towards Bad Tölz and some little climbs and descents. We reached the spa town at Km 71 and then on the final stretch to Lenggries turned south and attacked for the big sprint finish. Uwe was starting to suffer from hunger knock but I still had enough to chase down two riders on time trial bikes but could not keep up anymore on the climbs.
Uwe's massive victory sprint
Tired but happy we pulled into the driveway at Uwe's place, having covered 79 kms in just over 3.5 hours of actual riding (minus standing on the beach and Eiskaffee time). The surprise was that we had put in nearly 1000 m of climbing on our old bikes.
The next day was my birthday so that evening we celebrated in proper fashion with beer and pizza. It had been an excellent adventure and I told Uwe how lucky he was to live in area like this where you could do these kind of rides just out of your front door. He enjoyed himself and learned something about cycling longer stretches as well!
Germany has not been considered a great cycling nation on par with France, or Belgium or Italy. Sure, a German, the quite sturdy Josef Fischer, won the first Paris-Roubaix race in 1896, and more than a few Tour de France stages (and one overall) have been won by Germans but probably the country’s greatest two-wheeled tradition is on the track and Berlin continues to host the oldest Six Day Races in the world, which began in 1906. There were large-scale manufacturers of bicycles (Opel comes to mind) but as Germany industrialized and produced the first electric trains and (arguably) the first practical automobiles, attention turned elsewhere and the individual victories recorded by German cyclists were not the stuff of legends. Even now, the German Sports Hall of Fame only includes two cyclists.
Gustav-Adolf “Täve” Schur at speed
The division of Germany post-1945 meant that those behind the Iron Curtain would end up with races and heroes and stories quite different from those in the West. A colleague in Berlin sent me an article about a museum near the capital that covered some aspects of this and on a recent weekend I persuaded relatives to take me to the Radsport-Museum Wünsdorf.
Around 30 kms south of Berlin’s shortly-to-be-inaugurated international airport in the state of Brandenburg is the small and sleepy town of Zossen, which was consolidated from a number of villages in 2003. It was not always so sleepy as Zossen, and particularly the area that is Wünsdorf, was once the command centre for the Wehrmacht, with massive bunkers and its most modern telephone communications system. After World War II’s end the town housed up to 70,000 Soviet troops, who departed in 1994, leaving a bit of a shambles behind. Subsequently efforts have been made to renovate the old military buildings and many have been turned into very attractive housing developments.
The museum is on the top floor
With the departure of the troops and nothing much in the way of industry or agriculture, Zossen-Wünsdorf looked to new ways to survive. It offers tours of sections of the huge old bunkers, along with a great number of used books. It is categorized as a “Bücherstadt,” or “Book City,” such as the much more famous Hay-on-Wye in England, but it also refers to itself as a “Bunkerstadt.” There is what appears to be an unsuccessful restaurant seeking new management and a small art gallery and village centre, along with some souvenirs. Above the art gallery there is a sign made from an old bicycle fork and we figured this was where the bike museum should be.
Billboard outside the museum
The bike racing museum is above the gallery
We had called first to make sure that the museum would be open on this ice-cold Friday and the man answering the telephone had seemed astonished that we wanted to visit. He confirmed that it was in fact open and also helpfully warned us about a police speed trap on the outskirts of town. He told us to come into the bookstore to get our tickets. We found the store without much effort, passing a big sign on the road advertising the Wünsdorf Radmuseum, and met our interlocutor. He still seemed nonplussed that we were there to see the museum but he sold us our 3 Euro tickets. I bought some postcards but we had to invent a price as he had no clue. But he happily enough took us back outside to the museum and unlocked the door for us, telling us we could also tour the art gallery if we wanted. He also mentioned that the museum, which is on the top floor of a long building, was not heated and in summer had no air-conditioning. He reflected with amusement on the seasonal sufferings of visitors and then left us to ourselves.
Walking up the stairs, we went by a mid-1930s Derny track pacing bicycle and then past a very nice green Wanderer racing bicycle that was used by Bruno Roth to win the German pro road championships in 1935. The bike was displayed with his jersey and a nice photo, showing him in a natty eagle-and-swastika (!) outfit.
Bruno Roth's Wanderer
Moving into the museum proper, there was a nod to bicyle pre-history, with a copy of Baron von Drais’ “Laufmaschine” and an impressively crude high-wheeler. Then there is a stand with two Diamant road bikes from 1924 and 1940. Diamant (“Diamond”), founded in 1885, has produced bicycles since 1895 near Chemnitz, Saxony, and after various changes in ownership (including that of Opel from1928-1930) and conflicts the firm ended up as the predominant manufacturer of bicycles in the DDR. While in the 1950s its products were considered state-of-the-art, it gradually stagnated and by the end of the Soviet era it had been combined with another bicycle company, Texima, under the control of a knitting machine collective. The company was privatized and since 2003 has been part of the Trek group and continues to build non-racing bicycles in Chemnitz in what is probably Germany’s oldest existing bicycle factory.
Diamant Road Bikes (1924, rear and 1940, front)
The organization of the Wünsdorf collection is not completely clear but seems divided into discrete theme areas. The first part really seemed to cover East German (DDR) international success and there is a big emphasis on the exploits of Gustav-Adolf “Täve” Schur, nine times DDR Athlete of the Year and, as part of the single German national Olympic teams of the era, winner of a bronze and a silver medal in 1956 in Melbourne and 1960 in Rome in team events. Six times national DDR champion, he was World Amateur Champion on the road in 1958 and 1959. His green Diamant road bike is on display with supporting documentation. “Täve” was the DDR’s most popular athlete and became a member of the Communist legislature after his retirement from racing and after the reunification of Germany in 1990 continued to serve as a parliamentarian in the Bundestag, still representing the East German Communist successor-party. He is now 80 and apparently supports, in addition to the Wünsdorf museum, another museum dedicated to the famous Peace Race in Sachsen-Anhalt. He is not without controversy in German sports circles as he has consistently denied institutionalized doping by DDR atheletes, contrary to statements by other East German atheletes.
Schur's Diamant
Close-Up of Schur's Diamant
The Peace Race, known as the Course de la Paix or, to the German, the Internationale Friedensfahrt, was the Soviet Bloc’s answer to the Tour de France and clearly the most important race in Mitteleuropa. Beginning in 1948 on a route from Warsaw to Prague, it included East Germany in its itinerary in 1952. One of the highlights that year and in subsequent editions was the inclusion of a brutal little climb in Meerane, a small town in Saxony. The “Steiler Wand” (“Steep Wall”), as it came to be known, is 342 m in length and averages an 11 per cent gradient.
The race (won by the above-noted Täve Schur in 1955 and 1955) was an event for “amateurs” which continued in that form until 1989 and the collapse of the Soviet Bloc. Its subsequent history was a gradual decline as East Germany, Russian and other cyclists migrated to Western professional teams and competed in the Tour and other big name races and the final edition, after an uninterrupted 57 year run, was in 2005.
Peace Race Display
Wreath for the winner of the 1960 Peace Race: note the DDR "Hammer-and-Compass" insignia
Many winners of the Peace Tour went on to impressive careers: 5-time winner Steffen Wesemann, for example, was a force in the Spring Classics won the Tour of Flanders in 2004 and Jens Voigt won in 1994. The race is marked with a display case of medals and clippings at the museum as well as the pristine blue Colnago Master ridden in 1983 to an unexpected victory by Falk Boden. The race was also a proving ground for younger riders. Winners of the junior edition of the Peace Race include Fabian Cancellara, Denis Menchov, Roman Kreuziger and Peter Velits. I cannot resist adding that a British team, made up of semi-pros and real amateurs, won the Peace Race in 1952, with Scotsman Ian Steel taking the overall, undoubtedly to the shock and astonishment of the other “amateurs.”
A section of the museum is dedicated to the four man team that won the silver medal at the 1960 Olympics in the Four Man Pursuit event on the track. Althought the Italians were supreme in cycling at the games that year, the East Germans (competing as part of the combined East-West team) won silver on the track and on the road (Täve Schur leading his four man time trial team); as well, a West German, Dieter Gieseler, won silver in the 1 km track event. In addition to the various Olympic certificates, jerseys and photos, the museum also has an impressive silver trophy awared to the pursuit team when the riders set a world record of 4:32.8 at the Vigorelli Velodrome on October 26, 1959.
1959 Trophy for World Record in Team Pursuit
Positioned next to Falk Boden’s Colnago is an evil-looking all-carbon FES time trial bike which was ridden by Jan Schur (son of the inevitable Täve) to a gold medal in the 100 km team time trial at the Seoul Olympics in 1988, bringing the family haul of medals to a complete set of gold, silver and bronze. FES, which is an abbreviation of the less-snappy Institut für Forschung und Entwicklung von Sportgeräten, was established in 1962 in Berlin by the East Germans as a research and development institute dedicated to sports equipment. It continues to operate today financed by the Federal Republic. It began working on bicycle technology in the 1970s and in 1984 produced its first carbon disc wheel. FES is involved in a wide range of sports projects, including speed skating and kayaking.
1983 Colnago Master (left) and 1988 FES Time Trial Bicycle (right)
The museum is worth going through slowly as there are lots of interesting artifacts, including plenty of signed jerseys from German stars. Here is one from Jen Voigt; another from Erik Zabel. But some of the stories are a bit more obscure. I was very much taken with a lovely silver Rickert track bike hanging from the ceiling. It had a big sign on it and I was delighted to learn of the bike’s Canadian connection:
Rickert Track Bike
Heinz Dieter Reinhold lived in West Berlin until immigrating to Canada in the mid-1960s. Shortly thereafter, legendary Dortmund framebuilder Hugo Rickert constructed this track bike for him and it was brought to Canada by Gussi Kilian, son of Germany’s famous track star Gustav Kilian, who was then retired but serving as a coach on the West German national team. Reinhold competed in seventeen Six Day Races, placing well although never enjoying outright victory, and rode in races in Montreal, Quebec, Toronto and Delhi, Ontario before retiring from racing in 1973. He returned to Germany and the Rickert continued to see service as Reinhold was a trainer at the track in Kaarst-Büttgen, near Düsseldorf.
Bernd Drogan's World Championship Time Trial Bike
In addition to Reinhold’s Rickert, the museum displays two more track bikes, representing the outstanding success of DDR athletes. Both are Diamant/Textima bikes and one was ridden by Bernd Drogan to gold in the 1979 World Championships at Valkenburg in the 100 km team time trial, and the other one of the team bikes used by 5-time track World Champion Detlef Macha in the same era.
1989 Rund um Berlin winner's certificate: 210 kms in 5:15:27
Rund um Berlin jerseys
The final part of the museum tells the story of Rund um Berlin, the oldest German road race with its start in 1896 and, sadly, extinct since 2008. The race had national signficance primarily and was only won three times by non-Germans but the winners’ ranks include, yes, Täve Schur, Erik Zabel, Jan Ullrich, Olaf Ludwig and Robert Bartko, as well Wolfgang Lötzsch, who was probably the DDR’s finest cyclist in the 1980s but denied opportunity to compete in big races for his refusal to join the Party and contacts with the West.
Rund um Berlin Trophy
Rund um Berlin ran uninterrupted, with the exception of the war years, from 1896 until 2000 and then a final time in 2008. The museum has posters, jerseys, photos, certficates and medals spread out over the entire time of the race. Included is a trophy that is apparently modeled on Lady Godiva, probably the only nude-woman-with-long-hair-on-a-horse trophy ever awarded for cycle sport. The first race originated in Zossen and made its way in a big loop completely around Berlin without ever actually entering the capital. Recently, a professional road race has returned to Berlin with the expansion of the Velothon gran fondo in May to include a pro race managed by Erik Zabel and won in 2011 by Marcel Kittel in its first edition.
German national team jerseys
The museum also features memorabilia from cycling clubs in the region, which have a long and impressive history as well.
The museum was opened in September 2009 and I believe that much of the collection originates with its curator, sport journalist Werner Ruttkus. He has written a book about the numerous cycling World Championships that have taken place in Germany, as well as a book about the history of the BDR, the national cycling organization. As a personal collection, the museum is impressive but visitors should not expect much interpretive presentation. The difficulty of any bicycle-focused museum is the problem in conveying the speed and excitement of racing in a static display of artifacts. Some big-screen videos of historic races or interviews with stars would help but I suspect the museum is not really equipped to invest in this kind of thing. Wünsdorf is not an obvious place for a cycling museum (Herr Ruttkus lives there) and the surrounding countryside is not necessarily going to bring in many passing cyclists. Inexpensive but modern media has not been used to promote the Radsportmuseum and it is not easily found on any lists of bicycle museums in Germany or even on search engines.There are questions about the continuing operation of the museum given the few visitors.
As a person with a good knowledge of the history of bike culture and races in Western Europe, I found the Radsport-Museum Wünsdorf to be well worth the visit and very informative about chapters in European racing that were new to me. See it if you can!
Radsport-Museum Wünsdorf
Gutenbergstraße 1
115806 Zossen/OT Wünsdorf
Germany
Tel: +49 (0) 33702) 9600
Website: http://wuensdorf.radsportmuseum.de/
(Please note that the Website and all exhibits in the Museum are in German only)
Opening hours:
Monday to Friday: 10:00-18:00
Saturday and Sunday: 11:00-17:00
(Tickets are 3 Euros each and can be bought at Haus-Oskar, across the street)
One of the great cycling pleasures of living in Düsseldorf is the opportunity to participate in the monthly Klassikerausfahrtgruppe (catchy name!) ride, which takes place on the first Sunday of the month. It unites an interesting gang of riders who are joined by their interest in lightweight steel racing bicycles, although more modern bikes are present from time to time. Some great rides have taken place, including one in Holland, but most are local 2-3 hours rides around Düsseldorf. Although it is conceivable that no group on racing bikes has ever been so slow or so disorganized, we always manage to find our way back to the start at Ricci-Sport, perhaps lured on by the post-ride cake and coffee (which mirrors the pre-ride cake and coffee). There are generally no crashes, just a few flats, and always great camaraderie.
Yesterday's ride was the final official one for the season and I had special permission from houseguests to go out. Timing has been an issue for me so this was only my third group ride (the others have been written up here and here). However, many familiar faces were there with not only some old bikes but even some different old bikes. As this was the last ride and we were going to be photographed, we had been instructed to bring out the best in order to impress the locals as we rode through town. It was finally time for me to take down the SBDU Raleigh off the wall stand, pump up the tires and ride it for the first time in Germany, and only the fifth time since its restoration in early 2010. Since it was very humid, I decided to leave my wool Raleigh jersey at home and went with the old-style maple leaf one.
By the time I arrived at Ricci-Sport at 10:30 a great big group had already assembled and was working on the cake and/or admiring and comparing bicycles. It was clearly Rickert day as the made-in-Dortmund marque was represented by no fewer than four bikes, with two matching yellow ones from the early 1960s, a beautiful fully-chromed bike and an excellent blue one, the latter brought by Hartmut Snoek, who had come all the way from Münster. I met Hartmut last Sunday at an RTF ride in Essen, when he admired my Marinoni and I admired his Rickert. He is a serious collector of the brand, with around a dozen, including frames.
There were a lot of interesting bicycles. A Dutch cyclist had come with his Benotto and matching wool jersey (and white tires!). Conrad had a very fine Dutch RIH and a lady was riding a child-sized Colnago. Klaus had one of the yellow Rickerts instead of his usual Bottechia and there were Gazelles, and Koga Miyatas and a lovely blue/white Eddy Merckx, along with some makes unfamiliar to me.
As we prepared to ride out we were joined (with exceptionally loud brake squealing) by Richard of Ricci-Sports, who is a usual participant on these rides but broke his leg badly in July during a race in the Netherlands. He is down to one crutch instead of two now and managed to ride to the shop from home yesterday, which must have been a challenge. He brought out the second yellow Rickert and rode a block with us before turning back.
The weather has been unsettled and while it had been beautiful and hot on Saturday, the forecast was not so great. But we all started in great spirits, and in the usual semi-random disorder. We rode through the area near my apartment and then through the Grafenberger Wald. It was here at 6.5 kms I discovered that bikes that have not been ridden for a year should be checked out more carefully as my Campagnolo shifter went into "auto" mode: that is, once I shifted down at the base of a hill, the bike decided on its own to shift all the way back up five gears to the hardest gear. I had to get off, shift onto a smaller cog and firmly tighten the shift lever, something I had learned to do on my first test ride last year. I was the last one up the hill but had no further shifting issues for the rest of the day.
There were a few other hills to climb but the roads, many of which I have ridden before, were excellent and quiet on Sunday morning. We stop at the top of hills to regroup and things were going nicely when we looked to the north and saw some very very dark clouds, and heard some thunder. Someone cheerfully pointed out that the wind was blowing the clouds away from us. This may have been true at that point but once we were into Essen-Kettwig and about to begin the nice climb called "the Esel" (the Donkey), the skies opened up and the rain poured down.
At this point we were about to turn left past a Greek restaurant on Essener Strasse. It had an outdoor terrace with umbrellas and we zoomed into it and stood there while the rain came down in buckets. It was good timing as well for Karsten, who had the Usual Flat Tire of the trip. Most of us had left our bikes on a stand out front but two or three were standing with their bikes under the umbrellas, much to the dissatisfaction of the owner. I would have thought that with 20 or so cyclists totally captive by the rain, it would have been a good occasion to rev up the coffee machine or bring out the apfelschorle and make some profit but he was clearly anxious to get rid of us. We obliged as soon as the rain let up and began the climb up the hill.
I first rode the Esel last Sunday during the Essen RTF ride and really liked it. It is not extremely steep and has three nice switchbacks. The shifting on the Raleigh was working perfectly now and I could accelerate quite nicely up to the top. I was with a small group and then came the sucker punch as the rain suddenly began again in earnest. We pulled over to stand under the trees but it was pretty pointless as after a few moments we were soaking wet.
Once the rain let up again we were back on the road, looking like soaked rats. Klaus complained that his wool jersey soaked up water like a sponge and some of the other riders noted that their old-fashioned shoes did not have drain holes. Someone suggested that as a result of this ride my Raleigh would be worth half as much as it had been at the start but our spirits rose as the sun came out and we began to dry off in the warm wind. It was also obvious that on the short hills some of the oldie bicycles were not equipped with modern gearing for climbing as some of the oldie riders had to work heroically to get up them. At least I was able to use my toe clips and straps fairly effectively by the end of the ride. They are essential for the retro-look but clipless pedals are far, far better!
We passed through the woods around Oberdorf and soon rejoined our outward-bound route, taking us through Ratingen and back to Düsseldorf, Grünerstrasse and Ricci-Sports. There was lots of coffee and really, really excellent cake to balance any of the calorie-burning effects of our 44.34 km ride, with just under 400 m of climbing. Our 2:02 time of actual riding was pretty much matched by the amount of time it took me to clean all the grit off of the Raleigh today. And before people left, there was an opportunity to have your photo taken with your bike, using a large blue dumpster as a backdrop, which might perhaps be seen by many in the modern cycling community as appropriate given what we ride.
A group of the riders will go back to Holland on October 18 to ride with some of the Dutch steel lightweight enthusiasts but unfortunately I will be unable to join them. Many of the Düsseldorf group will be in Tuscany for l'Eroica so I look forward to exchanging coffee for Chianti with them then!
It has been a very busy few weeks, not helped by the fact that I was struck down on a business trip to Mainz by an evil virus that resulted in my losing 3 kilograms in about 12 minutes. Recovery was slow and my stomach muscles ached for days, putting a dent in all my biug plans. Although I only ate my first hot meal in a week on Thursday evening, I thought that I was well enough to go with my mechanic friend Richard to the indoor bicycle track in Kaarst-Büttgen. I felt bad because I had had to cancel out the week before due to the virus and was very disappointed.
When I got to Ricci-Sport on my city bike, Richard realized that I had no car, which posed a bit of a challenge. It seems that Kaarst-Büttgen must be one of the only places in Western Germany completely unreachable by public transit, so it was onto the bicycles and off we went through various suburbs of the city. It was only 17 kms but there were so many stoplights and bad traffic sections (not to mention pitch-dark sections of bikepath) it took us nearly 80 minutes to get there. I began to get the feeling we would arrive in Belgium momentarily.
The sports centre at Kaarst-Büttgen was quite an impressive facility. It was built in 1971. In addition to the cycling track, which is 250 m long (the same as Berlin’s Velodrome), there are facilities for gymnastics, inline-skating hockey, badminton, basketball, volleyball and handball. We quickly got to the locker room and changed before getting our bikes.
Crossing the track into the infield, I was surprised to see a lot of riders on this Friday evening. It was impressive to see them go around so quickly, following the small moped-like derny pacesetter. Richard got me to ride the bike around the track a few times at slow speed to get used to riding a bicycle with no brakes and no freewheel, meaning that the pedals never stop turning as long as the bicycle is in motion. I quickly got the hang of slowing down and stopping but as we practiced going around I discovered that the bicycle was quite unforgiving if I attempted to coast through the corners and jumped around a bit. It was actually startling and a bit nasty to feel the bike fight me, but in fact I was fighting the natural physics of the bike and the track. I mentally forced myself to relax my grip on the bars, as well as relax my shoulders.
Richard at speed on the Peugeot
Gradually I got used to the bike and increased my speed, practicing holding my position and trying to match Richard’s tempo. He has been riding a track bike since he was 12, so I was not under any illusions that I was going to impress anyone. As I began to get confidence and move up the track I found that I could slow down by putting a bit of reverse pressure on the pedals. However, it was soon clear that my recent virus-y condition would not allow me to go all that fast and I could feel my calf muscles getting sore from the unusual sensation of pedalling without a pause. It was quite dry in the hall and I had to stop twice for water but I did not get very cold. The fast riders all had arm and legwarmers, as well as jackets, even though the hall is heated. It is obvious that at the higher speeds they were going it would feel like cold wind and getting sweaty would be uncomfortable.
Richard showing what a bank of nearly 48 degrees looks like...
As I could feel my muscles slowly start to stiffen, I thought I would make a big effort to chase Richard up to the blue line, called the derny line. It was amazing to me how hard this was as riding on the track you do not perceive just how steep the banking really is at 47.8 degrees . It is like riding up a steep hill that appears quite flat. My legs and my lungs did not approve at all. When I stopped for water, I chatted with a big rider who, unsurprisingly, noticed it was my first time on the track. He was very enthusiastic about cycling, owning 11 bikes and using an expensive SRM power meter on his track bike. He also said that he had lost 34 kilograms due to cycling and various physical problems he had had, such as symptoms of diabetes, were now under control. He was off to Mallorca the next day and was very excited.
Richard rode for a while longer, chasing and being chased by a really strong cyclist named Vladimir, who is an Elite Men’s road racer and, apparently, an eight-time world champion.
Getting changed in the locker room, another rider also chatted about his first time on the track. I think I provided a great deal of amusement for the experienced riders but everyone recognized that the first few times are awkward. I felt that I did pretty well, all things considered, but I really need to get in better shape. I can imagine that an hour on the track is amazing for conditioning. And there is a rhythm you develop after a while on the smooth surface, with the bike quietly humming away under you. Although I am not ready for a Six Days yet, I can imagine how track racing can become addictive.
Riding back home in the cool night, with a few raindrops mixed with snow in the air, I felt completely exhausted. I got back to the apartment at nearly midnight and collapsed into bed. Unfortunately, I woke up twice in the night with extreme leg cramps. Nonetheless, I enjoyed my first excursion on the track and look forward to trying it again, although I think I would prefer not to have to ride all the way out to Kaarst-Büttgen before the track ride itself.
