Book Review: "Fast After 50" by Joe Friel

We are indeed living in the Age of the MAMIL—Middle-Aged Men in Lycra abound. Where once bicycles were sneered at as children's toys or for those too poor to afford motorized transport we now have astonishing two-wheelers, crafted of the highest of high-tech materials in the exotic Far East and featuring electronic shifting and featherlight wheelsets for five-figure sums that would buy excellent used cars. Gran fondo events have become all the rage in North America, catching up to European counterparts, and thousands are spent on travel packages to let the well-heeled enjoy the cobbles of Paris-Roubaix or retrace the Tour de France route itself. Middle age may not just bring the wherewithal to indulge in these luxuries but also some unpleasant surprises and noted coach and author Joe Friel brings succour to those who find their bikes losing weight in inverse proportion to themselves in his latest book “Fast After 50—How To Race Strong for the Rest of Your Life.”

Joe Friel has trained endurance athletes since 1980, including national champions, world championship contenders, and Olympic athletes in triathlon, duathlon, road cycling, and mountain biking.

He is an elite-certified USA Triathlon and USA Cycling coach and holds a master’s degree in exercise science. He conducts training and racing seminars around the world and provides consulting services for corporations in the fitness industry so he knows a great deal about athletics but the book had its genesis in his sudden realization that he was about to turn 70. He writes about his milestone birthday: “My greatest concern was that it might signal the beginning of the end of my lifelong adventure as a serious athlete. I simply didn't know what to expect.”

With six months to go until the dreaded day, he delved into the scientific literature to determine what his future might hold. Since writing a previous book (“Cycling Past 50”) published in 1998, he learned that the huge baby boom generation, a cohort entering their 60s in 2005, meant a significant increase in studies on aging and the patterns he saw in them came together in this new book.
“By the time we're in our 50s, it's just starting to become apparent that things are going the wrong way. The first thing that athletes typically notice around that age is that they don't recover from a race or a hard training session as quickly as they did a few years earlier. And not only that—race times are slowing, there's a loss of power, hills seem steeper, and other performance markers are also looking worse. What can be done?”

Apparently not all is lost! We learn that there is a surprisingly low deterioration in the performance of elite athletes as they move through their race age groups. But there is a reduction and Mr. Friel forces us to look at the grim truth in Part 1 of the book, entitled “Older, Slower, Fatter?” This examines the various theories of aging (and the book is festooned with footnotes to indicate just how much serious research went into it). There is a sad list of what happens with aging: skin loses elasticity; hair thins and turns grey; high-frequency sounds become more difficult to hear; sleep quality declines; bone density is reduced; the basic metabolic rate slows down, resulting in weight gain...well, that's enough for the general population. But for athletes this means aerobic capacity declines; maximal heart rate is reduced; muscle fibres are lost and so forth. The “Big Three” aging limiters for athletes are reduced by the author to:

1. Decreasing aerobic capacity;
   
2. Increasing body fat;
   
3. Shrinking muscles.
   

There is an inevitability to this but recognition of these three effects and the acceptance that one might not be as fast as one was in his or her 20s or 30s but that it is more important to live up to the potential fitness one might have is the heart of “Fast After 50.”

Frankly, it was disconcerting to read through this catalogue, as well-researched as it might be, and feel the cold breath of the Grim Reaper close by. The author realizes the effect and writes: “I know what you're thinking and I agree. There wasn't much in the way of good news in this chapter. Unfortunately, there's even more to the downside of aging that's been left unexplored. {In addition to the Big Three limiters}...we may also include other changes that senior athletes often experience, such as increased risk of injury and a weakened immune system that makes them more susceptible to disease.” Sigh.

Luckily, Part 2 arrives: Faster, Stronger, Leaner! This was designed to address the problems set out in the first section by noting that aging is a blend of genetics and lifestyle (in an unknown ratio) but research has shown that the process can be speeded up or reduced through something we can control. The physiology of training is no different with age although capacity may be reduced so it is by modifying our lifestyle we can truly reach the potential high performance of our athletic endeavours.

Given that the book is aimed at people who are already familiar with athletic activity, Mr. Friel does not need to go into detail about things like goal-setting but covers the importance of high-intensity training and avoiding the tendency to comfortable training levels and easier workouts that we slide into. With clear goals set we move onto periodization to avoid overtraining and then into advanced training that makes allowances for the aging athlete, including sections on strength training (not only to improve performance but to stop age-related loss of muscle mass) and on to the importance of rest and recovery. There is an entire chapter devoted to body fat and nutrition and how to deal with those shrinking Lycra™ jerseys. In addition to his own research, the author has called in interesting contributions from a number of noted sports figures, including the truly ageless Ned Overend of mountain bike fame.

The book ends on a hopeful note as the author believes that the baby-boomers will bring about statistical changes in the expected decline after 70. “If you count yourself among this group, then you are part of the most athletic and performance-focused generation in history. I believe you will rewrite the numbers in such a way that we may soon find that the rate of decline for athletes in their eighth decade of life is no greater than it was in the previous 10 years.”

Coach, author, competitor, septuagenarian: Joe Friel

Alas, a month after he reached 70 Mr. Friel crashed on a training ride when a strong gust of wind blew him into a curb. He broke seven bones and received a concussion and subsequently developed blood clots in his legs and lungs. He expects to be racing again on his 71^st birthday and invites his readers to write to him about their experiences with the ideas and suggestions in this thoughtful, well-written and groundbreaking book. We wish him a speedy and complete recovery and look forward to “Even Faster After 80” which we anticipate will come out in 2030. We will be ready!


“Fast After 50: How to Race Strong for the Rest of Your Life”
by Joe Friel
328 pp., some chart illustrations, paperback
VeloPress, Boulder, Colorado, 2015
ISBN: 978-1-937715-26-7
Suggested retail price: US$21.95
For more information about this and other VeloPress publications go to www.velopress.com

Book Review: Bike Mechanic—Tales from the Road and the Workshop

 The big stars of cycling: the race winners stand on the podium on the inevitable three steps, waving to the crowds, kissing podium girls, throwing bouquets around and spraying innocent bystanders with champagne. But the riders on the podium are only the most visible evidence of a pro team and now a book has come out that shines a bit of light on those that never end up mentioned, unless a chain breaks at a bad moment: the mechanics.

Guy Andrews' and Rohan Dubash's new book, “Bike Mechanic: Tales from the Road and the Workshop” is a welcome addition to the cycling library if only because it offers an unusual point of view. Well, it is also praiseworthy for the really good photographs, most effective in classic black-and-white, by Taz Darling. There are masses of books about celebrity racers and an impressive number that deal with famous bicycle brands or artisanal builders but nobody has had much to say about bicycle mechanics before. This book goes some way to addressing this gap but it might be better to consider it as a book about the management of the mechanical aspect of cycling. The structure of the book is unusual, with the opening section, “On the Road,” dealing with pro racing while the second section (“Hardware”) and the last (“the Bike”) move away from this to a nuts-and-bolts discussion (literally) of bicycle maintenance.

The first section, which makes up less than one-third of the book, includes excellent race photos as well as short accounts of life as a pro race mechanic. This is enjoyable and illuminating. We know that the racer gets the credit when the race is won but when the race is lost through a technical failure the opprobrium attaches to the previously-ignored mechanic. The book mentions two specific cases, both involving chains: David Millar's coming apart as he was about to commence what should have been a stage-winning sprint at the Vuelta; the 2010 Tour de France when Andy Schleck's jammed at a critical moment.

We learn that in the Good Old Days racers usually had only one bicycle and mechanics were freelancers who showed up at races. Today's mechanics are faced with pro teams that have upwards of 200 bicycles plus masses of spares to account for. Each racing bicycle is built to the idiosyncrasies of picky pros and the mechanics need to stay abreast of this. Then during the race itself the mechanics are either moving the big truck to the next stage location or sitting in a team car, preparing to leap out for a quick wheel change or on-the-fly adjustment. When the racing is done each day and the riders off for their massages, the mechanics are busy washing, lubricating and adjusting the thoroughbred machines in time for it all to be repeated the next day during a typical stage race.

The authors have included interesting snippets of interview with mechanics, some background on the arrival of Shimano components on the European pro racing scene, an examination of a typical UCI World Tour team service course (in this case the Omega-Pharma-Quick-Step one)--laconically described as the “team garage;” a vivid description of riding along with the neutral support mechanics of Mavic and Vittoria. There is an account of the huge team trucks and their valuable contents and a chapter on bike washing. For those who have not seen pro race mechanics in action after a race it is worth staying around for the show. This writer recalls seeing the mechanics at the HEW Cyclassics race in Hamburg hosing down expensive racing bicycles at top speed and stacking them in team station wagons as if they were firewood.

The second section of the book moves us into the esoteric world of the bicycle workshop, with its range of specific-purpose tools. The photographs are the highlight of this section and even those with no mechanical aptitude will feel motivated to at least consider doing some work if one could only get one's hands on these beautiful items. Even tools that most of us will never use (head tube facing tools, anyone?) look irresistible here.

The last section of the book covers the complete bicycle and provides advice on how to maintain your mechanical steed in the same way that pros do. There are explanations and suggestions for everything from tire installation to cleaning in a clearly-written and well-illustrated fashion. However, this book is not to be confused with manuals with exploded assembly diagrams (thinking of Leonard Zinn's here) and for really specific instructions you need to go elsewhere.

So the book is a bit of this and a bit of that—and I would have loved more “Tales from the Road”-- rather than a comprehensive look at the experiences of bike mechanics or a how-two book for those aspiring to be one. But the modest goal set by the author is easily reached:

So this book is a collection of stories with some tips and hints that we thought be useful to amateur mechanics and road cycling enthusiasts alike. It certainly isn't comprehensive; there just wasn't space.....We hope it inspires you to get the workstand out.

The book is a joint venture between VeloPress and Rouleur so as always the publication is of very high quality and many of the photos approach art. With the cycling season coming to an end for many of us, this is an excellent read for dark winter evenings, fun to just browse through, and would be a fine gift for any cyclist, even one with or without a workstand.

“Bicycle Mechanic—Tales from the Road and the Workshop” by Guy Andrews and Rohan Dubash,

with photography by Taz Darling

270 pp., ill., paperback

VeloPress 2014, suggested retail price US$24.95

ISBN 978-1-937715-18-2

For more information on this and other cycling books, check out www.velopress.com

Book Review: Pro Cycling on $10 a Day

 

Men's professional cycling: it's all about glamour. Jaguar team cars; on-demand massages; garages full of the latest super-light carbon wonderbikes; worshipful fans; exotic locales with breathtaking scenery; breathtaking podium girls; the big bucks and global recognition. But then again perhaps not and for an entertaining albeit rueful look at this Real World check out “Pro Cycling on $10 a Day” by American pro Phil Gaimon, the man with with Sad Clown Face on the cover photo. That's earning the $10, not spending it by the way...

Phil Gaimon, whose palmares not only include the Redlands Classic race but also columns in some of the bigger US cycling magazines and, putting his English degree to further use, a blog.  He seems to have been a particularly unlikely candidate to become a career bike racer. Born in Columbus, Ohio, he writes about how he grew up sedentary and obese in Atlanta until at 16 he obtained a used hybrid bike for transportation and within two years had dropped 40 pounds and saw his waist size melt from 36 to 30 inches. Compared to the typical European racer he had a very late start but worked hard to make time good. He joined the collegiate cycling club at university in Florida and slowly learned about race tactics. He began to move up the ranks, joining a team funded by a Bahamian billionaire (private jet! Caribbean training camp!) at the princely salary of $2000 (and two bikes) which was quadrupled for no apparent reason. The whims of team operators, billionaires and others, are a constant theme of the book but his Bahamas adventure is something he must look back to with longing considering what was to come.

In 2007 he joined the second in a series of seriously underfunded teams and managed to take the white jersey for Best Young Rider (and 7^th overall) at the Univest Grand Prix. 2008 and on to another team, sponsored by an organic jam company and paying the still-princely sum of $2000. 2009 saw him ride with Jelly Belly, a team that also forked over $2000 (and jelly beans). And on it goes as he recounts all the races where he seemed happy just to finish, all the terrible lodgings he had to use, all the miles he put on his unglamourous Toyota Matrix and a whole lot of disappointments, a major crash or two and plenty of broken promises. Pro cycling in the United States is an outsider sport, with on-off races, laughably amateur team management, tight-fisted sponsors and little community support. You can feel the frustration as he moves further up the US pro circuit as his abilities climb too, reaching the summit with the Bissell squad and earning $45,000 after leaving a team that reneged on paying him the miserable salary it had contracted with him.

Cookie-enthusiast Phil pulls no punches when describing his messy, disorganized life, sometimes in too-detailed biological form. But in between these tales of struggle and sheer awfulness and balancing life as a university student/coach/t-shirt tycoon are many entertaining stories told with wry humour of great teammates, juvenile fraternity practical jokes and the beauty and challenges of the racing itself. He loves cycling and over his career managed to shake off everything that was extraneous to that. Of his decision to go pro he writes:

“When I set my goal I knew of a lot of talented guys who'd tried to make it as bike racers and had failed or given up, and I'd gotten a later start than most of them. How could I succeed where they hadn't? Simple. I 'd have to outwork everyone around me. I'd have to be more focused, more dedicated, and more disciplined than they were. The plan was so distant it was almost abstract, but I thought I was up to it. Sometimes, I wish I could go back in time and slap myself.”

In this respect Phil Gaimon matches the old European racers, those men from Belgium or the Netherlands, who got by on grit and determination. And, in his case, many cookies. To race at the top level is the dream of every pro cyclist and in 2014, at 28, Phil Gaimon rode for World Tour team Garmin-Sharp. Sadly, the reorganization of that team means he will be returning to the US circuit again in 2015 but we can look forward to his wisecracks and positive outlook as he continues to cut a sympathetic figure in the harsh world of the pro peloton. And when he won that stage at the Tour de San Luis in Argentina (and second overall behind Giro winner Nairo Quintana) this year for Garmin-Sharp we would like to think that he was mobbed by podium girls, and not for the last time.  Enjoy Phil's Thrill Ride!

“Pro Cycling on $10 a Day: From Fat Kid to Euro Pro” by Phil Gaimon

295 pp., illustrated, paperback

VeloPress 2014, suggested price US$ 18.95

ISBN 978-1-93771524-3

For more information about this and other cycling books, check out www.velopress.com

For Phil Gaimon's own blog and the stories direct from the horse's mouth, so to speak, go to www.philthethrill.com

Book Review: Goggles & Dust

Photography and cycling both came of age as technologies in the late 19^th Century and were joined with the development of epic European road races. A new horizon was opened up for sports photography as newspapers, often sponsors of the events, demanded powerful images delivered in a timely fashion. And as photography moved forward so did the development of racing to include the elements we know today: disciplined teams; brilliant summer landscapes; high-tech equipment and superbly paved serpentine mountain roads with high-speed descents. But it was not always so and it is obvious leafing through the lovely little book “Goggles & Dust” from the Horton Collection...

Tour de France: the Peloton in 1938

Brett and Shelly Horton have over the years amassed an impressive collection of bike racing memorabilia, ranging from old bicycles to jerseys, trophies and accessories but over the course of the years have also obtained photos, originally to document and complement the other items in the collection. It must have come as something of a shock to inventory the photos and discover more than 350,000 original images. From this massive mother lode it must have been difficult to make a selection for this new book, although clearly the Hortons would have wanted to avoid duplication of the photos in their previously-released book covering racing from the 1940s through the 1960s. (refer to previous review of The Golden Age of Cycling). Their decision was to cover the first four decades of the 20^th Century and the book is subtitled “Images from Cycling's Glory Days.”

Honoré Barthélemy, 1921 Tour de France, where he won 2 stages and was third overall

They may have been glory days, those early years when road racing was novel and one of the most popular sports in the world. But it certainly was not a lot of fun for the principal actors and one cannot but admire the cyclists in these photos, pioneers in the establishment of professional sport, as they are pictured grinding up mountains on their heavy bikes, dragging them through muddy ruts and, in that time before team cars, radios and quick bike changes, doing an awful lot of roadside repairs.

Réne Vietto pauses for refreshment, 1925 Tour de France

The bikes were primitive and the roads to modern eyes look dreadful. The photos do not reveal much of the joy of competition but brutal hardship. As noted in the book's introduction the 1926 Tour de France was 5,745 kms over 17 stages, compared to today's 3,400 kms or so over 21.

The riders are almost always wearing heavy long-sleeved jerseys festooned with tubulars across the shoulders and everyone wears goggles (in on case two pairs!) as protection from the relentless dust of the gravel roads. The organization of everything is so simple, whether at food stops or finish lines. And one is struck by how old many of the riders, who would have only been in their 20s or early 30s, appear to us today old and exhausted. Victor Fontan, who was 36 at the 1928 Tour, looks to be 76.

Léon Despontin, Stage 2 of the 1925 Tour de France, aged 37. Despontin, a Belgian, won the Touriste-Routier class that year but in his six appearances at the Tour managed three 7^th places in the overall competition.

Most of the photos have not been previously published and while some are recognizable from a series, such as the one of Gino Bartali crossing the Casse Déserte on the Col d'Izoard in 1938, but others are quite new including the start line of a 1911 race for cyclists weighing at least 100 kg (220 lbs)! The names of those photographed include Tour de France legends Eugène Christophe, André Leducq, René Vietto, Antonin Magne and Ottavia Bottechia but others would be less familiar to today's readers. 

1927 Portrait of two-time Tour de France victor Ottavio Bottechia

The photos are consistently interesting and nicely reproduced. “Although the photos are derived from an original negative or a print made from that negative, all of the images...have undergone some degree of restoration” writes Brett Horton in the introduction and this gives the photos a welcome freshness and makes for an attractive presentation on the whole. Each photo indicates who is in the picture, what the situation is and often a few words (very few) of description. This might be the only fault of the book as an appendix with more details of the circumstances surrounding the image would have been welcome. The photos are very much close-focussed on the riders with comparatively little attention to backgrounds or scenery and a few more photos like the Izoard one would have been welcome too. 

 René Vietto on the Col du Galibier, 1938 Tour de France

Was there any other professional sport as well-documented by photographers in this period as bicycle racing? There are excellent photos of team sports such as baseball from the period, as well as boxing and tennis and the Olympic Games (well, amateurs only there!) but one is struck by the feverish activity displayed in the cycling photos, a dynamism that is not always there in the visual documentation of other sports in the early 20^th Century. The photos from the 1930s are in my opinion the best in capturing the action and personalities of the racers. Antonin Magne was one slick dude with perfect hair apparently.

Antonin Magne at the 1937 Grand Prix des Nations time trial

 “Goggles & Dust” is a very fine collection of black and white photos covering the formative--and brutally hard--years of road racing Leafing through this small volume makes one curious as to the photos that had to be left out for reasons of space and it is to be hoped that this is only the first in a series from the depths of the Horton Collection archives. This book will be available in September 2014.

“Goggles & Dust: Images from Cycling's Glory Days”

by Shelly and Brett Horton

VeloPress 2014, hardbound 106 pp.

ISBN 978-1-937715-29-8

Suggested Retail Price: US$ 16.95

Get yours at www.velopress.com

Book Review: Tour de France 100

100: that's a big number. Frenchman Robert Marchand was 100 years old when he set a new age group category record by cycling 100 kms in 4:17, soon after setting the One Hour Record for the same 100+ age group (of which he currently seems to be the only member) to crown his birthday activities. Well done, Robert! And to mark another 100^th in France, VeloPress has produced an elegant photobook to celebrate the first 99 editions of cycling's greatest event, the Tour de France from 1903 to 2012.

Author Richard Moore, in “Tour de France 100,” begins at the beginning, seeking out the Cafe Zimmer where early in the last century on a November evening in Montmartre the Tour de France was first proposed by staff of the struggling L'Auto newspaper. From that small group discussion emerged a race that has, befitting its origins as a commercial vehicle, received exhaustive press coverage from the start, that has adjusted itself over the decades to meet the varying demands of print, radio, film, television and the Internet. The race has outlived the Cafe Zimmer (although it still exists as the Indiana Cafe) and grown into a global enterprise. Its strengths include the glorious stage of the entire nation of France (with a few foreign excursions), a cast of great athletes with larger-than-life eccentricities or tragic tales and titanic clashes to overcome geography, weather and rivals. The rules have been constantly adjusted as the organizers sought out ways to heighten the tension, broaden the challenge or, apparently, kill the riders.

Reaching backwards to that first decade, the book opens with a grainy black-and-white photo not of a triumphant racer cresting a ridge or hammering to a sprint finish or even passing any spectators. It is 1910 and Octave Lapize is there shoving his bicycle up the Tourmalet in the year that Tour included the Pyrenees in its itinerary. A Tour legend was born: Lapize (who was faster on foot than his nearest competitor riding up the pass) famously called Tour organizers “Assassins!” (or “Murderers!” in this account) as he crossed the Aubisque. From the first flattish race in 1903 the rate of difficulty had progressed until this day, July 21, when the organizers saw fit to have a stage beginning at 2 a.m. and running 326 km over seven major climbs. Lapize was the victor in a sprint finish (!) and was the overall winner in Paris at the end. A Tour legend was born: Lapize (who was faster on foot than his nearest competitor riding up the Tourmalet) famously called Tour organizers “Assassins!” (or “Murderers!” in this account) as he crossed the Aubisque. Tour founder Henri Desgrange seemed to confirm this with his comment at the finish line:

We brought far too many people to Paris, and there was not enough wastage...Out of 110 starters, 41 riders finished the race. I repeat this is far too many.

Lapize was to win a single Tour and was one of three champions to die in World War One.

The Tour has had its constant themes but there have been so many rule changes, seemingly at Desgrange's whim from time to time, it gets confusing to follow how the race was judged in the past. “Tour de France 100” is helpful in dividing the race into eras and offering explanations of exactly what was happening. The early days were never much about fair play or sporting nobility. The first winner, Maurice Garin, was stripped of his second title for cheating and the first double winner became Lucien Petit-Breton (1907 and 1908). An atmospheric photo shows Petit-Breton (who also died in the Great War) looking filthy and haggard on his heavy team Peugeot bicycle, held up by an immaculately-dressed white-clad gentleman (an official, perhaps or his trainer?). And moustaches all around.

The race continues after a break for World War One as the riders regroup in the shattered countryside. Another legend is born with the Unluckiest Man in the Tour (well, aside from those who actually got killed) as Eugene Christoph breaks a fork in the 1913 edition, drags his bike to a village blacksmith and hammers it back together at the forge, receiving a time penalty because a boy operated the bellows to keep the flames up for him. Christoph was the first to wear the Yellow Jersey in 1919, broke his fork again that year, probably costing him overall victory, and, yes, again in 1922 descending the Col du Galibier. He found yet another blacksmith's shop and did his repairs, noting in later years: “That accident didn't upset me as much as the others. By then I was a bit of an expert.”

The photos are wonderful, showing the bikes built more for strength than anything, their riders more like muddy desperadoes than Olympic sporting heroes. In 1924 there was a protest when Desgrange enforced another one of his flippant rules, this one requiring cyclists to finish with the same clothing as they began, meaning you could not shed any layers after a descent. The Péllisier brothers had enough and withdrew and a third rider joined them in a bar where a journalist wrote down their thoughts, eventually turning them into a book “The Convicts of the Road,” emphasizing the suffering cyclists had to endure. Henri Péllisier described the race as “a Calvary,” and his brother Francis produced a box of pills, saying “We run on dynamite.” Anger, suffering, controversy, doping: more fuel for the Tour publicity machine!

Henri Péllisier, who was prone to violence himself, ended up being fatally shot with five bullets in 1935. The rider who went on to win the year the brothers dropped out was Ottavio Bottechia, the first Italian winner who took the victory in 1925 as well as 1924 but died in mysterious circumstances on a training ride two years later.

The rules changes are not always clear as Desgrange and his men tried to find ways to make the race more exciting. Freewheels were not allowed for a number of years and variable gearing was not permitted before 1937, when cycle tourists had already been using it for at least a decade. Trade teams were dropped in favour of national teams (and sub-national ones) and Desgrange was appalled by the idea of support riders, belittling Maurice Brocco who helped François Faber to victory in 1911 as merely a servant, or domestique. The noble domestique, giving up his own chances for his team leader, became part of the Tour legend. It made Desgrange so angry that one year he basically turned the Tour into a series of time trial stages. The book offers a fine photo of Lucien Buysse leading Bottechia through Saint-Cloud in 1925 on the final stage that year. This faithful helper won the Tour himself the following year.

By the 1930s the reach of mass media broadened interest in the tour and that decade saw management passing from Desgrange, who retired in 1936 due to ill health and was replaced by Jacques Goddet, who was to run the race for the next half-century, immediately dropping the rule against multiple gears and opening up the opportunity for some technical advances in equipment. Roads were actually paved on some of the mountain passes, replacing the previous goat tracks, but the beginning of Goddet's reign did not make the challenges less, as a fine image from the 1937 race shows, picturing the peloton lined up at speed on the cobbles stones of Vannes in the cycling heartland of Brittany.

My own favourite era of the Tour begins after the Second World War, with black-and-white photos, superb in their details, highlighting the adventures of famous riders including Koblet, Bartali, Copp and Bobet, leading us eventually to the Five Time Winners. Anquetil and Merckx still belong to this period, seemingly so far in the past.

The era of colour photography begins and it is a bit jarring to see Anquetil, Merckx and Hinault together in 1987 in bright yellow jerseys, two retired riders and the still-aggressive “Badger” in the modern world. One likes to think that those jersey are still wool as clothing moved then into half-developed polyesters and some of the most tasteless designs ever.

The great joy in a comprehensive visual history of the Tour de France lies in the unfamiliar photos and here the old images bring the most pleasure as once we pass the time of blurry colour to today's super-sharp photos there is a sense no longer of wandering in a foreign land. This is not to say the photos are not excellent. High-speed cameras have frozen Ullrich attacking or Armstrong crashing better than anything in the old days but these seem familar and workaday to us.

The book concludes with the 2012 win of Bradley Wiggins, continuing the trend of victories by non-French riders and preparing the stage for Chris Froome's domination in 2013 at the 100^th running of the race. And the race will probably remain the only sporting event with 100 races completed and only 93 winners but we don't need to rehash this.

The magic of “Tour de France 100,” which does feature excellent written commentary by Richard Moore, seems to be more in the distant haze of yesterday. Yes, there was plenty not to be nostalgic about and the reader can pick and choose his or her own view of the Tour de France and what it means. But the race's history is well-served by this finely-produced book with far too many excellent photos to describe. It should find a respected place among the many tomes dedicated to the ne plus ultra of bike races.

The Tour de France will surely go on to many more editions. And back in France on January 31 this year, Robert Marchand proved that 100 is only the start of things. Clearly having upped his training program in the last two years, Monsieur Marchand smashed his own One Hour Record in the 100+ age group.

Tour de France 100: A Photographic History of the World's Greatest Race

by Richard Moore

223 pp., ill., hardcover, VeloPress 2013

ISBN 978-1-937715-06-9

Suggested retail price: US$34.95

Available at www.velopress.com

Book Review: The Elite Bicycle

The Oxford Dictionary defines “elite” in noun form as “a select group that is superior in terms of quality and abilities to the rest of a group or society.” While being a member of the elite is seen somehow as a detriment in American political circles, a new book from VeloPress by British photographer Gerard Brown and author Graeme Fife shows that being part an elite is a Good Thing with respect to the world of bicycles. As in the case of the famous Lake Woebegon where “all the children are above average, “The Elite Bicycle” showcases a whole group of enterprises that are truly superior in quality and abilities.

The title of the book is a bit misleading, not because the “great marques, makers and designers” are not elite but because bicycles actually do not feature much in it. But calling the book “Elite Makers of Spokes, Chainrings, Saddles, Headsets, Double Butted Tubing and Mainly Steel Framesets” would lack a solid marketing ring. There are no photos of cyclists out on some picturesque road in Tuscany or Switzerland or anywhere. In fact, in this gorgeous 224 page book with 29 chapters there are only five complete bicycles shown, along with a shot of the Alex Singer shop, crowded with finished products. The fact that the bikes we see carry the names Dinucci, Seven, Paris, Brian Rourke and Faggin is indicative of the broad scope of the book, representing brands in the USA, Britain and Italy. This polyglot coverage includes Belgium, France, Germany and, yes, even Canada.

Bicycles at the Alex Singer shop

The authors try valiantly to identify what “elite” means to them. It “identifies the very best, and the following series of profiles is a snapshot of the top end of the bicycle production industry...the selection is not comprehensive. It is, rather, a portrait of a small cadre of exceptional makers and enterprises which combine traditional craftsmanship and new technology in the manufacture of the essential component parts of a bicycle.” They take delight in the fact that “steel, once the darling of the bicycle industry but long since overtaken by aluminium, carbon and titanium, is being used again, with superior modern production methods, and thus introduced to a new generation.”

Chamfering a Brooks saddle

Arranged in an order not immediately apparent, the profiles begin with a pair of saddle makers who are both very old but very different. Brooks, which dates to 1882, must be the oldest producer of a bicycle component still in business. Production methods and the product itself do not seem to have changed a great deal but with the popularity of retro the circle has come around. Selle Italia, an Italian competitor established in 1897, seems very modern in comparison with its production of 9,600 saddles daily yet surprisingly those saddles are for the most part produced by small family operations offsite.

The next two profiles again match British and Italian rivals, this time in the steel tubing business. Reynolds (the Patent Butted Tube Co. until 1924, when the current name was adopted) and Columbus developed steel tubing for a variety of products, including furniture and airplanes, but are most noted today for their bicycle applications and tubing continues to be developed. The book places the emphasis on steel here, perhaps because of its artisan qualities, but does not mention all the effort Columbus has put into carbon framesets. The explanation of how butted tubing is made is very interesting and is just one of many explanations author Graeme Fife offers to accompany the truly superb pictures of industrial environments and components of Gerard Brown.

Mr. Fife, known for his Rapha guide books on the mountain passes of the Alps and the Pyrenees among other literary efforts, likes to explain things in his markedly eccentric style. The profile on Cinelli begins with a paragraph about the Temple of Janus in Rome and spins off to a reference to Antonio Colombo's art gallery and a catalogue that lists the controversial Spinaci aerobars along with a quote from Virgil: “Here, in the inner, light-filled cave of thinking, in what many must call a sanctuary of classic Italian design and technical excellence, as elite as you can get, a poignant ache of the modern day expressed in the Latin of one of Italy's finest poets twenty-one centuries before.” And along with the origins of the words for rubber we also learn in the book that “swage” not only is a term used in metal-working but also means otter excrement.

Cinelli Supercorse frame before and after finishing

The book moves on to the familiar area of frames and even includes two noted makers of carbon frames, Guru in Canada and Cyfac in France (Time shows up right at the end of the book) but steel takes pride of place, with some titanium (first discovered in Cornwall, we learn) sprinkled in. There are excellent photos of workshops humming away, sometimes with a sole artisan, as is the case of American grand master Richard Sachs and several of his countrymen but also the larger operations of Seven, Independent Fabrication and Ben Serotta, no longer with his eponymous company.

Framebuilding in custom carbon at Guru

Careful finishing at Cyfac

You need to wait seven years if you want a frame from Richard Sachs

The chapter on Condor/Paris is an outlier as the company has its bikes made in Italy by contractors but the Paris track bicycle that graces the cover and is made with spectacular bilaminate lugs (no fears: an explanation of this procedure is also to be found!) excuses all.

There is an impressive amount of handwork that goes into framemaking at this level and the photographs show the whole process at various points. Filing, brazing, aligning...it is a great pleasure to look at the pictures and see the whole range of operations so clearly illustrated.

Frames are recognizable to most cyclists by name but then there are components that serve us equally well but more anonymously. “Elite Bicycles” continues its profiles looking at chainring and crankarm manufacturing at Spécialités TA (the “TA” coming from “Traction Avant,” a failed attempt at a front-wheel drive bicycle), Antwerp-based SAPIM which produces 600,000 spokes (daily? annually?) in two factories and Chris King of headset fame. In his enthusiasm for the lovely TA chainrings, Graeme Fife makes the odd claim that Shimano chainrings are difficult to get. This might be the case in Britain, where the authors are based, but has never been my experience.

The book concludes with the rubber meeting the road as we tour Mavic (which stands for Manufacture d'Articles Vélocipédiques Idoux et Chanel), maker of rims and wheelsets (although no mention is made of drivetrain components or electronic shifters which didn't work out so well), German tire giant Continental which has been making pneumatic bike tires since 1892 and French tire dwarf FMB, where pro racers have been getting their handmade tubulars since 2005 and where the workforce appears to consist of three related people with excellent sewing skills.

An eccentric and entertaining book, beautifully produced with top-quality photos and amusing but informative text and a foreword by cycling-made British fashion designer Sir Paul Smith, “The Elite Bicycle” deserves to find a place on many a cyclist's bookshelf this holiday season. Even ones unfamiliar with Virgil.

“The Elite Bicycle: Portraits of Great Marques, Makers and Designers”

by Gerard Brown and Graeme Fife

224 pp., ill., hardcover, VeloPress 2013

ISBN 978-1-937715-0803

Suggested retail: US$ 39.95

www.velopress.com

My Latest Book Review: Merckx 525

Now to be found at Pezcyclingnews.com is my latest book review, covering the volume of photos dedicated to the career of Eddy Merckx, the greatest cyclist ever.  His 525 victories are noted in the title, which is "Merckx 525."  I really enjoyed it and you can read my review here.

1974 Paris-Roubaix: Eddy Merckx being followed by Roger De Vlaeminck (the eventual winner). 

 

My Latest Book Review! Italian Racing Bicycles

"Cycling Literature" is my middle name these days with my third book review in a row on a Friday coming out today at Pezcyclingnews. You can read it in its entire glory here.

The Spring Classics: My Latest Book Review at Pezcyclingnews.com

My latest book review, "The Spring Classics: Cycling's Greatest One Day Races," published by the nice people at VeloPress, has just appeared at Pezcyclingnews.com, and you can read the whole thing here.

There are a lot of great photos in this large-format volume, and I really enjoyed the stories as well. And the next time somebody says that cyclists all look malnourished, show them this photo of three-time Tour de France winner Louison Bobet, who has legs like I have never seen before. In the pantheon of Tour winners, Bobet seems to be somewhat forgotten. In addition, he was World Champion in 1951 and features quite a bit in this book as he also won, among other things, Milan-San Remo, Paris-Roubaix, the Tour of Flanders and the Tour of Lombardy. The photo shows him at Bordeaux-Paris, a ridiculous race that covered 550 km non-stop, using motorpacing!

Come & Gone: My Latest Book Review at Pezcyclingnews.com

US bike racer Joe Parkin, whose entertaining "A Dog in a Hat" I reviewed a while back, has come out with a second book through the estimable VeloPress.  "Come & Gone" is about his subsequent career of racing back home in the United States.  My review of the book was put up today at Pezcyclingnews.com and you can find it right here.

Revealed: Dark Secrets of a Growing Cult!

"Roadie:" A Book Review

Depending on where you live, the amateur racing season is drawing to a close but there must be a lot of people wondering about the irresistible lure that takes their loved ones out on the open road, oblivious to all else. As I turned the pages of Jamie Smith’s entertaining book, Roadie, it slowly dawned on me just how strange the increasingly-popular pastime of bicycle racing must appear to outsiders. Mr. Smith provides a capsule description of a bike race, which indicates the tone of the book and its essential truthfulness:

A bike race is like a chess game, a boxing match and a stampede disguised as a sport, encompassed by a life-style, and surrounded by a community on a never-ending road trip to the brink of bankruptcy.

Offhand, this does not sound like the kind of summary that would necessarily attract newcomers to a sport, but this is precisely the intent of this book. Mr. Smith, an experienced cyclist and race announcer, decided to write it to explain bike racing to friends, colleagues and families of cyclists—people to whom this sport, which has stature in Europe, is an alien and exotic transplant in North America. He has succeeded with his light and amusing style and his ability to convey the joy of the sport with an unblinking eye. Has anybody else ever written about how roadies wear out their shorts without noticing it? They do.

The life-style of a road cyclist is so peculiar that it is worth the one-quarter of the book that Mr. Smith (a fellow blogger) devotes to it. The fact that the average roadie owns eight bicycles—Mr. Smith does too—is apparently something unusual to non-racers. Besides our obvious obsession over equipment, the author touches on the other idiosyncrasies of cyclists, such as our unwillingness to move very much when off the bike. The truism of “never stand when you can sit, never sit when you can lie down and never, ever walk” is actually good advice to help in the recuperation process but must seem strange to people who think that athletes should be, well, more athletic.

Getting into the riding itself training rides, outdoors and indoors, are discussed. The need to put in the mileage, typically 100-400 per week, is unquestionable but not always easy to explain to family members or acquaintances who would consider this a significant drive, let alone riding it. Perhaps if non-cyclists appreciated what goes into all this training they might be a little more inclined to leave some space for that cyclist they see when they are out driving on the road.

The chapter on tactics is very clear and should be helpful to neophytes but it is followed by a chapter on that very real and very unpleasant aspect of cycling: crashes, although Mr. Smith does say that he wishes he could ignore it. The fact is that if you are a racer sooner or later you are going to be involved in a crash. Improving your odds comes about through experience and upgrading your skills but it still happens to professionals. At least he speaks plainly so people are aware of this real risk.

Races are categorized into criteriums, road races, time trials and stage races, with a chapter devoted to each and not failing to note that there is not much in the way of money for any. Taking my favourite—time trialling—as an example, the account of what it is to ride one and what it looks like to a spectator (pretty undramatic) is very accurate. The author even mentions that fact that you need additional special costly equipment, which just makes it all that much more attractive. Here is an excerpt on time trials:

Once under way, a racer only needs to ride fast and avoid crashing into things. That may sound simple, but the one thing that makes the time trial such an intriguing event is the one thing that heightens the danger: concentration. A rider who is so sharply focused on riding can become blind to the most obvious things. For example, curves in the road.

Ahem, guilty.

So does this book meet its goals? It certainly would entertain any experienced cyclist, the kind of person who sits together with other roadies in a café after a ride and earnestly discusses tire brands, but would it be good to buy for a friend or family member curious about this bike racing thing? There is no question that in its breezy yet comprehensive way it will be able to keep the interest of someone new to the sport strong enough after 206 pages to watch a bike race and get something out of it, and, just possibly, become a convert and go for that first of eight bicycles themselves. Recommended.

It would be remiss not to mention the charming illustrations by Jef Mallett, who, unlike fellow-artist Toulouse-Lautrec, knows what a bicycle chain actually looks like. His work adds greatly to the liveliness and accessibility of this book.

“Roadie—the Misunderstood World of a Bike Racer”
by Jamie Smith, VeloPress 2008, illustrations by Jef Mallett
256 pp.
ISBN-10: 1934030171
ISBN-13: 978-1934030172
Suggested Price: $21.95 (but cheaper you-know-where)