Book Review: The Art of the Cycling Jersey

“What is the well-dressed cyclist wearing these days?”, I hear you ask me. “Or back in those early days?” I am glad you asked because Rodale Press' excellent book, “The Art of the Cycling Jersey,” subtitled “Iconic Cycle Wear Past and Present,” shows us that looking good and going fast are not mutually exclusive.

Copenhagen 2011: The British National Team leads Mark Cavendish to victory at the World Championships

British author Chris Sidwell's latest book addresses an area that has been an empty shelf on my gargantuan bookshelf. We have books on famous races, famous riders, suffering amateurs, the training programs they suffer with, custom bicycles, vintage bicycles, components (yes, we have both the original and revised editions of “the Dancing Chain," a history of the derailleur) and even variations of road surfaces in Belgium, to say nothing of daunting climbs and disastrous around-the-world rides. It is about time that somebody recognized the role of the cycling jersey in our sport and this elegant and attractive book is welcome indeed.

The Tour de France King of the Mountains jersey, little changed since its introduction in 1975

The book is set out chronologically. In the early days riders did not really have cycling-specific clothing in the first races but there was a realization that clothing should be more form-fitting to offer less wind resistance as well as appropriate to the weather conditions. During the first Tour de France racers did not ride in teams and were free to choose their own gear. The winner of that first race in 1903, Maurice Garin, wore a distinctive white jacket to keep cool. In a pre-yellow jersey move, race officials gave him a green armband to distinguish him as the race leader. While jackets had their place, it was the sweater's evolution that began the march towards the jersey as we know it.

“The first cycling jerseys were plain wool, but bicycle manufacturers who sponsored early professional riders soon saw the publicity possibilities of having their names on the jerseys. So in the early years of the twentieth century, bike manufacturers' names were embroidered onto some woolen jerseys, often in a rough copy of the script used in the manufacturer's logo. They were stitched by hand, using the same think wool the jersey was made from, although in a contrasting color. This relatively crude method was improved with the introduction of lighter, thinner wool yarns to make cycling jerseys. The embroidered letters on some of these were quite exquisite.”

1926 The three Pelissier brothers riding for Dilecta-Wolber

The first chapter of the book covers this early evolution and focuses on some of the notable teams that made their mark, at the finish line and in fashion statements. These included the blue jerseys of Alcyon, the French team whose riders won a dozen Tours de France on the way to victory in 120 world-class races; Legnano, the team of Gino Bartali, with its green jerseys with red sleeves; and Atala, a team that existed from 1908 to 1989, with striped jerseys (“reminiscent of the clothing you might expect jail inmates to wear”) and the company name in a flourished italic script.

The next section of the book deals with the World Champion's rainbow jersey, created in 1927, and a number of celebrated National Champion jerseys from the Promised Lands of Cycling: France, Belgium and Italy. It is clear that the author pines for the days of simpler jersey designs and disapproves of the watering-down of the impact of these iconic symbols, notably the Italian one which seems to have become subsumed in the colours of the team sponsor.

The Grand Tour jerseys, on the other hand, still retain their power, although it seems as if Vuelta organizers have not always been ready to settle on a particular colour for their race leader so the three jerseys of the Tour—yellow, green, and polka dot—and the Giro's maglia rosa get subchapters to themselves. The Yellow Jersey, introduced in 1919, may be the single most celebrated article of clothing in sports.

1966 Tour de France: eventual winner Lucien Aumar following Raymond Poulidor

There is so much in this book that is of interest that it is surprising it is only 224 pages in length. It covers national team jerseys, special track jerseys, and jerseys from particularly notable epochs of cycling: the 1920s and then each decade on from the 1950s. The greats of cycling were always closely identified with their jerseys: Poulidor with Mercier-BP-Hutchinson; Coppi with Bianchi; Hinault with La Vie Claire; Indurain with Banesto; Boonen with QuickStep; Merckx with Faema and then Molteni; De Vlaeminck with Brooklyn; Simpson with Peugeot. There is a fine selection of photos of these riders in their prime and the accompanying text is packed with unfamiliar facts or some that are just good to savour again:

“The man with the most yellow jerseys to his name is Eddy Merckx, who wore it 96 times between 1969 and 1975, on the way to winning five Tours de France. Another five-time winner, Bernard Hinault of France, is second, with 73 days in yellow....Only four men have held the Tour de France yellow jersey every day from start to finish of a single Tour...”

Jacques Anquetil (left), one of France's greatest cyclists, never won the French National Championship

Along with the history of the teams we are given an enlightening look at the development of the jersey from the sweater to a sort of polo shirt with front pockets, from wool to not-entirely-succesful wool/synthetic blends to the current clothing made from high-tech materials that fit the form exactly, so that time trial skinsuits, meant for the aero position, are actually awkward to walk in. There are different weights for different weather and a range of designs that vary from simple and elegant to garish and, well, embarrassing. The book concludes with modern jerseys, and a set of the jerseys used in the 2016 UCI World Tour.

Les bleus--the 2016 French National Team

It is perhaps to the author's credit that he does not single out the worst jersey designs of the past (and present). The famous saying “de gustibus non est disputandum” (“there is no disputing about taste”) probably applies here since everyone has their own views. For example, the Mapei jersey, with its vibrantly coloured plastic blocks, seems to annoy many but is also considered a classic. Mr. Sidwells is keen on the Carrera outfit, with its psuedo-denim look, and worn most effectively by Stephen Roche in his miraculous year (the Giro, the Tour, the Worlds) in 1987. So we are not given a chance to ridicule bad designs; I leave it to the reader to look up the 2010 Footon-Servetto team kit or the Castorama ones that made the riders look like housepainters or toys from Gepetto's workshop. Brrr...

This book focuses entirely on professional racing and does not cover the clothing choices of enthusiastic amateurs. The introduction by former Bicycling Editor-in-chief Bill Strickland is more tuned to this element:

“The jersey! The most dominant value of the cycling aesthetic, and one of its simplest components, yet also the one most laden with subtext and potential ironies and sincerities and affiliations and memories and references often unknown to the wearer A jersey can be a nod to a team, a racer, an era, a fabric, a design sense, a remembrance, a personal experience, an aspiration, or else simply come in a color we really like and that happened to be in our size.”

We are not going to enter the argument of whether it is good or bad form for amateurs to wear pro team kit—fans in other sports have no issues with this—but just remember that in his early racing days Greg Lemond showed up in a yellow jersey to the amusement of other competitors whom he then thrashed.

I would like to admit that I have a 2001 Mapei World Championship jersey (Oscar Freire's second title) that I wear but I only wear it while on my home trainer in the basement and never, ever outdoors where someone could see me.

Except for the jersey I look nothing like this.  Photo credit: Mapei Madness

All photos courtesy of Rodale Books unless otherwise noted


“The Art of the Cycling Jersey—Iconic Cycle Wear Past and Present”

by Chris Sidwells

224 pp., hardcover, profusely illustrated

Rodale Books, 2017

ISBN: 978-1623367374

Suggested Price: US$27.99/C$32.50

For more information: https://www.rodalebooks.com/art-of-the-cycling-jersey/

Carlton Reid's Next Literary Effort

After his excellent "Roads Were Not Built for Cars," which I reviewed here a short time ago, Carlton Reid is continuing his story up until the present day as bicycles--once derided as toys then accepted as a symbol of modernity and mainstream only to sink back to toy status--has now launched a Kickstarter campaign to fund his next book, "Bike Boom."  Judging from the quality of the first book, the new one will be definitely worth having.  Join track and Tour de France star Chris Boardman and myself in supporting this publication, which will be coming out in April 2016 if all goes well!  As of today he has found 151 backers and reached 86% of his funding goal but I am sure more money would always be welcome for a project like this!

Book Review: One More Kilometre and We're in the Showers, by Tim Hilton

A charming and eccentric book about a cycling communist...

“One More Kilometre and We’re in the Showers” is a typically English book in its meandering, delightful and often elegiac style. Tim (Timoshenko!) Hilton grew up as the child of ardent British communists and this book is his memoir of cycling in the UK from the 1950s to the 1970s.

The account of the Thursday evenings spent forced to listen to dreadful Marxist pontificating is quite funny, in a grim way, as young Tim dreams of getting out on his bicycle, a symbol of freedom, and escaping the Stalinist environment at home. His first bicycle was an ASP–All Spare Parts–assembled by a rider from the local club. Much of the book is about “clubmen,” and Mr. Hilton lovingly rolls through an alphabetical list of cycling clubs, many of which have ebbed and flowed but most of which were quirky enough: the Buckshee Wheelers, who served in North Africa in World War Two and raced in the desert; the Velo Club Pierre; the Out-of-Work Wheelers; the Scrumpy Wheelers; and the mysterious Rosslyn Ladies, who may or may not have existed at all. Many clubs were formed by admirers of a weekly newspaper called the Clarion, founded in 1892, and dedicated to a kind of relaxed socialism and although the name Clarion appeared in many bicycle club names, they were unaffiliated.

England was, at least in cycling terms, astonishingly provincial in Mr. Hilton’s time. Road races were not allowed and serious British cyclists were relegated to time trialling, developing this into a sort of national speciality as they set records from point-to-point. Those who wanted to do mass start races broke off into a new group, the BLRC, the British League of Racing Cyclists, and were seen as rebels, banned from the more conservative National Cycling Union, which was really more interested in cycletouring anyway. Mr. Hilton describes the leading “Leaguers,” such as Percy Stallard and who engineered the first BLRC road race in June 1942, in enjoyable detail.

But in addition to now-obscure local heroes, Mr. Hilton also reserves space for the great riders of his generation: Fausto Coppi, in the twilight of his career; Jacques Anquetil, the apprentice-soon-to-be-master; Louison Bobet, of the Spartan diet and training regime; the beautiful Hugo Koblet of Switzerland–Tour de France winners all. It is about Coppi that he is particularly eloquent–il Campionissimo, who was already fading away, a man burned out, when Mr. Hilton saw him race at an omnium in the Parc des Princes velodrome in Paris in the early 1950s:

Coppi was then thirty-four or thirty-five years of age, but appeared to be somehow ageless, or beyond age, his long thin body and melancholy features carved out by years and decades of suffering. The crowd paid him homage. Men and women acknowledged his tribulations and fate. Everyone knew that he was near to his end. There was no cheering....Even an adolescent such as myself realised that the occasion had a sacramental air–a ritual in honour of Coppi’s age, weariness and fragility.

Another fascinating character is the remarkable Beryl Burton, an amateur time triallist who was one of the best cyclists in Britain–man or woman–for more than 25 years. She was obsessive to the point that when her daughter outsprinted her in a local race she did not speak to her for a year afterwards. Her life was all about labour and training, and when she died at the age of 59 in 1996 it was from having a heart attack while riding her bicycle. Legendary in Britain, she never received much notice outside of the UK but then women were ignored by the cycling establishment generally. Women cyclists were excluded from the Olympics, for example, until 1984.

Ray Booty, time trial hero

I was very interested in reading the account of Ray Booty's record in the Bath Road 100, done in under 4 hours in late summer 1956. I had never heard of Ray Booty until I heard Alexander von Tutschek speak at Le Cirque de Cyclisme in June about being a collector in Britain. He spoke of how impressed he had been as a boy with Ray Booty's record (which stood for six years) and that one of the high points of his collecting life was to actually purchase Ray Booty's Raleigh Record used in the ride. Alexander von Tutschek was keen to get the bicycle not only for its historical meaning to him but because he himself is very tall and Ray Booty, at 6 feet 2 inches, was riding a 25 inch (63.5 cm) frame! The bicycle has been restored to what it would have been like in 1955, and there is an excellent description of it, fixed gear and all, here.

Tom Simpson, another Leaguer, also receives attention from Mr. Hilton and you realize why the cyclist still has such a strong grip on the British imagination even today. His dramatic death on Mt. Ventoux overshadows his great success as an international cyclist. He used drugs to drive himself through the races but reading this book you realize the degree of suffering, often for little reward, endured by these cyclists from another era and it is hard to be judgmental. To quote L.P. Hartley: “The past is a foreign country: they do things differently there.”

Part personal memoir, part reflection on contemporary cycling history, “One More Kilometre and We’re in the Showers” is an idiosyncratic work by someone who clearly loves the sport of cycling. Recommended for all comrades!

Book Review: Bike Cult, by David Perry

Bike Cult?–Seems Normal to Me

This is a great book, and it is unfortunate that it no longer seems to be in print. At time of its release in 1995, “Bike Cult” was the first attempt at an encyclopedia of cycling. This fat book (570 rather dense pages) covers the history of the bicycle its high-performance engine (that is, the human body), the bicycle as transportation and, lastly, the culture of the bicycle and the effect it has had on the human spirit.

There have been some changes in bicycle technology since 1995, and of course the tables of race winners is out of date, but “Bike Cult” remains a fascinating look into the origins and use of “the perfect machine.” I enjoyed the lovingly described history, which not only went over the bicycle as a whole but devotes sections to individual parts of the bike, such as handlebars and seats, and the whole question of how a bicycle is steered. It is a mad compendium of information: there is a list of international names for bicycles and related items on page 99, and we learn that the Hawaiian word for bicycle is ka’a paikikala, while in Uruguay it is known as a chiba.

The benefits of cycling are described in detail but there is no attempt to shield us from descriptions of bicycle ailments discovered in the heyday of cycling in the 1890s. However, in these times of great concern about the rise of obesity in America and Europe it is clear that the bicycle offers a solution, particularly when we read that Tour de France riders burn 6,000-9,000 calories per day!

But where are we to ride, given the modern, car-centric world we live in? The section of the book entitled “Bikeable Planet” is beguiling. For a brief and glorious moment, bicycles were actually seen as the best transportation alternative for the West and in some countries they still are. Too often derided as a child’s toy and treated by motorists as a menace, the bicycle can, with proper planning, be integrated into an urban transportation network. Low-cost in terms of acquisition, space requirements and maintenance, the bicycle in operation does not pollute, create noise or horrific traffic congestion. In the United States alone each year more than 40,000 people are killed in traffic accidents. Nonetheless, those who would propose bicycle-inclusive transportation systems are often derided as dreamers or utopian socialists or worse. This section of “Bike Cult” is provocative but perhaps only because our society has gone in such an illogical direction. Even today, Time magazine can run an article about how individuals can reduce carbon emissions, listing 51 ways to do so and not mentioning bicycles.

Author David Perry then takes us on a tour of cycling as a sport, including not only the expected pro racing/Tour de France information, but also strange sports such as Indoor Cycling and Bicycle Polo. Then our long journey takes us into art and bicycles and fashion and bicycles and even sex and bicycles.

There is a Bike Cult website maintained by David Perry, but it is really just a collection of links for the cycling community based in New York.

“Whoever invented the bicycle deserves the thanks of humanity,” said Lord Charles Beresford. And we should thank David Perry for this enchanting and entertaining look at the bicycle in all its forms and seasons. This is the kind of book that gives pleasure every time one opens it, reading at random. Addictive! It went through four printings and there were 20,000 copies made so if you are lucky you will locate one to cherish.

Book Review: The Six Day Bicycle Races: America’s Jazz-Age Sport, or perhaps, They Shoot Cyclists, Don’t They?

Once upon a time, in a very different America where spectators wore suits and ties and really nice hats to sporting events, bicycle track racing reigned as the most popular athletic pastime in the land after the Black Sox scandal of 1919 turned the fans away from baseball. Basketball was collegiate and pro football was marginal but cycling drew the crowds, brought in the money --cycling star Bobby Walthour Sr. earned four times as much as baseball legend Ty Cobb-- and regaled the nation with its astonishing mixture of speed, danger, film stars, underworld figures and larger-than-life riders and promoters. On a Saturday night an army of carpenters would move into an empty arena or hall and typically assemble 60,000 board feet of high-grade pine or spruce into a track, ready to be used by Sunday evening, the air redolent with fresh-cut wood. By the following Sunday the track was gone, sold for firewood, and the circus headed to another location. And this circus, once front-page news, faded away with the Jazz Age, almost without a trace.

Peter Nye’s latest book is a companion piece to the recent television documentary, “The Six Day Bicycle Races.” It is a very handsome work featuring a superb collection of photographs. Divided into twenty-six chapters, the book begins with the origins of the Six Day Races in England, its importation and enlargement in the United States, and goes on to provide profiles of stars including the Walthour family, Floyd MacFarland, Alf Goullet and Reggie McNamara as well as celebrated promoters Tex Rickard and John Chapman. There are fascinating insights into track construction, diet (stimulants were not unknown) and the work of the mechanics. From this book, it seems that many of the participants were real characters: trainer “Roaring Jack” Neville–so named for his behavior after a few drinks– created stopwatch-based training in the 1890s, coached world champions for three decades and claimed to have never ridden a bike.

In an era that produced dance marathons where participants danced until they dropped, it should be no surprise that track racing was brutally dangerous. In addition to dealing with tracks that were sometimes poorly designed so that control was difficult, riders had to contend with splinters, broken noses and collarbones, and occasional opponents who were not above fisticuffs. The cyclists rode in two-man teams and if one cyclist was unable to continue his partner would wait around and join up with another “orphaned” rider. Racers with broken bones paid their own medical bills. In the words of Reggie McNamara: “What else can you expect from a job like ours? If you can’t take it, you should try your hand at something else. This is a man’s affair.” Of course, the original Six Day Races were contested by solo riders until laws were enacted to prevent anyone from competing for more than twelve hours a day after complaints from spectators who watched exhausted cyclists tip over after falling asleep on their bikes. Promoter Bill Brady of Madison Square Gardens in New York created races with two man teams in 1898 and they became known as “Madisons,” setting the stage for three decades of colorful competition.

With successful races in the United States, with an impressive degree of international rider participation, American promoters took the Six Day Races to Europe, where they met with huge success as well. But eventually the Damon Runyons and the James Thurbers stopped writing about the Six Day Races and interest began to wane during the Great Depression. The last Six Day Race at Madison Square Gardens took place in November 1939. But the story does not quite end there as the tradition of Six Day Races continues in Belgium, Switzerland and Germany, where the crowds drink beer and lustily cheer every brave attempt to lap the field.

It is said that the silent movie is a unique art form in that it has a known beginning and a known end. So too was six day racing in America. This book, constantly filled with surprises and glorious pictures, is an excellent history of a sport that once was in a time so different from ours.



The Six Day Bicycle Races: America’s Jazz-Age Sport
by Peter Joffre Nye, with Jeff Groman and Mark Tyson
Van der Plas Publications/Cycle Publishing, San Francisco 2006
US$ 39.95

A Book Review: The Rider, by Tim Krabbé

An utterly engrossing book, "The Rider" by Tim Krabbé is a first-person account of a competitor in a French amateur cycling race. Kilometer by kilometer, the author describes, economically, but with plausible feeling, the range of emotions he goes through. It is clear that he rides for the love of cycling, but his writing reveals the mental calculations, often not very flattering, that go through the mind of a rider. A chess player, he is out on the road playing a form of chess with his opponents, considering their weaknesses, weighing their histories, examining his own position on the board, so to speak.

In this short book about a 150 km long race, Tim Krabbé also travels back in his mind, recalling legends of bike racing as well as his own dreams of sporting success in Holland. These include some wonderful absurdist episodes, including a brief "Little ABC of Road Racing" where he fantasizes about riding with Merckx and Anquetil and the other greats in a series of bizarre circumstances. And all through this one is conscious of the race going on, the change of scenery and weather and how the cyclist must constantly monitor his situation-now trying to make up for his downhill lack of skills, now attacking as the others weaken, now preparing for a sprint. One is struck by the fundamental cruelty of the sport, how one must endure pain and inflict it as well.

Anyone who has ridden fairly seriously will love this book, as will those who admire strong, clean writing. The author has brilliantly portrayed a concentrated moment. This is a world of intense focus and narrow but exhilarating boundaries.