Friends: I had designs on camping beside the towering Henri Desgrange monument honoring the founder of the Tour de France on the Galibier last night, but it was cold up there at over 6,000 feet with lingering patches of snow, and even worse, strong, gusting winds, so I descended fifteen miles, almost to Briançon, where today's epic alpine stage concludes, camping besides a nice big roll of hay in a grasshopper-infested field.
The Galibier was Desgrange's favorite mountain pass, and is a Tour regular, with only the Tourmalet in the Pyrenees included more often. Desgrange said all other Tour climbs were gnat's piss in comparison. Its summit offers a spectacular panorama of snow-covered peaks in all directions. The climb to its summit is a brute, especially from the north, as this year's route followed. From that direction the beyond category climb up the Galibier is preceded by the category one Col de Telegraph with only a brief three mile relatively flat interlude through the ski town of Valloire, making it a virtually uninterrupted steep climb of nearly twenty miles, a most demanding test.
Yesterday was an absolutely perfect day to be climbing it. Even though it was the first of two rest day for the racers, the Galibier was already closed to motorized traffic other than official Tour vehicles and those on motorcycles. There were hundreds on bikes though, inching their way up the mountain. Motorists were allowed as far as Valloire. It wasn't so pleasant struggling up the 7.5 miles of the Col de Telegraph contending with the steady stream of cars, motor homes and trucks, but that made the surprise closure of the Galibier all the more sweet. It was necessary, as already the 11.5 miles of the Galibier climb were packed with motor homes and tenters in cars. With no L'Alpe d'Huez this year, the Galibier becomes the glamor climb and the wise flocked early.
Despite the steady file of cyclists, no one was going fast enough for there to be any drafting. Other than the occasional mountain bike, just about everyone but me was riding a super-light racing bike. Those already stationed along the road, as well as passing cyclists, accorded me a non-stop chorus of most genuine "Bravos" with the occasional "Chapeau" (a tip of the hat) and other comments of respect, including someone with limited English, assuming that was my language, saying "very good, respect." The topper was a guy giving an all-out effort himself on a light-weight racing bike, who gasped to his friends, "Fucking hell," at the sight of me on my bike with gear alone that weighed three times as much as the bike he was pedaling. The climb had me at my limit, leaving me the most exhausted I've been on this tour, but at least there were no killer, inhuman grades as in Wales and Scotland, though when it got to ten per cent for one short stretch up in that thinning air and after miles of climbing, it took a comparable extreme effort to keep the wheels turning.
I anticipated seeing people pausing at the one-third or half-way points of the two climbs as I thought I might, but few people paused at any point other than to take a photo here and there. The biggest congregation was two miles from the summit where "The Devil," in uniform, was painting his trademark tridents on the road, warning the peloton that he was imminent. An official Tour vehicle had even stopped. Its occupants joined the line to have their photograph taken with him. Despite his celebrity The Tour broadcasters don't seem to make an effort to include him when the peloton passes him.
Only once this year have I glimpsed him in the background hopping up and down, waving his trident, without any comment from the broadcasters. If they truly wished to give him a close-up, it would be easy enough to do with all the motorcycle cameramen on the course. His road graffiti is easily spotted from the air, so the helicopters shooting the race could notify the producers where he was. But he is a big enough star that he doesn't need any more air time other than what he receives. When I was in London, a half-hour BBC radio show devoted to the Tour was promoed with "The Yellow Jersey and the Devil come to London." If he spoke English, I would have shown him the photo of he and I that appeared in "The Reader," though he would probably have been nonplussed, since he so regularly turns up in cycling and other publications.
After today the Tour and I will part company for several days, as tomorrow's stage starts in a town 115 miles from here, the first long, long transfer between stage finishes and stage starts. Its no great disaster, as The Tour will leave the mountains for a week or so before reaching the Pyrenees. I've been lucky there hasn't been a transfer of over thirty miles so far this year, enabling me to keep up over the first ten legs, the best I've managed in the four years I've been doing this. Last year a fifty-mile transfer after the fourth stage did me in. After that it took me a week to catch back up. I'm hoping to regain The Tour this year on Saturday for the time trial in Albi. The ride there will be nice, as it always is in France, but it will be a marked contrast to the divine aura of being on the Tour route. There is truly nothing to compare.
Early Sunday morning, as I passed through Faverges on the Tour route, just before the category-two climb over the Col de Tamie, I came upon a couple of grandmothers outside the town bakery, clutching their daily baguettes, engaged in conversation. It was quiet enough I could hear their animated chatter as I approached. At the site of me, they both simultaneously blurted a quick, impulsive, "allez, allez," perhaps in mid-sentence, then resumed wherever they had left off. It was Tour de France day for their community and they were primed and ready.
A while later, well up the six-mile climb, a trio of teen-aged boys accorded me the similar double-pronged greeting. I was ready, tossing them a spare trinket from the caravan I had been hoarding, a model car. I could see them scramble for it, and then maybe five or six seconds later, after I was well up the road and they'd had a chance to examine it, I heard a shout of "Merci Monsieur," which I acknowledged with a wave of my hand without even looking back. The "Merci" was nice, but the added "Monsieur" even nicer, a testament to the French politeness and respect.
Riding the Tour route, my day abounds with such incidents, any of which would make my day. Any time a site attracts my camera, I am again struck by the sensation that there is no place I would rather be. On the outskirts of a logging town in the mountains the locals had constructed a "Vive Le Tour" sign spelled out in logs. Just beyond was a logo of 2007 arranged to look like a person on a bike with the 0s the wheels and the 2 and 7 superimposed to be the rider. I had to stop a second time in the middle of the town for another photo, when I came upon an even larger version hanging from a crane with a large sign beside it saluting a local rider who had won a stage of The Tour in the '60s.
Cranes are frequently enlisted for a salute of some sort. A factory along the route was framed by two towering cranes 100 feet high to form a gigantic, utterly boggling, arch of suspended bicycles, over 100 of them, with twenty or so wheel-to-wheel across between the two cranes and another fifty dangling from each. It had to be a huge undertaking to collect all the bikes and then link them together. It would have been even more spectacular if the peloton could have ridden underneath it, but there wasn't the space on either side of the road to anchor both cranes, so they had to remain in the yard of the factory. It was just another of the countless examples along The Tour route demonstrating the French love for The Tour and the extremes they go to express it.
Early in the day towns are bustling with locals putting the final touches on their decorations, hanging banners and streamers and bunting and balloons and ribbons and flowers, real and artificial. One town lined their Tour route with recently cut sun-flowers each in a pail of water. Another town wrapped every lamp post with yellow paper eight feet high with a green bow on top.
The route is also alive in those early hours with the army of Tour workers putting up barriers and straw bales protecting hazards. They also mount arches at the various sprint points and at the summits of the climbs, as well as signs announcing one and five kilometers to the sprint and the summit and the feed zone. They also erect gigantic inflated arches twenty-five and twenty and ten kilometers from the finish. Workers are also busy hanging sponsor banners that go on for 100 meters or more on barricades along the course.
Another early morning feature of the race is the dispensing of the gendarmes. It can be a minor bane getting caught behind the bus dropping them off at every road that intersects the route, no matter how inconsequential. There can be a line of cars caught behind it making it even more of a headache. The gendarmes often take up their posts by nine a.m., hours and hours before the racers will pass. It is a long day for them, standing out in the sun in the middle of nowhere for eight hours or more.
Although it would be nice to be up there on the Galibier today as the racers pass, it will be even nicer to be at the finish line here in Briançon in front of the giant screen watching their progress up the Telegraph and the Galibier and the moment by moment dramatics of attacks and riders being dropped. Sunday I had the pleasure of watching the final three hours of the day's stage over three category one climbs in a bar in Albertville, forty miles into the day's stage. I had just ridden those forty miles, which included climbs of categories two, three and four, arriving in Albertville with ample time to find the Internet before the caravan, then the racers passed through. But it being a Sunday, the town, even one as large as this, was virtually closed down. As soon as the peloton passed, I sped to a bar for the rest of the day's action.
The announcers could barely keep up with all the stories unfolding up and down the course--the Dane Rasmussen breaking away, assuming not only the polka dot jersey but the yellow, the Aussie Rogers crashing on a descent while in the lead group of five with Rasmussen and having to abandon several miles further in tears, the great French hope Moreau repeatedly attacking but getting no support, the Spaniard Mayo breaking away from the chase group, the Katzathan favorite Vinokurov failing to respond to the attacks as the announcers exclaimed "The favorite of The Tour is in trouble," Vinokurov's German teammate Kloden sacrificing his own chances trying to pace him back to the leaders or at least limit his losses while not having to expend energy on his own, the American Hincapie hanging in there with a chase group for a while and later two of his Discovery teammates looking like threats, the German yellow jersey wearer lagging behind. And all the while, as they were climbing close to their limits, we're all waiting to see who has what in them to keep up or to get away. It was bike racing of its highest form and there will be more today. I can hardly wait.
Later, George
Tuesday, July 17, 2007
Friday, July 13, 2007
Bourg-en-Besse, France
Friends: It is Day Seven of The Tour and I'm still keeping up. I'm, in fact, four hours ahead of the peloton, awaiting their arrival here in Bourg-en-Bresse. I'm having my best Tour ever, averaging 125 miles a day and ten hours in the saddle since coming over from the UK. I'm lucky to get seven hours of sleep a night, riding until dark around ten, but I'm as well-trained as if I'd been following a Randy Warren regime.
Tomorrow brings the Alps. That will be the real test. It is well I arrived so early here as I desperately needed to find a bike store to replace my tires. The rear had 4,000 miles on it and the front 6,000. The rear had worn through the tread to the white inner layer. Finding an open bike store along The Tour route has been even harder than finding an Internet outlet. I thought I might have been saved when the support vehicle of an Australian-guided tour group I had ridden with for a couple of hours two days ago stopped at the summit of a category four climb this morning just head of me, awaiting its clients with food and drink. Unfortunately, the only tires they had were way too skinny for me.
But my tire held out for thirty miles more and then hallelujah, there was a Decathlon sporting goods store, a big European chain, on my way into Bourg-en-Besse, so I didn't even have to go out of my way to find a bike store. When I arrived at Compeigne three hours ahead of the peloton Tuesday, three days ago, I thought I had ample time to find a bicycle store and fulfill my Internet duties, but I was trapped on the wrong side of the barriers at the finish line in the Plaza de Gaulle, frustrating not only my pursuit of the bike store and the Internet, but also of food. It wasn't all bad, as I could sit in front of the monstrous screen televising the peloton's progress over roads I had just ridden and let my legs soak up some rest. The legs got an extra hour of it as the peloton took it easy on this 147 mile stage, the longest of this year's Tour, arriving an hour behind schedule at 6:30 rather than the usual 5:30, a valuable hour for me to get further down the road, but also an extra hour of respite for my legs.
As I sat there, I scribbled out what I would have been typing at a computer outlet while eating the only food I had left--two cans of baked beans and half a pound of nuts. I was able to supplement it, however, with pickings from the caravan--pretzels, a thumb-sized sausage, a packet of cheese and some candy. The only food I missed out on was a mini-bottle of yogurt. I scored big, as there were few people on my side of the barrier. I nabbed something from more than half the 45 sponsors tossing stuff, my best percentage ever. I've been stockpiling, so I can do some tossing myself to those who cheer me as I lead out the proceedings.
Anyway, here's what I would have sent on Tuesday could I have: Cops in three different countries have ordered me off my bike the past three days--England on Sunday, Belgium yesterday and today in France. I was close to where I needed to be along the road each time, so it wasn't too aggravating. It could have been catastrophic in England if I hadn't gotten as far out of London Saturday night as I did, as the English elected to close down the race course to bicyclists as well as motorists four hours before the racers were due to pass. The French policy has always been two hours. I was eight miles from the vantage point I wanted to reach, the closest point the route came to Dover and the ferry, about fifteen miles from the finish in Canterbury, and was able to find side roads to continue on. I was alarmed that this could be a new Tour policy, but an English cycling official explained that the English were overly concerned about course safety, as there had been a fatality in their national tour last year when a car slipped on to the course. They weren't about to let any such thing happen during The Tour with the world-wide attention it receives.
I was about the only one on a bike taking advantage of the closed route. There were already masses of people gathered, but little of the French tradition of decorating towns and homes and parked vehicles with something bicycle-related. Nor was there any writing on the road exhorting favorite riders and teams or causes, just an occasional banner from one of the several English bicycling organizations encouraging bicycle use. Transport for London was a leading sponsor of the race. It hoped The Tour would raise bicycling consciousness and "put the bike in the heart of Londoners." Signs and billboards advertised, "You're better off by bike" and "Extend your Life, Cycle." The latter was accompanied by an upright bike featuring a red, heart-shaped saddle. The Transport for London entry in the caravan was a float with a guy shouting most vehemently with machine-gun-rapidity to the thousands lining the course, "Get on your bikes! Get on your bikes!"
London's mayor is a strong bicycle advocate, a virtual zealot. He aggressively promotes bicycling to alleviate congestion and to clean up the air and improve health. He spoke at Friday night's team presentation. He said that in contrast to most cities who host the Tour, he was less interested in attracting tourists to London, than attracting people to the bicycle. His message in the program said, "I hope that it will inspire people to take up cycling for fun and to get around the city. It is, after all, a great way to improve your health and reduce your impact on the environment."
I was joined along the road on Sunday out in rural England by a pony-tailed Frenchman who had taken the ferry over with his bike that morning. He hadn't planned on coming to England for The Tour, but after seeing the tens of thousands lining the Prologue course the day before, he had to experience the English fervor himself, rather than waiting for The Tour to come to France. He was bubbling with pride at the tremendous reception it had received, comments I have heard from many others the past few days. The French are truly thrilled at the English response. It wasn't quite true of all the English though. One lunatic radio host was upset that his commute was delayed by The Tour road closures. He ranted and raved, "London has been in total gridlock for a race that has nothing to do with us." What will he say about the Olympics in 2012?
My French fellow comrade-of-the-bike and I gazed out on a road that was a virtual dead zone, bemoaning the wasted opportunity for cyclists to enjoy such a rare tranquility as they would in France. He was a life-long devotee of the Tour. Last year he had the once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to ride in a sponsor's car just behind the caravan the entire race route past the thousands and thousands along the road. He called it, "the best souvenir of my life."
Hardly a Tour is staged without a swing into Belgium, as the Belgians embrace it even more fervently than the French. The moment I entered Belgium, ten miles into Monday's stage that began in Dunkirk, the road was mobbed by a throng of boisterous fans, cup of beer in hand, even though it was only eleven and the peloton wasn't due for three hours.
The Belgian town of Oost-Cappel is my early favorite to win the award for best decorated town of the Tour. I could have spent a couple of hours photographing all the bicycle displays adorning virtually every business and home I passed in the town. Yellow and red polka dots and decorated bikes were everywhere. The coup de grace was a Buckminster Fuller geodesic dome made of bicycle frames.
I was pressed for time with course closure hanging over my head like a guillotine, so I had to pass up one spectacular photograph after another that abounded in Belgium--clusters of pre-teens Lycra-clad in their club uniforms eagerly awaiting their heroes, a white car decorated with red dots, a phalanx of nursing home residents in wheel chairs, the fire department hosing manure off the road, a red polka dot jersey on the hood of a car secured by a windshield wiper parked in a field with no other fans or cars in sight, elaborate picnic arrangements and on and on. Watching the racers pass gives a jolt of a thrill, but that is almost incidental to all these manifestations of devotion to the race and to the bicycle.
I only rode the first thirty miles of Monday's 105-mile route, halting at the point closest to where I could diverge toward the next day's route, which wound back into France. It was 98 miles due south. After the peloton passed me at 2:30, I had about 24 hours to bike 151 miles to reach Compeigne, tomorrow's stage finish. It was my first big challenge of this year's Tour, putting my fitness and good fortune to the test, and almost qualifying me for Paris-Brest-Paris if I pulled it off. I lost about an hour trying to navigate my way through the sprawling city of Lille in the evening rush hour after watching the crash-marred finish to Monday's stage, won by a Belgian, though not the favorite, Tom Boonen. He was nipped at the line by his team-mate and lead-out man Gert Steegman. Only several times before had a Belgian won a stage on home turf in the past 50 years--reason for great celebration there. Steegman was clearly ecstatic and Boonen clearly crestfallen, though he could have been happy for his teammate's success and also that his second consecutive second place finish had earned him the green jersey for the points classification of the race. But he is paid to win and that is where the glory is.
With the terrain relatively flat and the hint of a helpful northerly breeze, I knocked off 76 post-stage miles riding until 10:15, giving me 126 for the day, 21 more than the peloton. That left me 75 miles to the next day's finish line in Compeigne, which lies about 50 miles northeast of Paris and is the starting point for April's Paris-Roubaix classic. I was up at seven and off pedaling half an hour later. It was 22 miles to Ribemont, where I rejoined the race route and had those glorious markers guiding me the next 53 miles past early-arriving picnickers, many of whom were happy to "Bravo" the touring cyclist. I made it to within 250 meters of the finish line, where a swarm of gendarmes descended upon me. I had only one direction to go, off to the left, and that put me in a no-man's land where I was trapped for the next four hours.
After the racers arrived at 6:30 with Cancellera in yellow winning the sprint I went off in search of the town's lone Internet cafe. It was closed. It was no easy task finding the route out of town towards the next day's start town twenty miles away. As I headed in the direction I needed to go battling the throngs of fans, I ended up where all the team cars and buses were stationed. They were just preparing to head out. I was able to join in with them. I didn't arrive at the next town until after nine. I was in desperate need of food. Most grocery stores in France close by seven. I was forced to check the dumpster of the lone supermarket in the city, but it was behind a high barbed wire fence. I luckily happened upon a small Turkish fast food place selling felafel's. Then I went in search of the course markers and started biking the next day's route. I managed ten miles before dark, camping along side a field of potatoes.
And then got to get up and do it all over again.
Later, George
Tomorrow brings the Alps. That will be the real test. It is well I arrived so early here as I desperately needed to find a bike store to replace my tires. The rear had 4,000 miles on it and the front 6,000. The rear had worn through the tread to the white inner layer. Finding an open bike store along The Tour route has been even harder than finding an Internet outlet. I thought I might have been saved when the support vehicle of an Australian-guided tour group I had ridden with for a couple of hours two days ago stopped at the summit of a category four climb this morning just head of me, awaiting its clients with food and drink. Unfortunately, the only tires they had were way too skinny for me.
But my tire held out for thirty miles more and then hallelujah, there was a Decathlon sporting goods store, a big European chain, on my way into Bourg-en-Besse, so I didn't even have to go out of my way to find a bike store. When I arrived at Compeigne three hours ahead of the peloton Tuesday, three days ago, I thought I had ample time to find a bicycle store and fulfill my Internet duties, but I was trapped on the wrong side of the barriers at the finish line in the Plaza de Gaulle, frustrating not only my pursuit of the bike store and the Internet, but also of food. It wasn't all bad, as I could sit in front of the monstrous screen televising the peloton's progress over roads I had just ridden and let my legs soak up some rest. The legs got an extra hour of it as the peloton took it easy on this 147 mile stage, the longest of this year's Tour, arriving an hour behind schedule at 6:30 rather than the usual 5:30, a valuable hour for me to get further down the road, but also an extra hour of respite for my legs.
As I sat there, I scribbled out what I would have been typing at a computer outlet while eating the only food I had left--two cans of baked beans and half a pound of nuts. I was able to supplement it, however, with pickings from the caravan--pretzels, a thumb-sized sausage, a packet of cheese and some candy. The only food I missed out on was a mini-bottle of yogurt. I scored big, as there were few people on my side of the barrier. I nabbed something from more than half the 45 sponsors tossing stuff, my best percentage ever. I've been stockpiling, so I can do some tossing myself to those who cheer me as I lead out the proceedings.
Anyway, here's what I would have sent on Tuesday could I have: Cops in three different countries have ordered me off my bike the past three days--England on Sunday, Belgium yesterday and today in France. I was close to where I needed to be along the road each time, so it wasn't too aggravating. It could have been catastrophic in England if I hadn't gotten as far out of London Saturday night as I did, as the English elected to close down the race course to bicyclists as well as motorists four hours before the racers were due to pass. The French policy has always been two hours. I was eight miles from the vantage point I wanted to reach, the closest point the route came to Dover and the ferry, about fifteen miles from the finish in Canterbury, and was able to find side roads to continue on. I was alarmed that this could be a new Tour policy, but an English cycling official explained that the English were overly concerned about course safety, as there had been a fatality in their national tour last year when a car slipped on to the course. They weren't about to let any such thing happen during The Tour with the world-wide attention it receives.
I was about the only one on a bike taking advantage of the closed route. There were already masses of people gathered, but little of the French tradition of decorating towns and homes and parked vehicles with something bicycle-related. Nor was there any writing on the road exhorting favorite riders and teams or causes, just an occasional banner from one of the several English bicycling organizations encouraging bicycle use. Transport for London was a leading sponsor of the race. It hoped The Tour would raise bicycling consciousness and "put the bike in the heart of Londoners." Signs and billboards advertised, "You're better off by bike" and "Extend your Life, Cycle." The latter was accompanied by an upright bike featuring a red, heart-shaped saddle. The Transport for London entry in the caravan was a float with a guy shouting most vehemently with machine-gun-rapidity to the thousands lining the course, "Get on your bikes! Get on your bikes!"
London's mayor is a strong bicycle advocate, a virtual zealot. He aggressively promotes bicycling to alleviate congestion and to clean up the air and improve health. He spoke at Friday night's team presentation. He said that in contrast to most cities who host the Tour, he was less interested in attracting tourists to London, than attracting people to the bicycle. His message in the program said, "I hope that it will inspire people to take up cycling for fun and to get around the city. It is, after all, a great way to improve your health and reduce your impact on the environment."
I was joined along the road on Sunday out in rural England by a pony-tailed Frenchman who had taken the ferry over with his bike that morning. He hadn't planned on coming to England for The Tour, but after seeing the tens of thousands lining the Prologue course the day before, he had to experience the English fervor himself, rather than waiting for The Tour to come to France. He was bubbling with pride at the tremendous reception it had received, comments I have heard from many others the past few days. The French are truly thrilled at the English response. It wasn't quite true of all the English though. One lunatic radio host was upset that his commute was delayed by The Tour road closures. He ranted and raved, "London has been in total gridlock for a race that has nothing to do with us." What will he say about the Olympics in 2012?
My French fellow comrade-of-the-bike and I gazed out on a road that was a virtual dead zone, bemoaning the wasted opportunity for cyclists to enjoy such a rare tranquility as they would in France. He was a life-long devotee of the Tour. Last year he had the once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to ride in a sponsor's car just behind the caravan the entire race route past the thousands and thousands along the road. He called it, "the best souvenir of my life."
Hardly a Tour is staged without a swing into Belgium, as the Belgians embrace it even more fervently than the French. The moment I entered Belgium, ten miles into Monday's stage that began in Dunkirk, the road was mobbed by a throng of boisterous fans, cup of beer in hand, even though it was only eleven and the peloton wasn't due for three hours.
The Belgian town of Oost-Cappel is my early favorite to win the award for best decorated town of the Tour. I could have spent a couple of hours photographing all the bicycle displays adorning virtually every business and home I passed in the town. Yellow and red polka dots and decorated bikes were everywhere. The coup de grace was a Buckminster Fuller geodesic dome made of bicycle frames.
I was pressed for time with course closure hanging over my head like a guillotine, so I had to pass up one spectacular photograph after another that abounded in Belgium--clusters of pre-teens Lycra-clad in their club uniforms eagerly awaiting their heroes, a white car decorated with red dots, a phalanx of nursing home residents in wheel chairs, the fire department hosing manure off the road, a red polka dot jersey on the hood of a car secured by a windshield wiper parked in a field with no other fans or cars in sight, elaborate picnic arrangements and on and on. Watching the racers pass gives a jolt of a thrill, but that is almost incidental to all these manifestations of devotion to the race and to the bicycle.
I only rode the first thirty miles of Monday's 105-mile route, halting at the point closest to where I could diverge toward the next day's route, which wound back into France. It was 98 miles due south. After the peloton passed me at 2:30, I had about 24 hours to bike 151 miles to reach Compeigne, tomorrow's stage finish. It was my first big challenge of this year's Tour, putting my fitness and good fortune to the test, and almost qualifying me for Paris-Brest-Paris if I pulled it off. I lost about an hour trying to navigate my way through the sprawling city of Lille in the evening rush hour after watching the crash-marred finish to Monday's stage, won by a Belgian, though not the favorite, Tom Boonen. He was nipped at the line by his team-mate and lead-out man Gert Steegman. Only several times before had a Belgian won a stage on home turf in the past 50 years--reason for great celebration there. Steegman was clearly ecstatic and Boonen clearly crestfallen, though he could have been happy for his teammate's success and also that his second consecutive second place finish had earned him the green jersey for the points classification of the race. But he is paid to win and that is where the glory is.
With the terrain relatively flat and the hint of a helpful northerly breeze, I knocked off 76 post-stage miles riding until 10:15, giving me 126 for the day, 21 more than the peloton. That left me 75 miles to the next day's finish line in Compeigne, which lies about 50 miles northeast of Paris and is the starting point for April's Paris-Roubaix classic. I was up at seven and off pedaling half an hour later. It was 22 miles to Ribemont, where I rejoined the race route and had those glorious markers guiding me the next 53 miles past early-arriving picnickers, many of whom were happy to "Bravo" the touring cyclist. I made it to within 250 meters of the finish line, where a swarm of gendarmes descended upon me. I had only one direction to go, off to the left, and that put me in a no-man's land where I was trapped for the next four hours.
After the racers arrived at 6:30 with Cancellera in yellow winning the sprint I went off in search of the town's lone Internet cafe. It was closed. It was no easy task finding the route out of town towards the next day's start town twenty miles away. As I headed in the direction I needed to go battling the throngs of fans, I ended up where all the team cars and buses were stationed. They were just preparing to head out. I was able to join in with them. I didn't arrive at the next town until after nine. I was in desperate need of food. Most grocery stores in France close by seven. I was forced to check the dumpster of the lone supermarket in the city, but it was behind a high barbed wire fence. I luckily happened upon a small Turkish fast food place selling felafel's. Then I went in search of the course markers and started biking the next day's route. I managed ten miles before dark, camping along side a field of potatoes.
And then got to get up and do it all over again.
Later, George
Sunday, July 8, 2007
Ashford, England
Friends: The London prologue course was extraordinarily fan-friendly. There were large screens all along the five-mile course, roughly three to the mile. In France there is usually just one at the finish line. London provided a further super-bonus with the non-stop, commercial-free commentary of Phil and Paul for over four hours. They kept it fresh, hardly needing to recycle their material, commenting on each of the 189 competitors as they were released on to the course, one per minute. They provided a wealth of most-illuminating information.
I alternated between the screen in front of 10 Downing Street, just two blocks from the ramp launching each rider, and the next screen down the course in the shadow of Big Ben in a park that an Iraqi war protester has been encamped at for four years causing quite a national ruckus. For two-and-a-half hours before the racing commenced I remained at a choice spot in the shade leaning against a course barrier. Riders were warming up and familiarizing themselves with the course. By the time the caravan of sponsors came by, the fans were three or four deep behind me. There weren't a great many goodies to grab, as England was only treated to a caravan-sampler. Not even half of the 200 plus vehicles of the caravan made the trip across the Channel. There were no Super Champion polka dot hats, as there was no need for the super market chain to waste its advertising in a country where they have no stores.
The biggest disappointment was the daily Tour newspaper, that is always full of interesting features, was not being distributed. I was curious if there would be an English version, or if it would remain in French. There were the usual magnets and candy and key chains, as well as the pair of floats spraying water on the crowd, but no wristbands in this sampler. Last year five of the 40 sponsors added to the glut of wristbands in the universe. The best new give-away was a mini-reflective bib that slips over one's head. It has a yellow-green triangle front and back, lined and dabbed with silver reflective material. And it was branded with the Tour logo. I will be trying for as many of those as I can get in the days to come.
I was joined at the railing by a slight 50-year old guy on crutches. He had gashed his ankle with the crank of his bicycle in a track accident a couple months ago. He'd been a life-long racer, starting as a fifteen-year old junior. We talked racing non-stop for two-and-a-half hours like a couple of Americans talking baseball in the bleachers during batting practice. He was a dream rail-mate. He grew up not far from Tom Simpson and had an encyclopedic knowledge and insight into the sport. He was fanatic enough to buy the French sports paper "L'Equipe" during the Tour, arriving early enough at the sports stand that carried it to nab one of the three daily copies it received.
All too much of our talk centered on drugs. He remained an amateur, so he wasn't drawn into that side of the sport, but he was well aware of it. Early in his career he was shocked to see a semi-pro, competing in a race he was riding, pull out a syringe after about three-fourths of the race, jab it into his arm, toss it into the bushes and then a couple minutes later tear off down the road, winning the race by a couple of minutes. In all our talk he expressed no outrage, just a bit of sadness, that that is the way it is and always has been. He has no doubt that even Indurain, the Spanish great who won the Tour five straight times and seemed invincible until deposed by Bjarne Riis, who recently confessed to having been EPO-accelerated, was also a drug-taker.
But still my English rail mate loved the sport. And the specter of drugs had no effect on the crowd. The course was mobbed. I rode the course at nine a.m. There were already thousands encamped at the choice spot in front of Buckingham Palace and elsewhere along the course six hours before the racers were due to begin passing. I asked my friend if there was word if the Queen would be watching from a balcony. "I doubt it," he said, "She'll probably be too busy sorting out another family dispute." I was surprised there was hardly anyone else taking advantage of the opportunity to ride the course as I was. The Quick Step team with Tom Boonen was the only team out that early, riding at a moderate enough pace that I could have latched on to the former World Champion's wheel and ridden along in his draft.
I reluctantly tore myself from the Prologue after 45 minutes, as I needed to load up my bike and start riding the next day's course so I would be far enough out of the urban sprawl by dark to find a place to camp. I got about 25 miles down the road past the Greenwich Meridan line, before I stopped at a bar to watch the last 40 minutes of the Prologue. For a while it looked like the American George Hincapie would finish second, just as he did last year, but the Swiss favorite, Fabian Cancellara, stomped the field, earning the yellow, which he will probably keep for a few days. The two English hopes fell considerably short.
I'm now 100 miles down the course. The peloton will be here in three hours. I plan to ride a further twelve miles down the course after I sign off here and watch the caravan and peloton pass, then find a bar to watch the finish and then ride another twelve miles to Dover for the ferry to France. I ought to arrive on the Continent with an hour or so of daylight, enough time to get out into the country for a place to camp. Tomorrow's stage heads to Belgium. I'll ride the first half of the course and then cut over and start in on stage three ahead of the field. I am looking forward to not only the drastically cheaper prices of France, but also its respectful, or at least tolerant, drivers, in contrast to what I've encountered here.
The English don't recklessly tailgate as the French do or come flying out of nowhere as they do, which would have been highly treacherous with the hedge-lined winding narrow roads that give limited visibility, but the English rarely defer to the cyclist as the French do. They drive with great aggression despite the signs outside every town asking drivers to be considerate and the frequent signs along the road announcing the casualty statistics for the upcoming stretch--35 deaths in the next three miles over the past three years and such.
It was rare to have such a genuine give-and-take sharing conversation as I had preceding the prologue. More often than not what conversations I had with the English were one-sided affairs, and hardly conversations at all, more opportunities for someone to pontificate or preach. But those rare people who weren't so self-possessed were gems I could have developed a genuine friendship with. My racing friend could well turn into a lifelong email friend to discuss racing matters with. He offered me his email address even before I had a chance to ask him for it. It is just such people that make these dates with the Tour such a great success. I know there will be many more to come.
Later, George
Friday, July 6, 2007
London
Friends: Tom Boonen, Tour de France veteran and leader of the Belgian Quick Step team, looked out over Trafalgar Square and told the gathered that he had never seen such a large crowd at a Tour de France presentation. Me neither. The crowd spilled down the surrounding half dozen streets that radiate out of the plaza and beyond.
Since early in the day Friday, all streets within half a mile of the Square had been closed off to motorized traffic, once again proving the magnitude and the power of the Tour. It dwarfs all else and draws like nothing else. More than a million people are expected to line the five-mile prologue course tomorrow, rivaling the numbers for the L'Alpe d'Huez time trial a couple years ago. It starts just down the street from Trafalgar on Whitehall, goes past Ten Downing Street, then over and around Hyde Park, before heading back to near its starting point with Buckingham Palace in the background.
Sunday's first stage will be equally dramatic, passing Big Ben and the Parliament Building and The Eye before crossing the Tower Bridge on its way to Greenwich and its Meridian Line, then heading out of town to Cantebury 125 miles away. I'm headquartered just a few blocks from the Tower Bridge, staying with a film friend from Chicago who lives along the Thames across the street from Helen Mirren. It is a sensational location, just three miles from Trafalgar. Tom couldn't be a better host. He scoured "Time Out London" before I arrived looking for all the bike-related events going on this weekend. There are loads--three galleries showing Tour photos, a bike ballet, a bike play and a bicycle fair grounds along with all the racing.
Its been exciting to meet all the racing enthusiasts at the various events and out riding the course. They've all been exceptionally well-informed and fanatical, but none more so than Graham Watson, bicycle racing's premier photographer since the LeMond era. One of the galleries hosted an exhibition of over 100 of his photos. He was just hanging out in his shorts, happy to talk. As much as his photography, I enjoy his monthly column in a British cycling magazine. He writes with a frankness that ordinary writers can't. We'll be looking for each other along the course the next three weeks.
Later, George
Since early in the day Friday, all streets within half a mile of the Square had been closed off to motorized traffic, once again proving the magnitude and the power of the Tour. It dwarfs all else and draws like nothing else. More than a million people are expected to line the five-mile prologue course tomorrow, rivaling the numbers for the L'Alpe d'Huez time trial a couple years ago. It starts just down the street from Trafalgar on Whitehall, goes past Ten Downing Street, then over and around Hyde Park, before heading back to near its starting point with Buckingham Palace in the background.
Sunday's first stage will be equally dramatic, passing Big Ben and the Parliament Building and The Eye before crossing the Tower Bridge on its way to Greenwich and its Meridian Line, then heading out of town to Cantebury 125 miles away. I'm headquartered just a few blocks from the Tower Bridge, staying with a film friend from Chicago who lives along the Thames across the street from Helen Mirren. It is a sensational location, just three miles from Trafalgar. Tom couldn't be a better host. He scoured "Time Out London" before I arrived looking for all the bike-related events going on this weekend. There are loads--three galleries showing Tour photos, a bike ballet, a bike play and a bicycle fair grounds along with all the racing.
Its been exciting to meet all the racing enthusiasts at the various events and out riding the course. They've all been exceptionally well-informed and fanatical, but none more so than Graham Watson, bicycle racing's premier photographer since the LeMond era. One of the galleries hosted an exhibition of over 100 of his photos. He was just hanging out in his shorts, happy to talk. As much as his photography, I enjoy his monthly column in a British cycling magazine. He writes with a frankness that ordinary writers can't. We'll be looking for each other along the course the next three weeks.
Later, George
Thursday, July 5, 2007
Stevanage, England
Friends: When the Coventry Transport Museum opened in 1980, it was called the National Motor Museum and was devoted to Coventry's role in spearheading Britain's car and motorcycle industries. That was an outrage to cyclists, as the site of the museum was the former bicycle factory of James Starley, considered the father of the bicycle industry, which spawned Coventry's motorcycle and auto industries. Advocates of the bicycle gained a toehold in the sprawling museum that is dominated by hundreds of vintage cars and motorcycles, altering some of the museum's focus to the bicycle and its importance and also were responsible for the renaming of the museum.
Coventry has long acknowledged Starley. It erected a statue in his honor in 1884, three years after his death. Starley was the owner of a sewing machine company when someone brought a bicycle to his attention in 1869, a year after Michaux father and son in France were the first to attach pedals to a two-wheeled contraption that was the predecessor of the bicycle. Starley made further innovations, which evolved into the Penny Farthing. He started up a bicycle factory and others followed. Before long Coventry was the "Cycle Capital of the World." By 1891 it was Coventry's largest industry with 77 bicycle factories in operation.
Over the years there have been 271 manufacturers of bicycles in Coventry. A Role of Honor in the museum lists them all and their years of operation and where they were located. The Role of Honor also has a list of the 111 motorcycle makers and 136 car manufacturers of Coventry, which included Triumph and Daimler. In 1898 the first car in England was manufactured in Coventry, dooming the bicycle industry. By 1950 there were only four bicycle companies remaining in Coventry and today there are none.
Besides Starley, the museum gives tribute to others from Coventry who were instrumental in the evolution of the bicycle. Henry Sturmey (1857-1930), a master mechanic and inventor, was in on those early years, and is a name that lives on today with hubs and a company still bearing his name. Starley's nephew J.K. is credited with inventing the safety bicycle in 1885, adapting the lofty, treacherous Penny Farthing to the diamond-shaped frame, which remains the standard, with equal-sized wheels and independent front-wheeled steering and incorporating the chain drive to the rear wheel.
I thought I would be able to just duck into the museum and give its few bikes a look, but I ended up spending a couple hours there, as there was much, more more biking material than I anticipated. Bikes are sprinkled throughout the museum amongst the hoards of automobiles before one comes to a hall opened just two years ago devoted to the bike called Cyclopedia. It was a surprise, sudden, paradisaical oasis, too good to be true after having been immersed in a seeming endless nightmare of car after car, enough to make any autophobe nauseous.
Fortunately, the periodic bikes sprinkled throughout the museum provided a slight antidote all the way. Without their calming effect paramedics would have to be on standby to appease those stricken by the horror and terror of all those deadly beasts. Those monstrous, deadly hunks of metal seemed even more sinister and soulless than normal with the contrast of the recent addition of bicycles. The dichotomy of car and bike was a constant reminder of the outrageous absurdity of using such a huge hunk of metal to transport one's self, when right there beside them was a perfectly viable, most appealing alternative. The bike never looked so friendly and frisky. How could one resist them or possibly return to an automobile after this experience. It seemed inconceivable that anyone in their right mind would choose to venture inside one of those coffins on wheels when he could cheerfully perch himself atop a bicycle.
The bicycle advocates have made an array of remarkable statements, some subtle and some not so subtle, with their modifications to the museum. There are two short pro-bike films done in silent era style that shockingly the automobile interests haven't suppressed. "Rowley's Ride" recounts the first bicycle to come to Coventry and Starley's epiphany upon seeing it. "Hurry Up Harry" tells the story of the first car to come to Coventry and the horror it wrecks, terrorizing and knocking down pedestrians and bicyclists. People shout "Infernal Machine" at it. A police officer on a bicycle chases after the evil, sinister driver and arrests him. The movie concludes with him behind bars and inter-title, "Harry ends up in jail where he belongs."
Cyclopedia included commentary promoting and encouraging a return to the bicycle, whose use plummeted in the mid-1950s in Britain with the proliferation of the automobile. One sign chided,"The benefits of cycling were forgotten as the comfort and convenience of the car took over." Token, tho pathetically feeble, hope was offered by a statistic saying from 1987 to 1996, the last time such a survey was conducted, the number of adults who said they had ridden a bike in the previous month had increased from 8% to 11%. If people will wake up, maybe the car won't drive them to extinction. It also pointed out that people once treated the bicycle as a genuine means of transportation. Now most people just bicycle for pleasure.
And the bicycle interests are far from done with plans of expanding this bicycle exhibit. It already includes a variety of videos, one of a dinner conversation around 1900 discussing women riding bicycles and the attire they should wear. There was also a series of videos of notable English cyclists discussing biking. Tour de France commentator Phil Liggett was among them, recalling his favorite Tour de France--1989 when LeMond won by 8 seconds. There are also plans to move the James Starley statue, presently residing on the fringe of a small park just outside the city center, to the front of the museum. Right now there is a lone statue at the apex of the large plaza facing the museum of the man who invented the turbo jet engine.
I had been drawn to Coventry by the Starley statue, not knowing anything about the Transport Museum and its bicycle riches. And I had a further bonus--a statue of even greater renown than Starley's, that of Lady Godiva, naked, sitting atop a horse. It was under a canopy in the heart of the city outside the entrance to a mall. It was sometime after 1043, the year she and her husband founded a Benedictine Abbey in Coventry, that she rode naked through the streets of the city to protest taxes. She warned the townspeople of her intentions so no one would take a peek, or so goes the story. One man dared though, and was struck blind. His name was Tom, and thus was born the term Peeping Tom.
Later, George
Coventry has long acknowledged Starley. It erected a statue in his honor in 1884, three years after his death. Starley was the owner of a sewing machine company when someone brought a bicycle to his attention in 1869, a year after Michaux father and son in France were the first to attach pedals to a two-wheeled contraption that was the predecessor of the bicycle. Starley made further innovations, which evolved into the Penny Farthing. He started up a bicycle factory and others followed. Before long Coventry was the "Cycle Capital of the World." By 1891 it was Coventry's largest industry with 77 bicycle factories in operation.
Over the years there have been 271 manufacturers of bicycles in Coventry. A Role of Honor in the museum lists them all and their years of operation and where they were located. The Role of Honor also has a list of the 111 motorcycle makers and 136 car manufacturers of Coventry, which included Triumph and Daimler. In 1898 the first car in England was manufactured in Coventry, dooming the bicycle industry. By 1950 there were only four bicycle companies remaining in Coventry and today there are none.
Besides Starley, the museum gives tribute to others from Coventry who were instrumental in the evolution of the bicycle. Henry Sturmey (1857-1930), a master mechanic and inventor, was in on those early years, and is a name that lives on today with hubs and a company still bearing his name. Starley's nephew J.K. is credited with inventing the safety bicycle in 1885, adapting the lofty, treacherous Penny Farthing to the diamond-shaped frame, which remains the standard, with equal-sized wheels and independent front-wheeled steering and incorporating the chain drive to the rear wheel.
I thought I would be able to just duck into the museum and give its few bikes a look, but I ended up spending a couple hours there, as there was much, more more biking material than I anticipated. Bikes are sprinkled throughout the museum amongst the hoards of automobiles before one comes to a hall opened just two years ago devoted to the bike called Cyclopedia. It was a surprise, sudden, paradisaical oasis, too good to be true after having been immersed in a seeming endless nightmare of car after car, enough to make any autophobe nauseous.
Fortunately, the periodic bikes sprinkled throughout the museum provided a slight antidote all the way. Without their calming effect paramedics would have to be on standby to appease those stricken by the horror and terror of all those deadly beasts. Those monstrous, deadly hunks of metal seemed even more sinister and soulless than normal with the contrast of the recent addition of bicycles. The dichotomy of car and bike was a constant reminder of the outrageous absurdity of using such a huge hunk of metal to transport one's self, when right there beside them was a perfectly viable, most appealing alternative. The bike never looked so friendly and frisky. How could one resist them or possibly return to an automobile after this experience. It seemed inconceivable that anyone in their right mind would choose to venture inside one of those coffins on wheels when he could cheerfully perch himself atop a bicycle.
The bicycle advocates have made an array of remarkable statements, some subtle and some not so subtle, with their modifications to the museum. There are two short pro-bike films done in silent era style that shockingly the automobile interests haven't suppressed. "Rowley's Ride" recounts the first bicycle to come to Coventry and Starley's epiphany upon seeing it. "Hurry Up Harry" tells the story of the first car to come to Coventry and the horror it wrecks, terrorizing and knocking down pedestrians and bicyclists. People shout "Infernal Machine" at it. A police officer on a bicycle chases after the evil, sinister driver and arrests him. The movie concludes with him behind bars and inter-title, "Harry ends up in jail where he belongs."
Cyclopedia included commentary promoting and encouraging a return to the bicycle, whose use plummeted in the mid-1950s in Britain with the proliferation of the automobile. One sign chided,"The benefits of cycling were forgotten as the comfort and convenience of the car took over." Token, tho pathetically feeble, hope was offered by a statistic saying from 1987 to 1996, the last time such a survey was conducted, the number of adults who said they had ridden a bike in the previous month had increased from 8% to 11%. If people will wake up, maybe the car won't drive them to extinction. It also pointed out that people once treated the bicycle as a genuine means of transportation. Now most people just bicycle for pleasure.
And the bicycle interests are far from done with plans of expanding this bicycle exhibit. It already includes a variety of videos, one of a dinner conversation around 1900 discussing women riding bicycles and the attire they should wear. There was also a series of videos of notable English cyclists discussing biking. Tour de France commentator Phil Liggett was among them, recalling his favorite Tour de France--1989 when LeMond won by 8 seconds. There are also plans to move the James Starley statue, presently residing on the fringe of a small park just outside the city center, to the front of the museum. Right now there is a lone statue at the apex of the large plaza facing the museum of the man who invented the turbo jet engine.
I had been drawn to Coventry by the Starley statue, not knowing anything about the Transport Museum and its bicycle riches. And I had a further bonus--a statue of even greater renown than Starley's, that of Lady Godiva, naked, sitting atop a horse. It was under a canopy in the heart of the city outside the entrance to a mall. It was sometime after 1043, the year she and her husband founded a Benedictine Abbey in Coventry, that she rode naked through the streets of the city to protest taxes. She warned the townspeople of her intentions so no one would take a peek, or so goes the story. One man dared though, and was struck blind. His name was Tom, and thus was born the term Peeping Tom.
Later, George
Wednesday, July 4, 2007
Bedford, England
Friends: The caretaker of the cemetery outside the small ex-coal mining town of Harworth was pruning its hedge when I dropped in upon it the other morning. As I sauntered over to him, still wearing my helmet, he could have pointed and said, "It's one of those two black ones over there," but he waited for me to ask,"Is Tom Simpson buried here?"
Harworth was his home town. I had come to visit his museum, but I didn't know if he was buried here too. Happening upon the cemetery on the way in to town, I decided to give it a look and fill my water bottles. Even if there had been no one at the cemetery, I would have had no problem finding Simpson's grave. It was one of the more prominent ones, marked by a slab of glistening black marble with an etching of him on his bike in downhill flight. It was forty years ago he collapsed and died at the age of thirty a kilometer from the summit of Mont Ventoux, during the 13th stage of the Tour de France on July 13 wearing the number 49, whose digits add to 13, as the exhibit honoring him in town noted.
The epithet on his grave read, "His body ached, his legs grew tired, but still he wouldn't give in." Such could be said of every champion cyclist or any who have risen to the ranks of the pro peloton. The sport demands one to push one's self to their limit and beyond and not to give in. Many resort to any means to reach those ends, risking the ultimate, their very life, as did Simpson, who died with pills and vials in his jersey pockets and their contents in his veins. It takes extreme effort to excel at this sport, or even to keep up. The body must be conditioned and convinced to withstand the suffering. At a certain point many cyclists say they can't take any more of it and rather than quitting the sport turn to the needle.
The latest in the recent rash of racers to confess to drug use, the ten-year veteran Jorg Jaksche of Germany rationalized, "Cycling per se is not fun. It always hurts. The sport is a lot about pain, physical pain." But enduring the pain can lead to great, almost religious, ecstasy, as seen on the faces of those triumphantly crossing the finish line first. No other athletes burst into such sudden exhibitions of exhilaration.
Simpson remains the greatest English cyclist ever, the first to wear the Yellow Jersey in The Tour and the only one to win the road World Championship and such classics as the Tour of Flanders (Belgium's most important race), Paris-Nice (an early-season, week-long stage race in which he beat Merckx), and the two great Italian races Milan-San Remo and the Tour of Lombardy. Any of those victories would be the highlight of most cyclist's careers. Twice he ended the season as the second ranked cyclist for the year.
Besides directing me to Simpson's grave, the caretaker revealed, "I knew Tom. We went to school together and were members of the local cycling club." They joined as 13-year olds. Even though the club had over 100 members of all ages and both sexes, the town wasn't big enough to have a bicycle shop then, nor now. The nearest one was ten miles away. The club still exists, but only has a handful of members. "Its hard to get kids to want to ride a bike on these roads with all the traffic these days," he said. "I don't even ride any more."
He gave me directions to the Simpson museum. It was actually just an exhibit at the local Sport and Social Club, a pub of a sort, at the town's athletic grounds. "Take a left at the second round-about and then go through town and past the pit and you'll see it on your right," he explained. The pit was the old coal mine, right in the center of the town, with all the town's shops on a two block strip across from the mine. There wasn't much vitality left in the town, though it did have a library and other social services. The liquor store doubled as a music store--Rhythm and Booze.
There was a guy outside the Sport and Social Club sweeping its deck and a woman inside cleaning up from the night before. Upon entering one is greeted by a wall-sized glass-encased display of Simpson memorabilia--photos, newspaper articles, jerseys, trophies and the bike he was riding when he expired. It was a Peugeot PX-10, the very bike, other than the sew-ups and the pine cone cluster, I biked coast-to-coast across the US on and up the Alaskan Highway. Otherwise it was the same white, black-trimmed Reynolds 531 frame with the identical TA cranks and Simplex derailleurs and handlebars and leather seat. The display case included the leather hairnet "crash hat" he wore when he competed on the track in the six-day races. On another wall was a photo from 1951 of the town's cycling club with a 14 year-old Simpson and the caretaker of the cemetery.
Although his training grounds in this region were fairly flat, his first prominent victory was the English Junior National Hill Climbing Championship in 1955. The plaque he was awarded was also on the wall. I camped in what's left of Nothingham Forest the night before, not far from Robin Hood Airport.
Later, George
Monday, July 2, 2007
Doncaster, England
Friends: I'd been engrossed in the National Museum of Film, Television, Radio and Photography for about 45 minutes when a security guard approached me and asked,"Is your bike the one with the load on it? I moved it from against the building over to the railing. With the events of the past two days we have to be careful about such things. I just didn't want you to think it had been nicked."
With its great popularity and peripheral theme of extolling Western culture, the 20-year old, seven-story museum in Bradford in the heart of the country could make an inviting, tho not likely, terrorist target. The country is on high alert after the events at Glasgow's airport. Of much bigger concern is the Tour de France, which ranks right up there with the Olympics and the World Cup and the Oscars as far as international attention goes. Saturday's prologue will be in the heart of London and Sunday's first stage will leave London and head towards Dover and the Chunnel. Security ought to be overwhelming for those two days.
The guard interrupted me just as I had finished watching a most moving and powerful 15-minute compilation of "Iconic Moments" that had been televised over the past 50 plus years. Among them were the collapse of the World Trade Towers, the explosion of the Challenger, the fall of the Berlin Wall, Queen Elizabeth's 1953 coronation, the moon landing, Princess Diana's wedding and funeral, England's 1966 World Cup victory. They were just one of many offerings on the floor "TV Heaven." The floor's most popular attraction was an archive of over 1000 of television's most significant programs ranging from Monty Python to Michael Moore and many of the BBC's acclaimed documentaries that one could request to view in one's own private screening area. Or one could just wander about watching random clips being shown on a multitude of screens. There was the woman answering the question, "Which king was married to Eleanor," that made her the first million pound winner in 1999 on the English version of "Who Wants to be a Millionaire." There was the first English commercial and much, much more.
The exhibits devoted to film were far less comprehensive luckily or else I would have wanted to spend a week or two at the place. But there were some very worthwhile things on offer. There was a special exhibit devoted to Indian cinema. It was largely posters from its earliest days to the present, but there was also an 18-minute program of clips from 16 seminal films starting with Awaara from 1951 up to Being Cyrus and Page 3 from 2005 with Lagaan and Mother India and of course an offering from Satyajit Ray in between. There were a handful of the opulent song and dance numbers that have been the hallmark of Indian cinema since its first talkie, Almara in 1931 with seven such numbers. A handful of small children watching couldn't help but dance along with them.
In the adjoining movie theater was a special exhibit to Roy Alon from neighboring Yorkshire. According to the Guinness Book of World Records, he is the world's most prolific stuntman. He had more than 1,000 credits. There were photos of some of his stunts from the Indiana Jones films and Superman and Pink Panther and James Bond. The museum has an IMAX Theater and an exhibit devoted to it, including a window into the projectionist's booth. IMAX was invented by a group of Canadian film-makers and debuted at the 1970 World Expo in Osaka. The seven kilowatt lamp in the projector emits a beam of light so powerful Neal Armstrong could have seen it from the moon.
Another film exhibit was devoted to David Puttman, British producer whose first great success was "Chariots of Fire" in 1981 winning the Oscar for best picture and two other Oscars. There was a photo of my drying beach at St. Andrews with a flock of runners accompanying the exhibit. Puttman went on to produce The Killing Fields, The Mission and Midnight Express. He was knighted in 1995.
Along with terrorism, the big story in England is the weather. Its been raining incessantly. I'm in a region now with excessive flooding, making the camping a little more challenging. There was a 43 car pile-up on a highway a day ago. Some of the superhighways that are are recessed have filled with water making them more desirable for vehicles with hulls than with wheels. But the terrain has flattened and I'm fast closing in on London.
Later, George
With its great popularity and peripheral theme of extolling Western culture, the 20-year old, seven-story museum in Bradford in the heart of the country could make an inviting, tho not likely, terrorist target. The country is on high alert after the events at Glasgow's airport. Of much bigger concern is the Tour de France, which ranks right up there with the Olympics and the World Cup and the Oscars as far as international attention goes. Saturday's prologue will be in the heart of London and Sunday's first stage will leave London and head towards Dover and the Chunnel. Security ought to be overwhelming for those two days.
The guard interrupted me just as I had finished watching a most moving and powerful 15-minute compilation of "Iconic Moments" that had been televised over the past 50 plus years. Among them were the collapse of the World Trade Towers, the explosion of the Challenger, the fall of the Berlin Wall, Queen Elizabeth's 1953 coronation, the moon landing, Princess Diana's wedding and funeral, England's 1966 World Cup victory. They were just one of many offerings on the floor "TV Heaven." The floor's most popular attraction was an archive of over 1000 of television's most significant programs ranging from Monty Python to Michael Moore and many of the BBC's acclaimed documentaries that one could request to view in one's own private screening area. Or one could just wander about watching random clips being shown on a multitude of screens. There was the woman answering the question, "Which king was married to Eleanor," that made her the first million pound winner in 1999 on the English version of "Who Wants to be a Millionaire." There was the first English commercial and much, much more.
The exhibits devoted to film were far less comprehensive luckily or else I would have wanted to spend a week or two at the place. But there were some very worthwhile things on offer. There was a special exhibit devoted to Indian cinema. It was largely posters from its earliest days to the present, but there was also an 18-minute program of clips from 16 seminal films starting with Awaara from 1951 up to Being Cyrus and Page 3 from 2005 with Lagaan and Mother India and of course an offering from Satyajit Ray in between. There were a handful of the opulent song and dance numbers that have been the hallmark of Indian cinema since its first talkie, Almara in 1931 with seven such numbers. A handful of small children watching couldn't help but dance along with them.
In the adjoining movie theater was a special exhibit to Roy Alon from neighboring Yorkshire. According to the Guinness Book of World Records, he is the world's most prolific stuntman. He had more than 1,000 credits. There were photos of some of his stunts from the Indiana Jones films and Superman and Pink Panther and James Bond. The museum has an IMAX Theater and an exhibit devoted to it, including a window into the projectionist's booth. IMAX was invented by a group of Canadian film-makers and debuted at the 1970 World Expo in Osaka. The seven kilowatt lamp in the projector emits a beam of light so powerful Neal Armstrong could have seen it from the moon.
Another film exhibit was devoted to David Puttman, British producer whose first great success was "Chariots of Fire" in 1981 winning the Oscar for best picture and two other Oscars. There was a photo of my drying beach at St. Andrews with a flock of runners accompanying the exhibit. Puttman went on to produce The Killing Fields, The Mission and Midnight Express. He was knighted in 1995.
Along with terrorism, the big story in England is the weather. Its been raining incessantly. I'm in a region now with excessive flooding, making the camping a little more challenging. There was a 43 car pile-up on a highway a day ago. Some of the superhighways that are are recessed have filled with water making them more desirable for vehicles with hulls than with wheels. But the terrain has flattened and I'm fast closing in on London.
Later, George
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