It's All About the Bike (25 page)

I swung a leg over the bike. Click . . . click . . . into the pedals and we rolled down the lane. Here was the calming familiarity — my window on the world: faster than walking, slower than a train, higher than a car, lower than a plane. The bike felt tight, as you would expect a new, quality bicycle to feel — hard saddle, gears in perfect sync, taut chain and responsive brakes. It felt beautifully balanced, and somehow alive with the hands of the people who had made it.

I dropped down into the Llanthony Valley, commanding the bike through the corners with the tiniest shifts in balance. Briefly, I was going over 35 mph. The bike felt plush and stable. On the long, gentle ascent through the valley, I found a rhythm in the spinning pedals. Rhythm is happiness. A myriad of concerns — about the bike, about this book — dissipated completely. This is the beauty of cycling — the rhythm puts serious activity in the
brain to sleep: it creates a void. Random thoughts enter that void — the chorus from a song, a verse of poetry, a detail in the countryside, a joke, the answer to something that vexed me long ago.

Lance Armstrong was wrong. I realize this is rich — telling the winner of the world's toughest cycle race a record seven times that the title of his global, best-selling book,
It's Not About the Bike,
is erroneous — but there you go. I've done it now. Lance, you don't know what you're talking about. It is about the bike. It's
all
about the bike.

Past Capel-y-ffin the road gets steeper. The cloud had peeled back to reveal a canopy of powder blue. The hills shone and the air filled with promise. Climbing out of the saddle, the intensity of effort cast off the last vestiges of ennui. The bike felt eager in my hands.

At Gospel Pass, we slipped through the notch in the rock and the landscape fell away. We began freewheeling slowly downhill. The views into mid-Wales were magnificent. The world lay beyond the handlebars. I was in the best seat in the house: a seat that had cost over $5,500. That's a lot of money for a bicycle, I thought. Then again, it's not a lot of money for the loveliest thing I've ever owned.

The book that inspired me to cycle round the world was
Full Tilt,
Dervla Murphy's ingenuous account of her intrepid journey by bike from Ireland to India in 1963. It's the best kind of adventure story and a clarion call to ‘travel for travel's sake'. I've also read and enjoyed the two-wheel tales of Bernard Magnoloux
(Travels with Rosinante)
and Ian Hibell
(Into the Remote Places),
both of which, in different ways, authentically present the simple pleasures of travelling by bicycle. Tim Moore's
French Revolutions
is a witty introduction to the travails of the Tour de France.

The best autobiographies of time spent ‘on the rivet' are written from the thick of it: Paul Kimmage's
Rough Ride
is an exposé of life as a struggling pro, and the drug culture inside the peloton; Matt Seaton's
The Escape Artist
is a heartbreaking tale of love and loss as an amateur racer;
The Flying Scotsman
is the engaging story of Graeme Obree's World Hour Record success; and
One More Kilometre and We're in the Showers
by Tim Hilton is a loving paean to the post-war cycling scene in Britain and Europe. And, of course, there is Lance Armstrong's bullish and best-selling, ghost-written account of recovering from cancer to win the Tour de France,
It's Not About the Bike: My Journey Back to Life.

Good biographies of great racing cyclists abound:
Major
by Todd Balf gives a good insight into the American pro track scene at the beginning of the twentieth century;
Put Me Back on the Bike
by William Fotheringham perceptively deciphers the enigmatic Tom Simpson. Richard Moore's
In Search of Robert Millar
and
Matt Rendell's
The Death of Marco Pantani
are both finely researched and grippingly written.

Pedalling Revolution
by American journalist Jeff Mapes analyses the dynamic of urban cycling culture today.
The Literary Cyclist,
edited by James E. Starrs, is a delightful compendium of excerpts from literature about cycling and cyclists. Surprisingly few novelists have tried to fictionalize the drama of professional cycle racing. Dutch writer Tim Krabbé wrote the excellent and thoughtful
The Rider;
Ralph Hurne's
The Yellow Jersey
will enthral keen cyclists. Other fictional works with cycling or the bicycle central to the narrative include
The Third Policeman
by Flann O'Brien — the story of a love affair between a man and a bicycle,
Three Men on the Bummel
by Jerome K. Jerome and H. G. Wells's
The Wheels of Chance — A Bicycling Idyll.

The best book I've read about the history of the machine is
Bicycle
by David Herlihy.
King of the Road
by Andrew Ritchie,
Cycling History: Myths and Queries
by Derek Roberts,
On Your Bicycle
by Jim McGurn and
The Story of the Bicycle
by John Woodforde are also very readable. Finally, if you're planning on getting your hands dirty fixing your own bike,
Bicycle Repair
by Rob Van der Plas is a good primer.

This book principally owes its existence to two people: my editor Helen Conford, who first thought the bicycle deserved a fresh appraisal; and my wife Vicky, who, knowing I'd always rather be riding than writing, shackled me to a desk while I wrote it.

Several people enthusiastically contributed thoughts and ideas: my thanks to Stephen Wood, for arcane stories from the cycling underworld, Victoria Hazael and Chris Juden at CTC, Anna Simms and Matt Davies at Sustrans, John Hudson, Charles Phipps, Roger Crosskey, Joe Christle, Flash, David Miller and Andrew Moore. Brian Palmer, Doug Pinkerton and my old riding buddy, Will Farara, all kindly perused the first draft.

For sharing their love and knowledge of the bicycle, I am grateful to Garrett and Peter Enright at Phil Wood, Chris DiStefano, Diane Chalmers and David Prause at Chris King, Antonio Colombo, Paulo Erzegovesi and Lodovico Pignatti at Cinelli, Lerrj Piazza and Lorenzo Taxis at Campagnolo, Wolf vorm Walde and Hardy Bölts at Continental, Cliff Polton at Royce, Andrea Meneghelli, Steven Green and all the staff at Brooks England, Julian Wall at Cyclefit, Dominic Thomas, Slate Olson, Rudy Contratti, Iacopo Destri, Marco Consonni, Peter Zheutlin, John Moore, Klaus Grüter, Charlie Kelly, Joe Breeze, Billy Savage and Steve ‘Gravy' Gravenites. I'm indebted to Chris Anderson for the cover portrait of my dream machine.

For their time and insight into the ‘diamond soul', thanks a million to Gary Needham at Argos Cycles, Donald Thomas at Bob Jackson Cycles, Grant Mosley at Mercian Cycles, Barry Scott
at Bespoke Cycling, Chas Roberts at Roberts Cycles, Lee Cooper, Barry Witcomb, Neil Orrell, Paul Corcoran at Pennine Cycles, Vernon Barker, Sacha White at Vanilla, Terry Bill and Keith Noronha at Reynolds Technology and Matt Roberts and all the lads at Rourke Cycles. My greatest debt is to Brian and Jason Rourke.

The dream team at Penguin responsible for putting the book together include Nikki Lee, Rebecca Lee, Jessica Price, Chris Croissant and Mari Yamazaki. I'm delighted to say they all ride. The documentary film based on the book and made for BBC4 drafted a whole new team into the project: thanks to Steve Robinson, Gwenllian Hughes, Emma Haskins, Louis Fonseca and Sally Lisk-Lewis at Indus Films, Ben Hall at Curtis Brown, Steve Bagley at the Coventry Transport Museum, Gwynfor Llewellyn and particularly the producer, Rob Sullivan for showing quenchless enthusiasm for the subject.

My appreciation to Miles, Dawn and Mark in my local bike shop, M & D Cycles, Abergavenny, and to Steve and Cherrie Chadwick, landlord and landlady of my local pub, the Crown at Pantygelli, where much of the first draft was edited. Finally, thank you to my indefatigable agents, Camilla Hornby and Camilla Goslett at Curtis Brown.

Finally, finally, ‘aye' to all the friends I've shared so many happy miles with, people who instinctively know that a good bike ride, like life, is about balance: they include Alf Alderson, Chris Anderson, Paulo Baillie, Tommy Bayley, Dave Belton, Rohan Blacker, Harriet Cleverly, James Cole, Tim Doyne, Will Farara, James Greenwood, Tom Halifax, Jimmy Hearn, Simon Martyn, Andy Morley-Hall, Mark Sainsbury, Spencer Skinner, Dave Stirling and Antony Woodward.

Long may you all ride.

Useful Information

Tyre size

All tyres have an identification code determined by ETRTO (European Tyre and Rim Technical Organization). It's a universal sizing system that consists of two numbers separated by a dash:

• a two-digit number (the inflated cross-section of the tyre in mm); followed by

• a three-digit number (the diameter of the ‘bead seat' of the rim bed in mm).

My Continental Grand Prix 4000 S tyres are: 23-622.

Rim size

Rims also have an ETRTO identification code consisting of two numbers separated by an ‘x':

• a three-digit number (the diameter of the ‘bead seat' of the rim bed in mm, as with tyres)

• a two-digit number (the inside width of the rim in mm).

My DT Swiss RR 1.2 rims are: 622 × 15.

The critical number is the three-digit number: it must match if the tyres are to fit the rim.

Gear size

How we calculate bicycle gears in the English-speaking world is a curious legacy of the ‘high-wheeler' or ‘ordinary' bicycle: these machines had no gears and so the ‘gear ratio' was simply the diameter of the large front wheel (i.e. the distance covered in one complete revolution of it) given in inches. When the safety bicycle — a machine with a chain drive — was introduced, gearing continued to be calculated with this principle in mind: it still is today, even though it has no physical significance. It is calculated thus:

diameter of the drive wheel (in inches) x the number of teeth on the front chainring ÷ the number of teeth on the rear sprocket = ‘gear inches'.

On the Continent, and in countries that use metric measurements, a different gear calculation system called
La developpement
(or ‘metres in development') is used. It's more practical as it measures, in metres, the distance the bicycle travels for one crank revolution. It is calculated thus:

number of teeth on the chainring ÷ number of teeth on the rear sprocket x diameter of the wheel (in metres) x pi = ‘metres of development' (a number to two decimal points).

p.vi
Leo Baeck Institute, New York

p.6
Peter Zhleutin

p.8
Robert Penn

p.10
Robert Penn

p.12
Bicycle Books

p.20
Jason/Brian Rourke

p.26
Canada Science and Technology Museum

p.27
Coventry Transport Museum

p.28
Raliegh

p.36
Reynolds

p.40
Historic Hetchins

p.50
Science Museum/SSPL

p.61
Ely Museum

p.69
Robert Penn

p.71
Columbus/Cinelli

p.79
Raleigh

p.91
Renold PLC

p.94
Raleigh

p.95
Campagnolo/Lerrj Piazza

p.98
Campagnolo/Lerrj Piazza

p.114
Robert Penn

p.129
Dewey Livingston

p.131
Charlie Kelly

p.139
Coventry Transport Museum

p.146
The Granger Collection/TopFoto

p.164
Bicycles & Tricycles: A Classic Treatise on Their Design and Construction
by Archibald Sharp

p.166
Brooks England Ltd

Copyright © 2010 by Robert Penn

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without
written permission from the publisher except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles
or reviews. For information address Bloomsbury USA, 175 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10010.

Published by Bloomsbury USA, New York

The lines from Patrick Kavanagh's “Inniskeen Road: July Evening” are reprinted from
Collected Poems
,
edited by Antoinette Quinn (Allen Lane, 2004), by kind permission of the Trustees of the Estate of the
late Katherine B. Kavanagh, through the Jonathan Williams Literary Agency.

The lines from Seamus Heaney's “A Constable Calls” are reprinted from
New Selected Poems, 1966–
1987
by Seamus Heaney, by kind permission of Faber & Faber.

LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING-IN-PUBLICATION DATA

Penn, Rob.
It's all about the bike : the pursuit of happiness on two wheels / Robert Penn.
p. cm.
Includes index.
ISBN-13: 978-1-60819-538-1 (hardback)
1. Bicycles. 2. Bicycles—Design and construction. 3. Cycling. I. Title.
TL410.P46 2011
629.227'2—dc22
2010049942

First published in the UK by Particular Books in 2010
First published in the U.S. by Bloomsbury in 2011
This e-book edition published in 2011

E-book ISBN: 978-1-60819-576-3

www.bloomsburyusa.com