Racing Bikes

It was much simpler in the old days.We didn't have all these different categories, a bike was just a bike. But nowadays it seems that there are as many types of bike as there are cyclists, and - particularly since the MTB explosion - the humble road bike has been sadly eclipsed. But the roadies live on, and cycle-touring is more popular than it has ever been.

Cycle racing is fast, addictive, and as old as bikes themselves. And it's hard. Hard on the riders, hard on their machines. Cycle sport involves a mixture of brain-work, endurance, exciting speeds, and danger. But there's also the technology. Races are often won or lost by the matter of a few seconds. Riders know this, so an integral part of the sport is the relentless quest for new and useful technological developments. Whether you are the manager of a pro team, or a young novice gazing through shop windows, having the best possible technology is an important aspect of your sport. But racing can be on the receiving end of a spot of inverted snobbery nowadays. With the rebirth of cycling as a solution to all of humanity's ills, from congestion and pollution to alienation and crime, the whole 'Tour de France' side of things sometimes gets written off as a commercial sideshow. The cycle rights lobby has often had its work cut out to convince the powers that be that cycling is more than just a leisure pursuit. And the technological trickle-down from racing has not always benefited everyday cycling.

The great cycling events of the calendar have a colourful and heroic poetry of their own which takes them beyond the mundane and the showy. The Tour de France is one of the most testing of human endeavours. Finishing a single stage of the Tour demands the kind of physical fitness, stamina and psychological resilience to which most mere mortals can only aspire. Life in the peloton of riders is crowded and hectic with individuals riding as close as possible for aerodynamic benefit, with the constant danger of crashing at high speeds. And after 200 or more gruelling kilometres, they've got to do it all again the next day.

The effect on the rest of us is not always obvious. Heroic cycling feats mean more kids rushing out and emulating Greg Lemond and Chris Boardman instead of Michael Schumacher or Damon Hill. At the same time more and more people realise that there is something special about that unique combination of human power and relatively simple machinery - and because the higher levels of cycle technology are reasonably accessible to most of us, we can go out and buy the kind of bikes and equipment which the top professionals use. And if it's good for them, it's equally good for the rest of us - especially when we want the thrill of speed! Cycling, on the edge of unaided travel, takes us as fast as it is possible to go, without leaving our spirit behind. Granted, we can whizz along in a train, a plane, or an automobile, but the experience lacks a certain something, that edge of reality which only self-powered travel provides. Whether the emphasis is on maximum human velocity, or simply pedalling steadily through the landscape, the road bike is still a machine which superby combines the needs of the body and the spirit.