CQ21

THE CYCLING QUARTERLY 

ISSUE 21 2019 £12 

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Editor 

Trevor Gornall 

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Matthew Bailey 

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©Conquista Cycling Club Limited 2019 

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Contents 

WORDS 

Trevor Gornall 

Chris Auld 

Tom Owen 

Matthew Bailey 

Suze Clemitson 

Cillian Kelly 

Holly Blades 

James Shepherd 

Matt Ben Stone 

The Peloton Brief 

Russell Jones 

1 Editorial 12 

2 My Favourite Shots Of 2018 14 

3 Papa’s Bravas 32 

4 Six Day London Derny Riders 50 

5 Searching For The Swinnerton Sisters II 70 

6 Liquinvincibles 86 

7 Threads Of History: Team Z 100 

8 Two Lives Entwined 110 

PICTURES 

Chris Auld 

Matt Grayson 

Drew Kaplan 

Swinnerton Family Archive 

Cor Vos 

PhotoSport International (John Pierce) 

Paul Davy 


Russell Jones 

Tom Owen 

9 Sandy Knee Stars 130 

10 Cobbles For Breakfast 257 144 

11 Briefings 164 

12 Fans, Vans And Chilly Bins 168 

13 Postcard From Mallorca 186 

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Editorial 

by Trevor Gornall 

SUSTAINABLE DISCOMFORT 

After the best part of a year off 

I’m back in training and remembering 

how it feels to hurt yourself again. Toiling 

to the halfway point of the first of my 2 x 

20-minute intervals I glance up to see a 

message on my laptop screen proclaiming 

“You should be at a level of sustainable 

discomfort.” “Yep” I thought, “ . . . that 

pretty much sums it up.” Not only right 

now as I focus to hold my threshold 

after 10 minutes of sustained effort, but 

more my general state in facing the daily 

challenges of holding down a day job and 

helping produce this journal, while trying, 

once again, to get fit enough to race 

without humiliating myself. 

Invariably when it all gets a little 

full-on it’s my training and racing that 

suffer most. This year I’m determined 

not to fall into that same old trap of work, 

work, work. We are reminded frequently 

enough that not taking care of our 

physical wellness can negatively impact 

our mental wellbeing, as well as the size 

of our bellies. Last year didn’t go to plan 

and served as a reminder how fragile our 

worlds can be and how one sudden and 

unexpected change can throw everything 

out of equilibrium. I’m more determined 

this year to preserve my health and 

fitness through regular training, and to 

revive my blog Riding by Numbers (found 

in the ‘Blogs’ section of our website, 

conquista.cc) as I go back in search of 

some more club standard times for time 

trialling, with maybe even the odd road 

race thrown in for ‘fun’. 

So, what have we packed into this 

issue to encourage and inspire us all to get 

out into the fresh air and explore more of 

the world on two wheels? 

Our good friend Chris Auld has 

been kind enough to share with us 12 of 

his favourite shots from the 2018 season 

as he followed the pro peloton all over the 

world. 

Tom Owen and Matt Grayson 

team up to serve us a tasty helping of 

Papa’s Bravas, in their quest to discover 

why Spain was so loved by Hemingway. 

We are back on the boards of 

the Six Day London, where Matthew 

Bailey explores the highly talented and 

under-reported skills of the Derny Team, 

in conversation with Derny boss Peter 

Bäuerlein. Pictures are expertly supplied 

by Drew Kaplan. 

Suze Clemitson presents the 

concluding second part of her delve into 

the Swinnerton dynasty, this time talking 

to Catherine and Margaret, following in 

the footsteps of elder sister Bernadette 

(see issue 20). 

We welcome Research Director of 

The Road Book Cillian Kelly to Conquista 

as he explains the unique achievement of 

Liquigas that has, until now, gone largely 

unnoticed. 

Holly Blades rounds out her 

Threads of History series with a look at 

Team Z and their funky jersey design, 

with images supplied by John Pierce of 

PhotoSport International. Her piece also 

inspired our cover, which we are delighted 

to say was designed by our friends 

Cachetejack. 

James Shepherd takes an indepth 

look at how the Swiss broke the 

domination of road racing by France, 

Belgium and Italy in the 1950s, largely 

through the performances of Ferdi Kübler 

and Hugo Koblet. 

Matt Ben Stone visits the sand 

flats of South Wales to bring us his view of 

the Battle on the Beach race in his piece 

Sandy Knee Stars. 

Laura Fletcher of The Peloton 

Brief returns to bring us her unique view 

of what’s going down in Girona town in her 

regular update Briefings. Find out what’s 

new with Nic Dougall and Carlee Taylor. 

Russell Jones returns once more, 

this time with Fans, Vans and Chilly Bins 

– his tale of joining the Kiwi national team 

at the UCI Road World Championships in 

Innsbruck. 

And as is his tradition, our 

sub Tom drops another postcard into 

the Conquista mailbox, this time from 

Mallorca. 

It’s another blend of the 

unexpected, extraordinary and 

exquisite and we hope very much 

something to at least distract from the 

daily discomforts. 

See you on the road . . .

A BORA-hansgrohe rider 

takes on the ITT at the Giro 

d’Italia. The narrow streets 

here offered striking contrasts 

of light and shade. 

C h r i s A u l d 

My Favourite Shots Of 2018 

Star photographer Chris Auld chooses his twelve favourite images from the 2018 season. 

Chris’s shots can be purchased at https://chrisauld.photoshelter.com/archive. 

Words & Pictures: Chris Auld 

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Chris Auld 


The peloton snakes through one of the hundreds of small villages it visits during Paris-Nice. 

I managed to secure this vantage point on the balcony of a farmhouse using my best pidgin 

French. 

Storm clouds follow the peloton at this year’s running of Paris-Nice, the race not quite living 

up to its billing as la Course au soleil. 

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Chris Auld 

My Favourite Shots of 2018 

Julian Alaphilippe taking victory on 

the Mur de Huy with his usual style 

and panache. Cycling has a host of 

iconic finishes but this one is up 

there with the best. 

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Chris Auld 


The summit of Lagos de 

Covadonga shrouded in mist 

on a pretty disastrous day for 

photography. A couple of riders 

get a helping hand back to the 

team bus from the Guardia Civil. 

Rusty Woods making the mighty 

Zoncolan look easy as he weaves 

his way past a stricken moto. 

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Chris Auld My Favourite Shots of 2018 

Taken at Paris-Nice. On its final 

stage the Race to the Sun again 

failed to live up to its reputation 

in 2018, with rain of biblical 

proportions falling on the way to 

Nice. 

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Chris Auld 

My Favourite Shots 0f 2018 

Andorra hosted two stages of 

the 2018 Vuelta. Thibaut Pinot 

celebrates after taking victory 

on stage 19, hotly pursued by 

Simon Yates wearing the race 

leader’s red jersey. 

Cycling fans do not get more 

passionate than the Basques, 

so when this year’s Vuelta 

crossed into the Basque 

Country I knew we would 

be in for some fun. Here 

Antoine Duchesne shows 

his appreciation to the fans. 

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Chris Auld 


Greg Van Avermaet emerges 

from the sanctuary of the BMC 

bus. Team buses always have an 

air of mystique: what goes on 

behind those curtains and tinted 

windows? 

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Nathan Haas and Laura Fletcher 

Kinda Big in Japan 

The peloton cuts through 

mile after mile of the arid 

landscape that dominates 

the centre of Spain. 

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Chris Auld 


The Giro d’Italia is the world’s 

most beautiful bike race and 

the tifosi are among the most 

passionate fans. 

Chris Auld 

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PAPA’S 

BRAVAS 

Inspired by Hemingway’s writing, 

three amigos went in search of the 

Spain he loved - wild and remote. 

Papa’s bravas 

Being a fan of Ernest 

Hemingway is not without 

its complications. He was, 

in the parlance of his era, 

a man’s man. Nowadays 

we might lean towards 

phrases altogether less 

complimentary. 

There are long arguments 

to be had about separating 

the art from the artist, 

but perhaps this is not 

quite the right forum. 

Indeed, if any subculture 

understands the nuance of 

admiring an individual’s 

achievements while not 

condoning their actions, 

it is professional cycling. 

Nevertheless, his writing 

is inspirational. To me 

and to lots of others. 

Spain was a country in 

Hemingway’s good graces 

– he spent a lot of time 

there throughout his life. 

Long stints in Madrid, 

countless days spent at 

bullfights up and down 

the country and of course 

his time as a reporter 

during the civil war. The 

place left a significant 

impression on him, much 

as he has had a huge 

impact on our perceptions 

of the country. 

In a letter written to a 

friend he called Spain “the 

last good country left.” 

It was this throwaway 

quote that formed the 

basis of our bikepacking 

trip – a route that would 

connect some places that 

loomed large in the life 

of Hemingway. We would 

begin in Madrid and 

ride to Pamplona – the 

two cities in Spain most 

closely connected with 

the author. 

Our route bisected a bit 

of the country dubbed 

‘Spanish Lapland’, an 

area twice the size 

of Belgium with the 

population density of the 

northernmost region of 

Finland – and it really 

did feel like we were 

crossing one of Europe’s 

most isolated expanses. 

Strange, prefabricated 

villages in the middle of 

forests, put there for the 

use of loggers; dusty old 

villages with double-digit 

populations; abandoned 

factories, the residue 

of industries no longer 

viable. The contrast 

between these places and 

the vibrant, cosmopolitan 

landscape of Madrid 

where we began, or 

the raucous streets of 

Pamplona in the grip of 

a festival day (festivo) at 

the end of our journey, 

was palpable. 

Words: Tom Owen 

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Pictures: Matt Grayson 

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Tom Owen And Matt Grayson 

Papa’s Bravas 

Guerrillas, monks and kings 

Leaving later than 

planned from Madrid on 

a Monday morning, we 

struck out for the Royal 

Monastery of San Lorenzo 

de El Escorial. Madrid is 

a high city, so the first 

part of our journey was 

downhill. An easy start. 

We passed over the River 

Guadarrama, a name we 

would encounter often in 

the first couple of days, 

and trundled along the 

plains towards El Escorial. 

The towering white edifice 

now known as the Royal 

Monastery has been at 

various times a university, 

a royal palace, a museum 

and a hospital – and it 

can be seen from far away 

down in the valley. 

To Hemingway, El Escorial 

was a place of retreat 

from the bustle of Madrid 

– a place he described as 

being “like I’ve gone to 

heaven under the best 

auspices.” For us it was 

not much of a rest, but 

rather a brutally steep 

climb to an incredibly 

large building, followed 

by an abortive attempt at 

buying some food in a café. 

We didn’t have time to 

hang about and breathe 

the ‘good air’ of Escorial 

for long, charging onward 

towards the Sierra 

Guadarrama, where 

the river we’d already 

crossed has its source. 

In the dying light we 

enjoyed the enchantingly 

desolate Navacerrada 

ski resort that sits atop 

the range of mountains 

where Hemingway’s 

band of guerrillas from 

For Whom The Bell Tolls 

spent long days and 

longer nights trying not 

to be killed by Francoists. 

While they didn’t spend 

much time in the book in 

ski resorts, there’s still 

something of the deathly 

and depressing about 

this part of the country 

– it is stark and empty 

and not very surprising 

that nearly every 

business in Navacerrada 

is permanently closed. I 

couldn’t help but think of 

the following passage from 

the book as we peered into 

the gloom of the deeper 

forest back from the road: 

“Spain,” the woman of Pablo said bitterly. Then turned to 

Robert Jordan. 

“Do they have people such as this in other countries?” 

“There are no other countries like Spain,” Robert Jordan said 

politely. 

“You are right,” Fernando said. “There is no other country in 

the world like Spain.” 

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Petta McSharry - Andy Bucha - Rolf Moser 

For All The Worlds 

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In the last dregs of the 

light we descended 

toward Rascafria. 

Ravenously hungry and 

lightly toasted from the 

sun, we were extremely 

lucky and profoundly 

pleased to discover a 

steak restaurant open 

for “five more minutes” 

in the town. We fell upon 

our three terneras, 

cooked medium, like 

desperate men. The wine 

came by the glass and 

cost €1.40. Afterward we 

wobbled into the night in 

search of a field in which 

to bivvy. As we rolled 

out of town with phone 

lights to guide our path, 

an almighty clamour 

went up from what was – 

I guess – a hunting pack 

of dogs kept by a farmer. 

Oh, how they barked and 

howled at our approach 

and oh, how we bottled it 

and immediately turned 

back the way we came. 

It was the hardest I 

pedalled all that day. 

We found a field we hoped 

would be far enough 

away that the dogs 

would pack it in, but we 

were to be disappointed 

on that score. They kept 

it up until about 3 in the 

morning. They may have 

kept it up yet longer, but 

at that point the Rioja 

took me into its warm 

embrace. 

Day two began with 

mist and a chill in the 

air. We made it about 

10 km before stopping 

for multiple coffees. A 

big climb through pine 

forests that took us an 

hour was followed by a 

descent into the sunny 

side of the Guadarrama 

range. From there the 

sun never left our backs 

and we became practised 

hands at applying sun 

cream on the go. Spain 

is a miraculous place 

– it has the feeling of 

total isolation until you 

most desperately need 

a drink or something 

to eat, at which point 

a Repsol petrol station 

or a village bakery will 

rise up from the horizon. 

This happened many 

times on our trip, but the 

first was a bakery in the 

town of Navafría at the 

bottom of that descent 

from the Guadarrama. 

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Peta McSharry, Andy Bucha and Rolf Moser 

For All The Worlds 

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Peta McSharry, Andy Bucha and Rolf Moser 


Pushing on, we managed to rack up 130 km that 

second day, finally flopping down under a pergola in 

a municipal park in El Burgo de Osma. Having raided 

a supermercado on the way through town and with 

a few minutes until nightfall we even found time to 

wash our Lycra in the river. We ate a picnic dinner of 

chorizo and cheese dropped into Uncle Ben’s instant 

rice, washed down with Rioja supped from torn-inhalf 

beer cans. 

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Tom Owen And Matt Grays 

Bodegas and bulls 

After the second day 

my memory gets a bit 

blurry. We settled into a 

pattern of fitful sleep on 

the ground, desperate 

searches for an earlymorning 

cafe, long 

attritional hours in the 

saddle in the noonday 

sun, menú del día, a 

cursory look on Google 

Maps for a likely sleeping 

spot, a mad dash to the 

supermarket, a grateful 

slump into a bivvy bag. 

It’s supremely easy 

when travelling long 

distances by bike to 

nestle into a basic level of 

brain function – thinking 

only about your stomach 

and where you’ll sleep. 

The world beyond the 

borders of Spain could 

have descended into 

nuclear war and we’d 

have been none the 

wiser. 

I can remember the 

highlights, the waypoints 

along the route most 

relevant to Hemingway’s 

life. In Haro we cycled 

by a bodega which is 

(mildly) famous as the 

spot where Hemingway 

got very pissed and lost 

in the cellar. I believe this 

story to be apocryphal, 

but it fits beautifully 

into the Papa myth. We 

spun our legs through 

Logroño, where ‘Hem’ 

watched a great many 

bullfights and partook 

in more than one festivo. 

Most magically of all, 

on our penultimate day 

we swam in and slept 

by the River Irati in 

the farthest northern 

part of Spain, which 

has its source right up 

against the border with 

France in the Pyrenees. 

Hemingway loved the 

Irati and the village 

of Aribe on its bank, 

spending many hours 

fishing for trout. 

But more than any one 

place that Hemingway 

definitely went, the 

striking power of Spain 

is that there is so much 

of it – so empty, for the 

most part – and this 

is what was easiest 

to associate with the 

author’s work. His short 

stories in particular deal 

frequently with man 

and nature, with the 

wildness of the world 

we no longer inhabit. 

The purity of feeling and 

sometime loneliness of 

being out in the open. 

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SIX DAY 

LONDON 

DERNY 

RIDERS 

Derny races are always a high point of a 

night at the six-day, but where did these 

strange machines come from – and who 

are the people riding them? 

Words: Matthew Bailey 

Pictures: Drew Kaplan 

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Matthew Bailey And Drew Kaplan 

Six Day London Derny Riders 

Everyone has a favourite 

race. Yours is probably 

Paris-Roubaix. Your dad’s 

is probably the Tour. 

Your hipster mate might 

prefer the Giro. Me? 

Mine is Bordeaux–Paris. 

Of course, I have to admit 

I haven’t actually seen 

much of Bordeaux–Paris. 

There appears only to 

be a relatively small 

amount of footage in 

existence, mostly of the 

cor-blimey-look-at-what- 

Johnny-Foreigner’s-upto-now 

newsreel variety. 

But Bordeaux–Paris was 

once one of the biggest 

events in the calendar, 

and its heyday certainly 

coincided with the Golden 

Age of Cycling. Its winners 

between 1950 and 

1970 included Louison 

Bobet, Ferdi Kübler, Tom 

Simpson, Wim van Est, 

Jan Janssen and Walter 

Godefroot. But more 

importantly, by the time 

it died – the last edition 

was held in 1988, its 

elevated status long since 

forgotten – it was the 

last surviving remnant 

of the very earliest 

days of bicycle racing. 

For one thing, with a course 

that approached 600 km 

in length, it was a direct 

connection to the same 

19th century obsession 

with implausible feats of 

endurance that gave us 

channel-swimming, 1,000- 

mile walking contests 

and horse-versus-man 

races. Many editions 

started in the middle 

of the night. Winning 

times in the very early 

days exceeded 24 hours. 

And as far as bike racing 

was concerned those 

were very early days 

indeed. Henri Desgrange, 

the father of the Tour 

de France himself, was 

reputedly inspired to take 

up cycling after witnessing 

the closing stages of the 

very first Bordeaux– 

Paris, held in 1891 (and 

won by the great George 

Pilkington Mills of Anfield 

CC, with British riders 

filling the top four places). 

And for another, like 

many early bicycle races, 

the rules allowed for 

competitors to be paced. 

This job was initially done 

by other riders working in 

teams, often on tandems, 

and sometimes triplets or 

even quads. As technology 

developed competitors 

came to be paced by such 

a chaotic blend of two 

and four-wheeled motor 

vehicles that the modern 

eye cannot help but 

scrutinise contemporary 

photographs in the hope 

of a glimpse of the Ant 

Hill Mob battling Dick 

Dastardly. (It’s worth 

remembering that these 

were also the early days 

of motor racing, and 

that the 1895 Paris– 

Bordeaux–Paris Trail 

is often described as 

the first motor race. It’s 

hardly surprising there 

should be some overlap.) 

After a number of hairraising 

accidents and 

near-misses, from 1931 

only motorcycles were 

allowed. Even then the 

precise rules continued 

to vary from year to year, 

but after the second world 

war the rules stabilised 

into their final and most 

familiar form, according 

to which the peloton 

would ride from Bordeaux 

to either Châtellerault 

or Poitiers, where riders 

would collect their pacers 

and make their way 

individually to Paris. 

What facilitated that 

stabilisation was, above 

all, the introduction 

in 1938 of the derny, 

with which Bordeaux– 

Paris will eternally be 

associated. Today the 

word ‘derny’ is used to 

refer to any lightweight 

motorised two-wheeler 

used for pacing bicycle 

races, but the original and 

highly distinctive machine 

was built by Roger Derny 

et Fils at 81, Avenue 

St. Mande, and later 

at Avenue du Général- 

Michel-Bizot, in Paris’s 

twelfth arrondissement. 

It had pedals, handlebars, 

a saddle and frame 

all borrowed from or 

modelled on those of a 

bicycle. In fact, in yet 

another throwback to the 

late 19th century, it looked 

rather like one of the very 

first motorcycles, when 

manufacturers were still 

simply bolting engines on 

to existing bicycle designs. 

But there were good 

reasons for this apparent 

technological regression. 

The derny was conceived 

of not as an everyday 

motorcycle for use as a 

means of transport by 

the general public but 

specifically as a training 

device which would allow 

an individual cyclist to 

experience the speed 

and the aerodynamic 

and psychological 

effects resulting from 

riding with others. (Yes, 

psychological: many 

coaches believe riders are 

capable of greater efforts 

when striving to hang on 

to a wheel rather than 

riding alone.) So, firstly, 

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it wasn’t built to achieve 

an especially high speed 

– it only needed to be a 

bit faster than a single 

cyclist – and secondly, it 

was intended to provide 

not maximum protection 

from the wind, but only 

about the same amount of 

shelter as a normal bicycle. 

In both respects M. 

Derny’s entraineur 

differed greatly from 

the standard cars and 

motorcycles once used to 

pace Bordeaux–Paris at 

such hair-raising speeds. 

What is more, robustly 

built, but much lighter 

than a true motorcycle 

and equipped with only a 

small two-stroke engine, 

it could cover great 

distances on the contents 

of a petrol tank small 

enough to be mounted 

on the handlebars. 

Finally, it addressed a key 

problem in using standard 

motorcycles to pace 

cyclists. Motorcycles are 

built with low gear ratios 

and high-revving engines, 

meaning that they 

accelerate and decelerate 

extremely swiftly as the 

throttle is opened and 

closed – unpleasantly 

and dangerously so for a 

cyclist following at close 

quarters. This is why 

normal motorcycles have 

to be fitted with protective 

rollers that stick out 

behind the rear wheel if 

they are to be used for 

pacing. The derny, by 

contrast, was equipped 

with a very high fixed gear 

and an engine tuned to 

pull hard at low revs. This 

meant that speed could be 

controlled very precisely 

and smoothly, mostly via 

the throttle but partly 

also by the rider’s subtly 

varying the pressure on 

the always-turning pedals. 

And so the organisers 

of Bordeaux–Paris 

immediately saw the 

derny as the perfect 

solution to all their 

problems. At a stroke it 

removed the considerable 

safety problems of an 

event that combined all 

the risks of a one-day 

classic (complete with 

entourage) with those 

of a long-distance motor 

race – and all without 

a return to expensive 

teams of human pacers. 

So for 1938’s edition 

they decreed that the 

entraineur was obligitaire: 

every rider would be paced 

by an identical machine. 

And so perfectly did this 

remarkable invention 

fit its niche that its use 

would remain compulsory 

until 1974, even though 

Roger Derny et Fils went 

out of business in 1958. 

If it’s a long way from 

Bordeaux to Paris, it’s 

further still from the 

midnight start of a 600 

km road race to the rolling 

disco and light show of the 

modern six-day scene. 

Nonetheless, remarkably, 

the light, tough, agile 

derny is just as much 

at home on the steep 

banking and tight corners 

of the track as it is on the 

endless dusty, tree-lined 

nationale routes of rural 

France, and the distinctive 

oily aroma of its buzzing, 

rattling 98cc two-stroke 

engine is as integral 

a part of the six-day 

experience as gassy beer 

and frietjes with mayo. 

While the UCI now restricts 

use of the derny at track 

events to the keirin – a 

double anachronism, as 

Japanese keirin races are 

always paced by a cyclist, 

and the UCI-approved 

dernys are anyway 

electric rather than 

petrol-driven – six-day 

promoters understand the 

importance and excitement 

of true derny racing. 

This is as true of the 

Six Day London as any 

of its more traditional 

continental counterparts, 

and the half-term 

crowds give the drivers a 

deafening welcome each 

time they take to the track. 

Now riding as a cohesive 

outfit under the collective 

term Derny Team, this 

group of specialists light 

up the boards with their 

unique combination 

of knees-akimbo dadnext-door 

bonhomie, 

racing smarts, technical 

skills, snug leisurewear 

and willingness to flog 

professional cyclists to 

within an inch of their lives. 

But the affection is as 

much for the machines 

as it is for their pilots. 

It’s the fastest, loudest, 

most fun and, on the face 

of it, simplest racing of 

the evening: no bunch, 

no hand slings, no timing, 

no track stands and first 

over the line wins. And 

none of it is possible 

without that redoubtable, 

anachronistic, 

irreplaceable littleengine-that-could 

– M. 

Derny’s entraineur. 

Keen to learn more, 

Conquista caught up with 

top derny driver, and longstanding 

member of Derny 

Team, Peter Bäuerlein. 

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Matthew Bailey and Drew Kaplan 

SIX DAY LONDON DERNY RIDERS 

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What sort of a person becomes a 

derny driver? 

It's a bit like golf. On the one hand, 

you have to be self-confident, but on 

the other hand also a bit humble. 

It doesn’t seem much like golf to us. 

And there must be more to it than 

balancing confidence and humility. 

How about balancing the throttle 

and the pedals, for a start? 

After almost 40 years of derny 

pacing I am really used to it but 

yes, it isn’t as easy as it looks. To 

combine both kinds of drive in a 

way which makes it easy for a rider 

to follow and to win against the 

competitors is a special art. 

But in the end it is just training and 

competing. If you have a coach who 

supports you, and if you can learn 

from your own mistakes too, that 

makes it much easier. 

So how did you get into it? 

I watched derny races at six-days 

as a child as well as stayer races in 

the summertime on open tracks. I 

started pacing in 1981 at the age of 

20. 

How do you qualify to be a 

professional? Do you have to race 

the others to see if you’re quick 

enough? 

It’s not just a matter of speed. But 

driving at high speed is a basic 

requirement. We had aspiring 

drivers who lost three laps in the 

first 5 km. They then had to go back 

home and continue practicing. 

Are the drivers competitive among 

themselves? 

Certainly. But we also discuss the 

racing, and I hope that everyone is 

still learning from each other. 

What goes through your head when 

you are on the boards? How much 

does it vary with different riders? 

It is a mixture of the will to win and 

the wish to bring the rider to the 

end. For an inexperienced rider, 

the pacer has a lot of responsibility 

but with more experienced and 

successful riders the pressure on 

the pacer is also very high. 

What do you think of the relatively 

new system of derny drivers 

drawing different riders at random 

for each race, rather than forming 

long-term partnerships, as is 

traditional? Is it more exciting or 

just more dangerous? 

It is definitely both. 

Tell us about your machine. We 

know the basics are standard 

but every rider makes his derny 

unique, right? 

Please understand that secrets 

have to be kept secret. Otherwise it 

wouldn’t be unique. 

Peter Bäuerlein. 

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What do you think of the Six Day 

London? How does it compare to 

the other events in Europe? To 

us it seems rather different – it’s 

very family oriented, with not so 

much beer drinking. 

I love the Six Day London very 

much. It is more a 3.0 Six 

Day, adapted to the conditions of 

our time and not a relic of ancient 

times. The crowd in London is 

treating the pacers very well. We 

are considered as kings in the Lee 

Valley Velodrome. 

Do you ever race on the 

road as well as on the track? 

We’ve seen derny-paced crits on 

the continent, which look very 

exciting but are not well-known in 

the UK. 

Yes, I race on the road as well as 

on the track and we would love to 

race on the roads in the UK even 

on the wrong side. I tried to work 

it out a few times in the past at 

crits in London and in other parts 

of the UK but unfortunately it 

never happened. 

If the old-fashioned, long-distance 

paced races like Bordeaux–Paris 

were resurrected would you 

be interested in taking part? 

Have you ever taken part in a road 

race like that? 

Never in Bordeaux–Paris. My 

longest derny road race was less 

than 150 km and to be honest 

that was really long. I guess it is 

out of time. Everyone is against 

doping but everyone wants to 

see races like Bordeaux–Paris. 

In my opinion it couldn‘t work in 

the modern world. It is a relic of 

an ancient time, like a 48-hour 

dancing competition. 

Finally what makes a really 

good derny driver? Who is the 

greatest derny driver of all time, 

and why? 

I am only able to talk about the 

last probably 50 years. In my 

opinion there have been two real 

legends. Both are Dutch and one 

was the successor of the other. So 

I would like to start with Noppie 

Koch. When I started pacing in 

1981 I had the pleasure and the 

honour to participate together 

with him (and compete against 

him) in a lot of derny races on the 

road and on the track until he had 

to stop his career at the end of 

1988 after a bad crash at the Six 

Days of Cologne. Noppie Koch was 

recognized by all racers as the best 

pacemaker on the derny and also 

on the motorbike for stayer races. 

He had a very calm and reassuring 

manner and knew how to use the 

power of the racers extremely 

efficiently in the race. After he 

had to stop he had two successors: 

Dieter Durst for the stayer 

competitions and Joop Zijlaard 

for the races with the dernys. 

Joop Zijlaard was the pacemaker 

whom the publikum loved. In his 

inimitable way he fired his racers 

and led them to victory over and 

over again. He finished his career 

at the Rotterdam Six Days in 

January 2013. 

Peter Bäuerlein. 

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67

Matthew Bailey and Drew Kaplan 

SIX DAY LONDON DERNY RIDERS 

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70 

71

Suze Clemitson concludes her 

enthralling deep dive into the 

history of one of Britain’s most 

prodigious cycling dynasties. 

Words: Suze Clemitson 

Images: Swinnerton Family Archive 

Illustrations: RUNE - CREATIVE (Pip Claffey)

Suze Clemitson And RUNE - CREATIVE (Pip Claffey) 

Searching For The Swinnerton Sisters II 

Stoke-on-Trent, 1975. The Bay City Rollers brought Hanley to a 

standstill, the streets thronged with screaming, tartan-clad teenage 

girls. A series of earth tremors known locally as ‘goths’ or ‘bumps’ 

rocked the suburbs. The Northern Soul scene that had burned so 

brightly around the Torch nightclub flickered out, though the allnighters 

would live on in Blackpool and Wigan. And Stoke City 

finished 5th in the league again, despite paying a £325,000 world 

record transfer fee for goalkeeper Peter Shilton. 

Meanwhile, in the rather less glitzy world of cycling in 

Stoke, Roy and Doris Swinnerton were still running the hugely 

successful Stoke Athletic Club Cycling Section, one of 15 cycling 

clubs in and around Stoke at the time. Phil Griffiths was busy 

winning the third of his five BBAR titles for the club and 17-yearold 

Catherine Swinnerton had just taken third in her first British 

National Road Race Championships. 

“I always looked up to Bernadette being the next sister 

down. She was my hero and that’s why I wanted to race – because 

Bernadette raced and I wanted to be just like her,” Catherine 

Swinnerton tells me 43 years later. She and her sister Margaret 

started racing against the boys in the park, “I was 10 when I started, 

but it wasn’t proper racing just crits in the park, having fun,” she 

says. 

Then Bernadette won silver in the Worlds. 

“She’d just finished high school and I was just starting 

the grammar school she’d finished,” Catherine remembers. “I was 

so proud of her and I remember in assembly I was expecting the 

head teacher to mention it and she didn’t say anything because it 

wasn’t hockey or netball, it was a cinderella sport. And just as some 

of the girls had filed out she said ‘oh by the way, ex-pupil Bernadette 

Swinnerton has just won a silver medal in the World Championships 

in Czechoslovakia’. I was really disappointed they didn’t make a 

bigger thing of it but that’s how it was in those days.” 

Catherine and Margaret carried the Swinnerton name into 

the women’s racing scene of the 1970s and 80s, a Wild West affair of 

piecemeal sponsorships and the faintest inklings of the emergence 

of a modern women’s cycling scene. It was a landscape dominated in 

Britain by Beryl Burton and in Europe by the likes of Jeannie Longo, 

Maria Canins and Connie Carpenter. The Swinnerton girls are like 

Russian dolls, each one looking up to the next. It was no surprise 

that where Catherine went, Margaret followed. 

“She talked me into meeting her from college and we used 

to ride back together and she’d be saying ‘you could race, you know, 

we only go this fast,’” Margaret remembers. “And I said I just wanted 

to watch the lads race, Mark and Paul. And she’d say ‘you could do 

it’, so she talked me into it.” Both women have a lilt to their voice, a 

musicality and a soft burr. It’s easy to see how persuasive Catherine 

would have been. Margaret was the third and final Swinnerton sister 

to pull her toe straps tight and start racing. “She really only wanted 

me to do it because she wanted someone to travel with, she was fed 

up going around the country on her own,” Margaret laughs. “So I got 

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the shock of my life when it turned out to be quite a bit faster.” As 

long-time friend and top time triallist Louise Cuming remembers, 

Catherine wanted someone to have a laugh with, “And needless to 

say the Swinnerton genes ensured they won as well as laughed.” 

1975 was the year when Catherine started taking it 

seriously. Like her siblings, Catherine had to get her qualifications 

out of the way before she could focus on racing. “I remember doing 

my O levels, thinking ‘as soon as these are out of the way I’m going 

to start racing properly.’” She’d ride to the shop after school, drop 

off her bag and ride 25 miles home the hilly way, come rain, shine or 

snow. “That’s dedication,” deadpans Margaret, “you wouldn’t catch 

me doing that.” 

At the end of the year Catherine was selected for her first 

Worlds. “You can imagine going to the Worlds as a 17-year-old with 

only a few races under your belt and meeting these international 

girls. It was a bit of a shock.” 

Terrie Riley remembers many happy hours spent round 

the Swinnertons’ kitchen table. “Doris was always willing to feed 

you and you could always find a bed for the night and a lift to the 

bike race,” she tells me. Terrie was in the GB team that went to 

the 1975 Worlds in Naumur, Belgium alongside the men’s amateur 

team with the likes of Bill Nickson, Phil Griffiths and Bob Downs. 

She remembers her and Catherine not being too keen on getting a 

massage from a male masseur, nor on having to give back their team 

GB jerseys once they’d raced in them. The Dutch dominated with 

Hennie Kuiper and Tineke Fopma running out as World Champions. 

But it was definitely the start of something. 

Catherine: I always rode a lot of miles in training. 

Margaret: I didn’t train as much as Catherine. 

Catherine: I only did it because I had brothers. 

Margaret: I had brothers too! 

Catherine: I needed the miles, you always had the talent. 

Mark and Paul Swinnerton were shining stars on the road 

and the track – Mark winning the Pernod GP trophy in 1980, Paul 

tearing up the track and setting a Guinness World Record reaching 

109 mph unassisted on the rollers. Both riders wore the British 

colours all over the world. 

Margaret recalls how vibrant the local track leagues were 

in the 70s and 80s. 

“We’d all pile in the van and all go to the club room and do 

circuit training around the dustbins. We’d go sprinting down one 

side and then back up the other, learning how to corner. And that 

was your training.” Basic as it was, both women agree they were 

lucky to have grown up in the club system. 

“The way a lot of girls come into the sport now is by being 

talent spotted and they’ve missed the club side of it. They have to 

be taught how to ride a bike because they missed out on what we 

learned naturally,” adds Catherine. 

“It’s not around so much nowadays,” agrees Margaret, 

“they don’t have that and we took it for granted. We were taught by 

the lads we rode with and it was fun.” 

“I know we had fun as we weren’t under the same pressures 

as the girls racing today,” Catherine points out, “but we did take our 

racing seriously!” 

They talk about training in terms of long club runs and 

youth hostelling with saddle bags, just to get the base miles in. There 

was no training structure, no coaches, just talks about looking after 

yourself and some basic training ideas. You did your own thing and 

you were all in the same boat. “We spent every weekend travelling 

the country having a laugh,” Margaret says “we just had fun.” The F 

word comes up frequently in my conversations with British women 

riders who blazed a trail in the 1970s and 80s, those three letters 

conjuring up a spirit and an attitude that sometimes seems lacking 

in the modern era of lottery funding and marginal gains. 

Louise Cuming remembers how it was all done with very 

little support. 

“The girls had to use their own bikes and kit and often make 

their own way to races and coaching was certainly not scientific. If 

you talk to the generation of women cyclists who were at the top in 

the 70s and 80s they see the main difference with today’s winners 

is the fun factor. Not that racing didn’t hurt and they were certainly 

motivated to win, but there was a freedom and a fun that seems 

missing now.” 

Terrie Riley agrees. “You rode your own bike and brought 

your own spare wheels. I’d save up all year to buy Clement Seta 

Extra tyres in the hope I’d get selected to ride,” she says. “We had no 

money, no financial support but we had one hell of a great time and 

great memories!” 

1976 was Olympic year. Catherine and Terrie headed south 

to Ostruni in Italy for the Worlds in the company of the Great Britain 

Britain professional men’s squad – Sid Barras, Keith Lambert, Phil 

Bayton and Phil Edwards. “They rode the course with us in the days 

before and came out to cheer us on even though they were racing 

the next day,” Terrie recalls. They returned the favour in spades 

when the BCF failed to send out any musettes for the men’s team. 

“Catherine and I set to and tore up a bed sheet and sat and 

sewed musettes from it so that they had something to put food in,” 

Terrie says. Then she and Catherine did the feeds each lap, “as there 

were no officials with us to handle feeding for the pros. It just had to 

be done and neither of us would ever profess to be seamstresses!” 

A year later they were both on the flight to Trinidad 

and then on to Venezuela for the Worlds in San Cristóbal. “The 

accommodation was the pits,” Terrie remembers, “five girls in a tiny 

room with windows but no glass in them with all sorts of insects 

flying around.” 

They slept with the light on every night and Catherine’s 

nightly ritual was to get her Adilettes [a style of sandal made 

by Adidas] and stand on the bed and kill as many insects as she 

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could with them. “So much so the white walls were splattered with 

smeared insects!” Terrie laughs. 

What was forged in the crucible of those pioneering days 

were friendships that continue to endure 40 years later – when 

Catherine crashed badly at the 1978 Worlds and was hospitalised 

with a head injury, it was Terrie who stayed behind and then 

travelled home with her. 

There is a long list of amateur GB riders from that era: 

Catherine, Margaret and Bernadette Swinnerton, Terrie Riley, 

Pauline Strong, Vicky Thomas, Julie Earnshaw, Linda Flavell, 

Jackie Griffiths, Maria Blower and Mandy Jones. They achieved 

some amazing results, but few of them live in the past. If they get 

together they will talk about the past, but rarely. They rode for their 

country, they won medals, they have some great memories but 

have moved on and, unless pressed, will not reminisce. They are 

modest and certainly did not benefit in any material way from their 

achievements. 

“We never talk about the past,” Catherine says. “It’s been so 

difficult racking our brains!” We talk about the start of sponsored 

clubs in the 1980s and how lucky they were to have the Swinnerton 

bike shop behind them. How there were no family holidays just trips 

to bike races with the family. But there was always equipment. And 

the better they performed the more publicity they gained for the 

shop. 

More sponsorship came from Reg Harris, one of the fabled 

names of British cycling, winner of four world sprint titles in the 

40s and 50s and a silver medal in the sprint and tandem at the 

1948 London Olympics. So famous he was referenced in an episode 

of Hancock’s Half Hour, Harris came out of retirement to win the 

national sprint title at the age of 54. He also took Paul Swinnerton 

under his wing and coached him to great success. 

But despite the club car, the jerseys and the tracksuits, prize 

money still didn’t amount to much. Even so, the Swinnertons knew 

they were lucky. Catherine had the luxury of working as a supply 

teacher through the school year so she could take the summer off to 

focus on her racing. The GB girls couldn’t race full time in the way 

they do now and as their continental contemporaries were capable 

of doing. 

Margaret: She was a star, she was my hero. 

Catherine: I tried my best and that was it. 

At the beginning of the 1980s word got out that there would 

finally be a women’s Olympic road race in 1984. Catherine was 26 

and had been racing for nearly a decade. But at an age when today’s 

riders are just beginning to hit their peak she was already considered 

over the hill. “I felt I was getting stronger and I was finishing top 

15 in the Worlds every year, but because I wasn’t winning medals 

the BCF wasn’t interested. By the time you reached your 20s they 

didn’t want to select you.” The road race would be her last hurrah – 

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Catherine hung up her wheels the next season. 

It’s difficult to think of a rider with Catherine Swinnerton’s 

British championship record not getting routinely selected to ride 

these days. In her 10 years on the bike she ran out the winner twice 

and was on the podium a further 4 times. From 7 starts she never 

finished lower than third. It’s an elite record backed up by her equal 

prowess on the track. 

By her own account the final two years of Catherine 

Swinnerton’s road racing career were the most amazing experience. 

She went to the LA Olympics and finished a more than creditable 

13th behind Connie Carpenter. She rode the second edition of the 

women’s Tour de France and came within a tyre’s width of taking 

victory on the Champs-Elysées. And she met and subsequently 

married a slender and quietly spoken Irishman whose steel rimmed 

glasses would become a familiar sight to cycling fans of the 80s as 

he took stage wins in the Tour de France and the Giro d’Italia during 

the last truly golden period of men’s cycling. 

Catherine: I’ll never forget Pauline Strong saying to me ‘you 

know you’ve got an advantage over us girls, you’ve got God on 

your side.’ And I said, ‘don’t be silly!’ 

“Every time you went away the first thing you did was find 

a church,” Margaret says. “It was just something we did as a family, 

it was a comfort.” 

“It used to help me because I got so nervous, and if I could 

go to mass it was the same thing I’d be doing at home” Catherine 

adds. “Our team manager used to say whenever we used to go away 

we had to find a church for Catherine!” 

Margaret remembers an interpreter finding her a Catholic 

church in Japan, dropping her off and waiting in the car through the 

one hour service before taking her back to the hotel again. 

In the Olympic Village in Los Angeles there was a multifaith 

room with a Catholic mass among the services on offer. 

“I’d go to church every Sunday. And the final Sunday just 

before the team time trial I was at mass and the Irish team were 

there,” Catherine recalls, and you can hear the spark in her voice 

as she remembers it. “And as soon as the mass finished the priest 

said ‘right lads as soon as you finish the team time trial tomorrow 

we’re going for a drink.’ There were only a few of us there and Paul 

Kimmage said ‘do you want to come with us Catherine?’ I said I 

would if the other girls could. So we went for a drink outside the 

Olympic village and that was how I met Martin.” 

Margaret: We did some testing at university but we never got 

any feedback. Those were the years they learned from us. We 

were the guinea pigs. 

Despite the lack of support for women’s riding in the 1980s 

there were definite perks to having a professional male rider in 

your life. When Catherine hit the start line of the 1985 Tour Cycliste 

Féminin and faced mountains for the first time – “we weren’t used 

to racing up high mountains!” – Martin was just a phone call away 

riding the men’s Tour de France in his first season as a pro. “He 

had me calling him for advice every night,” Catherine laughs. “It 

wouldn’t have been the best preparation for him.” 

“We rode the last 50 miles of the men’s stage. One time we 

started at the foot of the Tourmalet, went down the other side and 

then up to Luz Ardiden.” A trip to the local phone box every night 

brought professional advice from Martin Earley. “We had a good 

manager and mechanic, but they didn’t know about gearing for 

women so I rang Martin every night and said ‘Martin, what sprocket 

do you think I need?’” Four years later Earley would streak to the 

finish in a last gasp dash for victory that saw him throw his arms 

aloft as he crossed the line in Pau alone. Catherine watched him on 

the TV, pregnant with their son Joseph. 

That 1985 race was the first of several thrilling battles that 

pitted the queen of French racing, Jeannie Longo, against the 36 

year old Italian maestra of all things mountainous, Maria Canins. For 

the next five years they would trade victories with Canins proving 

supreme before Longo found a way to match her and become the 

first triple winner of the race. Catherine recalls the thrill of racing 

in front of the same clamorous, adoring crowds as the men. “It must 

have been a nightmare for the organisers,” she admits “sometimes 

we only finished half an hour before the men.” 

She nearly capped it all with a stage win on the Champs- 

Elysées: “I was so excited it was finished I attacked with a French 

girl – she went one side of the road and I went the other and she just 

beat me.” She’s quick to downplay the achievement: “It’s nothing 

compared to what the girls do now but for me, then, it was amazing 

and the crowds were fantastic.” 

“I have ridden with two unbelievable descenders in my life, 

Sean Kelly and my Aunty Margaret.” 

Joseph Earley 

Throughout our conversation the intertwining love, support 

and pride in each other’s achievements is palpable. They tell me 

about riding in the women’s Giro in 1982 or 1983 when all they can 

remember is getting on the plane, arriving in the dark, getting on a 

bus over the mountains, getting up and riding the race, finishing and 

repeating again day after day. Catherine remembers a stage finish 

outside the Colosseum in Rome “but apart from that I don’t know 

where we went.” Margaret remembers packing and repacking for 

her first Worlds in 1979 in Valkenburg where Dutchwoman Petra de 

Bruin smiled a toothy grin of triumph as she pulled on the coveted 

rainbow jersey. 

“It was the first international race I rode and I repacked my 

bag about six times. And when we got there I’d left half my clothes 

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behind! Catherine had to lend me some tights – my big sister looked 

after me, and Bernadette looks out for all of us.” 

According to Catherine, Margaret is the naturally 

gifted one who didn’t need to train to get results. Margaret says, 

“Catherine could explain the mechanics of the sport to anybody, but 

I couldn’t. We’d go on training camps and I’d tell Terrie to sit on my 

wheel and follow because she wasn’t good at descending and I didn’t 

understand how she couldn’t do it. But I just do it and I don’t know 

how I do it.” 

Margaret strikes me as the pragmatic sister. She married 

John Herety – one of the lynchpins of the British domestic scene – 

in 1983 and raced her final season under her married name. They 

had a daughter, Georgia, who is that rare thing – a Swinnerton who 

doesn’t ride a bike. Margaret may have ridden for the sheer love of 

cycling, but when it disappointed her she simply walked away and 

cut herself off. 

“These days it’s a job. They might not like to do it and they’re 

under a lot of pressure but that’s their job. They have to do it, they 

have to perform and if you don’t you lose your job. It’s difficult, but 

it is a job which it wasn’t for us.” 

Despite her natural gifts, Margaret missed out on a much 

coveted place in that first women’s Olympic road race. 

“I was so disappointed with being left out of the Olympics 

I packed up and stopped racing. I was selected to ride the Tour de 

France as a consolation but, sour grapes, I packed up.” Margaret 

won’t be pressed on what happened – “politics” she snorts with a 

half laugh – but it killed her interest in women’s competitive cycling, 

“I never watched a women’s race ever again.” 

These days, however, Margaret is back on the bike. 

“I had 30 years off. I went to the Tour of Texas in 1985 after 

the Olympics and then I never touched a bike for 30 years and I 

really regret doing that. I wouldn’t have stopped, but I got married. 

I’ve been back for 10 years and we all love it, we all ride.” 

“It was a shame because the way she rode she had this 

incredible sprint and if she was there at the end of a race she 

was just unbeatable,” says Catherine. Good enough to give Connie 

Carpenter a run for her money? My question goes unanswered, but 

the tantalising possibility of a British winner of that first road race 

hangs in the air for a second or two. “In those days you didn’t get 

women’s teams,” Catherine continues, “no one rode as a team – but 

we did. As long as one of us won we didn’t mind. There was never 

any jealousy and we’d always help each other.” 

Margaret: I remember one stage race when we were on different 

teams and I was leading and I came down in the wet, slid across 

this bend and came down and nobody stopped. But Catherine 

stopped. 

Catherine: I was just so disgusted, I went back for her to get her 

back into the race and she won the race overall in the end and 

I got told off. None of the team helped, but then they shouldn’t 

have split us up should they? 

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To say that the Swinnertons lie at the epicentre of British racing 

would be an understatement. Cycling was woven into the fabric of 

everyday life as surely as breathing and it wasn’t uncommon, as 

Terrie Riley told me, to find extra faces at the kitchen table. One of 

them was Beryl Burton, one of the greatest women riders of all time, 

whose legend throws a long shadow. They remember her coming to 

stay if she was racing locally with Bernadette, their dad building her 

wheels and looking after her. 

Catherine raced against her as a 17-year-old when Burton 

was in her 40s and past her prime. “I held her in high esteem but 

my experience racing with her was not the best.” She refuses to go 

on record, not wanting to speak badly of such a legendary figure, 

saying only, “Bernadette stopped racing but Beryl couldn’t stop.” 

But the complex and competitive relationship between Beryl and 

her daughter Denise is a way into speaking about the deep, enfolding 

bonds of family – of pride not jealousy, collaboration not competition 

and of the synchronicity of twins who both won their first national 

championships on the same day when they were just 19. 

Margaret: The doctor told us she could go at any time and we 

said ‘well we’ve got another three weeks then because she won’t 

go when the Tour’s on’. 

Throughout the sisters’ racing careers Roy and Doris were 

always there. Roy was at Catherine’s first Worlds in Belgium back 

in 1975 and was manager of the British track team in 1976. He was 

a constant fixture at the Worlds until 1978 and managed the track 

team at the 1974 Commonwealth Games in Christchurch, where the 

men dominated winning four of the six gold medals on offer. He had 

even been at the 1972 Munich Olympics, where the British men took 

a bronze in the team pursuit just days before the massacre of 11 

Israeli team members overshadowed the Games. 

Meanwhile, Doris was managing the shop and organising 

local time trials and leagues. Every night she was out at a track 

team meeting, every day making sure that Swinnertons Cycles ran 

like clockwork. But Catherine remembers that if it was raining and 

dark and she was about to go out training again after college her 

mum would say ‘Don’t do it, have a night off,’ because she wanted to 

look after us,” her daughter says with undisguised affection. 

Margaret says her mum could tell you “everything about 

every race” and remembers the time she was hospitalised a few 

years ago with pneumonia. 

“I went to see her one evening and she asked for the remote 

control and Bernard said ‘Mum, you can’t, the telly’s for all four of 

you’ and she said ‘Bernard it’s the Tour de France I’ve got to get 

Eurosport on.’ ‘Mum, this is the NHS there’s no Eurosport.’ ‘Well 

Channel 4 will have to do.’ So she managed to get hold of the remote 

control and Bernard said ‘you can’t just grab the remote control and 

keep it’ and she said ‘see that woman in the corner? She’s deaf. And 

she never wakes up – just give us the bloody remote control’. And 

she sat on it and no one ever saw it again.” 

Catherine: I worry about Joe racing and I asked Mum how she 

managed with 7! And she said ‘you know what, Catherine, I was 

just too busy to worry’. 

Margaret: She was a star, she still is at 93. 

“We’re really blessed as a family,” says Margaret, simply. 

“The fact our children ride bikes is lovely,” Catherine adds, 

“and it would be lovely if they did race.” Among the next generation 

of Swinnertons is a national junior sprint champion and Catherine’s 

son Joe tears up the northern track scene like his uncle Paul. 

“It’s a joy for us that they just enjoy cycling like we did,” 

Catherine concludes. Hardly surprising when their close family 

have held cycling honours from schoolboy championships to World 

Championship medals. 

It’s a sentiment Louise Cuming echoes. 

“All of them still love riding their bikes – and I have personal 

experience that many of them are still annoyingly fit and fast! Most 

deny any competitive spirit these days. I don’t believe them,” she 

laughs. 

Terrie Riley agrees, “We are all still great friends now and 

still riding bikes. I spend most of my time in Mallorca now and the 

‘girls’ still come out to ride with me here 40-odd years on!” 

Catherine: We don’t live in the past, there’s so much in the future, 

so much to live for. You can’t change the past and the future is 

so much more exciting when you have your own children to look 

forward to. 

Family seems as fundamental to the Swinnertons as 

growing up on wheels. There’s time for one last story, of Catherine 

and Martin taking their three children out for a ride – Joe on the 

tandem behind his dad, Maria in the child seat and Katrina on a tag 

along behind her mum. 

“Martin as usual led the way and I’d ride behind. And 

Katrina used to go mad because she always wanted to ride in front. I 

remember her moaning about me going too slow and saying that she 

couldn’t believe her mum could have ever gone quick on a bike – at 

the time, I had to agree with her!” 

We say our goodbyes, the lilting Midlands melody of their 

intertwining voices still echoing in my ears. After I finish talking 

with the Swinnerton sisters I imagine them both slipping on their 

cleats and going for a ride, heads close together, chatting with the 

easy intimacy of a lifetime lived together on and around the bike. 

I think about their sense of astonishment that theirs should 

be a story worth telling – partly because they’re so unassuming 

about their achievements and partly because their lived experience 

is to them something so utterly normal, as if every family’s life is 

packed with medals and cups and Guinness World Records and 

being bundled into the caravan to watch your siblings compete in 

yet another World Championships. 

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I think about Doris and Roy, who created a dynasty of 

cyclists and supported them equally without fear or favour, instilling 

the virtues of hard training and good qualifications but never at 

the expense of having fun. Of Doris pinching the remote control to 

watch her beloved Tour. Of Roy being carried in triumph shoulder 

high. A modern couple who were forward-looking enough to see a 

time when Stoke would be packed with cycle shops but there would 

only ever be one Swinnertons. 

And I think about Bernadette and Catherine and Margaret, 

blazing a trail for a kind of British women’s cycling that is long lost 

now – where winning isn’t everything and you get stuck in beside 

the men because they’re happy to be your training partners and you 

travel the country and the world on a shoestring and have a laugh. A 

time both more egalitarian and less up its own arse than the modern 

professionalised sport. The kind of cycling we all profess to want to 

see more of until we’re blinded by the bling of medals. 

I picture them cycling out towards Hanchurch Woods or up 

into the Peak District, Catherine romping effortlessly up the climbs 

with the gearing Martin taught her and Margaret swooping down 

them before unleashing her natural sprint. Pedalling back the years, 

the sound of their laughter trailing behind them. 


Read the first part of this two-parter in Conquista issue 20. 

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Words: Cillian Kelly 

Pictures: Cor Vos 

Matthew Bailey and Frank Lösel 

T H E 

L I Q U I 

N V I N C 

I B L E S 

H O W O N E T E A M 

A C H I E V E D S O M E T H I N G 

N O B O D Y E L S E C O U L D , 

A N D D I D N ’ T E V E N 

N O T I C E 

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The Liquinvincibles 

You probably think professional cycling 

is about winning races. You’re wrong. 

It’s a perfectly understandable mistake 

to make. Winning is what riders get 

asked about in interviews most often. 

How did you win that race? Why did you 

not win that other race? How are you 

going to prepare to win the next race? 

Which other riders are you concerned 

about who may prevent you from 

winning? How are you going to help your 

teammate win? 

The success of a rider’s career is 

measured in wins, both the quality and 

quantity. Finding out the identity of the 

winner of a race and how they did it is 

why most people watch cycling. But it’s 

not what cycling is about. It’s not what 

cycling is for. 

Cycling is and always has been for 

selling stuff. Going right back to the 

19th century, road racing was invented 

to sell newspapers. Then it continued to 

exist to sell bikes and equipment. And 

beginning in the 1950s, when Fiorenzo 

Magni landed himself a sponsor with 

Nivea hand cream, the first extra-sportif 

sponsor, the sport existed – as it still 

does to this day – as a vehicle for selling 

absolutely anything. 

It just so happens that winning races is 

usually the best angle to take when trying 

to sell whatever random tat happens 

to be emblazoned on a rider’s jersey. 

Crossing the finish line first with arms 

spread-eagled gives sponsors the money 

shot they can use for advertising their 

product. It associates them with success. 

Everyone wants to be associated with 

success, right? So, buying that specific 

brand of laminate floor will make you 

feel better about yourself, because then 

you’ll be almost exactly like Tom Boonen. 

Winning is one very effective way of 

activating the advertising possibilities 

of a company. But it’s not the only way. 

Advertising is the only plausible reason 

why riders with almost no hope of winning 

take it upon themselves to make it into 

a day-long breakaway (with Thomas 

De Gendt perhaps the self-flagellating 

exception). They get up the road, get the 

sponsor on television and that’s the next 

best thing to winning races when you 

have a team full of riders who can’t win 

races. 

There are others who have discovered 

that cultivating a public persona can also 

have a similar effect. In these cases the 

rider also benefits because they become 

more likely to land another contract. 

But the benefits are symbiotic: whatever 

exposure the rider gets will also provide 

a platform for the team sponsor. 

Jens Voigt, for instance, would get into 

breakaways and win the odd race. But 

so do lots of riders. The difference with 

Voigt is that he also pushed a persona. 

An identity which consisted of Jens! 

with an exclamation mark. A wacky 

interview style where he would use 

words like “KAPOW!” and “Holy Shit”. 

And most importantly, a slogan, “shut 

up legs!” It set him apart from other 

riders with a similar palmarès. He got far 

more exposure for his sponsor than his 

sporting ability could have done on its 

own. He ended up with a book deal and 

now he commentates with Phil Liggett. 

THE PASSION OF THE CRADDOCK 

There is an even newer, previously 

untapped method for riders to sell 

themselves. Getting injured and then 

dragging their broken bodies around 

an entire country to get to the end of a 

Grand Tour. In previous decades if you 

were chewing your handlebars in the 

gruppetto all day every day, nobody 

cared. Your final GC result probably 

wasn’t even listed in the relevant edition 

of Cycling Weekly. Nobody appreciated 

what you were going through because 

nobody saw it. How could they? There 

were no cameras. 

But now everyone watching the race 

has a camera. So if ASO or RCS don’t 

have enough resources to record your 

suffering, don’t worry, it’ll end up on 

Facebook, Twitter and Instagram anyway, 

where the pain face is fetishised. The idea 

that a rider is doing damage to themselves 

just to finish a race is celebrated. This is 

not the same thing as the glory days of 

the lanterne rouge in the late 1970s 

when Gerhard Schönbacher and Philippe 

Tesnière would partake in a farcical slow 

bike race around France. This is different. 

It’s not a celebration of your position in 

the race. It’s a preoccupation with selfinflicted 

torture. But it works. 

Lawson Craddock at the 2018 Tour de 

France fractured his shoulder blade 

and smashed his face up on day one. 

But he soldiered on defiantly. Despite it 

being a fucking stupid idea and despite 

Craddock’s team staff abandoning any 

responsibility for the welfare of their 

rider, he made it to Paris. To Craddock’s 

credit he turned the experience into an 

opportunity to raise $200,000 to help 

repair a velodrome in Houston, Texas. 

But the net result was that he was talked 

about and written about far more for 

damaging his body and making a show 

out of his suffering than if he had actually 

won a stage of the race. More advertising 

banked for the sponsor. More cachet 

when it comes to negotiating Craddock’s 

next contract. 

Sam Bennett did the same at the 2016 

Tour after he fell ill almost immediately 

after he set foot in France for the Grand 

Départ. Geraint Thomas cycled around 

France with a broken hip in 2013. Dan 

Martin broke two vertebrae in 2017 but 

continued. The injury becomes the story. 

The rider becomes a vehicle for suffering 

and it doesn’t actually matter if they win 

or not. The anguish is now the reason the 

rider exists. 

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Cillian Kelly And Cor Vos 


TEAM EFFORT 

Despite the fact we’re discussing a team 

sport, all of the ways of advertising a 

sponsor mentioned so far are centred 

around the individual. For years the 

only tangible ways of displaying team 

excellence were winning team time 

trials or winning the team classification 

in the Tour de France. But we’ve already 

established cycling isn’t really what 

winning is about and let’s face it, nobody 

gives a shit about the team classification 

at the Tour de France. 

Recently teams have begun coming up 

with ways of showcasing their sponsor 

which don’t involve winning. Many 

teams now produce behind the scenes 

videos to increase their ‘reach’ and get 

shares and likes on social media. Orica– 

GreenEDGE’s Backstage Pass was a 

particularly fine example of just what 

can be produced if the team focuses 

on such things. An approach that is 

spreading. 

For the individual, finishing a Grand 

Tour can become an internal battle 

where demons are fought and barriers 

are broken down, but for an entire team 

to finish a Grand Tour is an altogether 

more impressive feat. As of 2018, Grand 

Tour teams consist of eight riders 

each, but for the rest of modern cycling 

history, teams have generally consisted 

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of nine. To bring nine riders to a race and 

have them all be physically capable of 

completing the 3,500 km route; without 

any of them getting ill or injured or 

missing the time cut; and to not have one 

significant equipment or logistical failure 

is a feat of teamwork which involves a 

whole lot more than simply exploring 

the murky depths of the pain cave. 

Managing to complete an entire Grand 

Tour with all nine riders still standing 

should be considered a mind-boggling 

achievement. It should be cause for the 

sponsoring company to rejoice. What 

an exercise in teamwork, precision, 

planning, management, excellence, 

endurance. A cause for celebration in 

itself. No need to win the race. The team 

has proven its excellence in more than 

just organising a lead-out train or getting 

into a lucky breakaway. 

This sort of achievement should be 

lauded. When a team manages it, 

they should be shouting it from the 

promotional caravan. They should be 

raising the topic in every interview they 

do. They should be making a behindthe-scenes 

documentary based on that 

achievement alone. They should, but 

they don’t. Nobody even notices. And 

there is one team in cycling history 

which is guiltier than any of failing to 

capitalise on this type of situation and 

for even failing to realise what they’d 

done. 

LIQUID GOLD 

Only one team in the history of cycling 

has ridden all three Grand Tours in one 

year and completed all three without a 

single rider abandoning. That team was 

Liquigas. 

What is even more astonishing is that 

the team managed to do it three years in 

a row. No other team has ever done this 

and Liquigas did it every year from 2009 

to 2011. They actually extended the 

streak into 2012 through the Giro and 

the Tour. They managed 11 Grand Tours 

in a row with no abandons until the run 

was ended by Daniele Ratto abandoning 

on Stage 12 of the Vuelta. 

Let’s set some context to this criminally 

uncelebrated statistic. The Tour de 

France has, of course, existed since 1903 

and the Giro was created six years later. 

But the Vuelta didn’t come into being 

until 1935. So it wasn’t until then that 

it became a possibility to even ride all 

three of these races. Regardless, cycling 

was a much more parochial affair back 

then. An Italian team taking part in 

the Vuelta, or vice versa, was not yet 

conceivable. 

It was 20 years before the first riders 

rode and finished all three Grand 

Tours in a single year. In 1955, the feat 

was achieved by Raphaël Géminiani, 

Bernardo Ruiz and Louis Caput. 

Amazingly Géminiani finished the Giro, 

Tour and Vuelta in fourth, sixth and 

third place respectively – thirty-five 

riders have completed three Grand 

Tours in a year and nobody has managed 

a set of aggregated finishing positions 

better than this. 

But in those days the Tour de France 

was contested by national teams which 

meant it was not possible for a team 

to partake in all three Grand Tours 

in a year. The Tour switched back 

permanently to being contested by trade 

teams in 1969 but also moved away from 

national teams between 1962 and 1966. 

It was during this time in 1964 when 

the Salvarani team of Vittorio Adorni 

and Ercole Baldini became the first in 

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cycling history to be at the start line of 

the Giro, Tour and Vuelta. It should be 

pointed out that in the 1960s the notion 

of a ‘Grand Tour’, let alone grouping the 

three together was not yet a ‘thing’. But 

that’s a whole ‘nother history lesson. 

It wasn’t until 1971 that another team 

spread themselves across the calendar 

again, the Spanish KAS team of José 

Manuel Fuente. It became a regular thing 

for KAS throughout the seventies as 

other teams began to join in – Magniflex, 

Rokado, Frisol, Teka. Then there was 

something of a lull. Between 1979 and 

1984, no teams rode all three. This was 

primarily due to the Vuelta running into 

financial difficulties and they were no 

longer able to incentivise Italian teams 

to take part. In 1979 only one Italian 

was at the start line of the Vuelta. In 

1983 there were none. But by the mid- 

1990s it had become quite normal for a 

single team to race all three. The likes 

of Banesto, Carrera, Gatorade, Festina, 

Kelme all regularly did so. 

Then came the UCI’s master plan, the 

ProTour, which began in 2005, where 

Grand Tour berths were no longer to be 

at the whim of the tyrannical organisers. 

They would now be dictated by the 

UCI. All of the top tier teams were now 

guaranteed entry to all the Grand Tours, 

with a handful of wildcard invitations to 

do what they wanted with. The same 

system which is in place now under 

the excitingly rebranded WorldTour 

umbrella. So these days, 18 teams are 

obliged to race all three every year. 

Since Salvarani got the ball rolling in 

1964, a total of 368 teams have ridden 

the Giro, Tour and Vuelta in the same 

year. And every single one of those teams 

had at least one rider abandon at least 

one of those races, apart from Liquigas. 

During those three years from 2009 to 

2011, Liquigas sent 35 riders to those nine 

Grand Tours. They won six stages of the 

Giro (Franco Pellizotti x 2, Ivan Basso, 

Vincenzo Nibali, Eros Capecchi and a 

team time trial) and three stages of the 

Vuelta (all Peter Sagan). They also won 

the polka dot jersey at the Tour through 

Pellizotti, although his results from this 

time were subsequently stripped due to 

a biological passport violation. And in 

2010, Liquigas won both the Giro and the 

Vuelta, with Ivan Basso and Vincenzo 

Nibali respectively. Two Grand Tours in 

a single year with two different riders 

is something which had only been done 

four times previously (or six if you want 

to include Lance Armstrong which is, of 

course, entirely up to you). And has only 

been done one other time since, Team 

Sky last year with Chris Froome and 

Geraint Thomas. 

It’s almost certain the Liquigas team 

had not realised the unprecedented 

nature of what they had achieved. It 

is a feat that should be celebrated and 

remembered, something that current 

squads should try to emulate. If teams 

are starting to realise that winning is, 

actually, not everything when it comes 

to selling windows or expanding foam or 

bottled gas, then perhaps it might dawn 

on one of them that attempting to ‘do a 

Liquigas’ might be quite a worthy cause 

for celebration. 

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C i l l i a n K e l l y i s r e s e a r c h d i r e c t o r 

o f T h e R o a d B o o k a n d a r e n o w n e d 

c y c l i n g s t a t i s t i c i a n . 


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Holly Blades And PhotoSport International (John Pierce) 

Threads Of History: TEAM Z 

Threads Of History: 

TEAM Z 

Last alphabetically they may have been, but Holly Blades says Team Z belonged 

right at the front of the style pack. 

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Threads Of History: 

TEAM Z 

Words: Holly Blades 

Pictures: PhotoSport International (John Pierce) 

Rising out of the ashes of the mighty Peugeot team, 

Z-Peugeot were an explosion of pop art in the peloton. 

In an attempt to distance his new team from the 

classic black and white Peugeot jersey, boss Roger 

Legeay teamed himself with a young businessman, 

Roger Zannier, who was looking to publicise his range 

of children’s clothing – thus the overtly bright and eyecatching 

Z jersey was born. 

The super 80s design of a bright yellow comic book 

explosion and a sky blue jersey with hot pink touches 

could not be missed on the roads and has remained an 

absolute classic since its first appearance in 1987. 

Legeay brought the Simon brothers, Pascal and Jerome, 

and Gilbert Duclos-Lassalle along from Peugeot to lead 

Z, but the team’s first season was pretty quiet and it 

wasn’t until 1988 that things picked up. Ronan Pensec 

took a couple of wins and Jerome Simon won the ninth 

stage of the Tour de France. 

In 1989, Z picked up steam as it signed Robert Millar 

and witnessed the resurgence of the Scot in a move he 

said felt like “coming home.” Millar would go on to win 

stages of the Tour of Romandy and the Tour de France, 

plus the mountains classification of the Critérium du 

Dauphiné. 

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106 

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Threads 0f History: TEAM Z 

In a surprising move, Z managed to secure world 

champion, Greg LeMond, following his period out of the 

saddle after his hunting accident. Although they didn’t 

present the highest of his several salary offers, they 

did assure him he could ride his own bikes. Swayed by 

this opportunity, LeMond broke his contract with ADR 

– later facing a court case – to join Z. 

Probably worth it for the team though, eh? Because 

in 1990, Z saw two yellow jerseys in the shape of the 

overall Dauphiné on the back of Robert Millar, plus the 

iconic Tour de France maillot jaune on Greg LeMond, 

the first non-European to win. In a fantastic piece of 

what I believe the kids would call “shade”, Wikipedia 

lists LeMond as, “the first and only American to win 

the Tour de France.” 

Although LeMond wouldn’t win any more major 

titles in the period between the 1990 Tour and his 

retirement, Z still had Millar, Bruno Cornillet and the 

stalwart Duclos-Lassalle to bring in the wins. The Z 

logo was never seen on another winner’s jersey, but 

the team raked in stage wins in the Tour, the Giro and 

the Dauphiné, and Duclos achieved his aim of winning 

Paris-Roubaix not once, but twice in consecutive years 

(1992 and 1993). He now has two cobble trophies and 

two sections of pavé named after him on the Paris- 

Roubaix route. 

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Threads 0f History: TEAM Z 

Alas, in 1993, sponsorship of the team changed to GAN 

and the jersey became a restrained-if-tasteful white, 

blue and yellow affair. Where’s the fun in that? 

Z were technically the last French team to win the 

Tour de France (albeit with an American rider – the 

only American rider to win, no less!) and their legacy 

lives on in their fondly remembered line up of LeMond 

and Millar and their, let’s face it, much-loved jersey. 

It even features in virtual form on the popular online 

training platform, Zwift! 

Laurent Fignon may have called the entire team 

Z a marketing stunt, but it was a marketing stunt 

that worked for Z owner Roger Zannier, as cycling 

journalist William Fotheringham points out in his team 

profile. Awareness figures of Z, the children’s clothing 

company, rose from 5% to 38%. By 1992 sales had 

topped two billion francs and there were more than 

200 Z stores. Indeed, Z still exists as a store, although 

the logo is slightly more subtle now and the aesthetic 

is more ‘Ron Weasley’ than ‘Roy Lichtenstein’. 

Z were a much loved team with a fun, memorable 

jersey. They might have started off a bit slow, but 

eventually they won the Tour and showed Fignon what 

a marketing stunt can achieve. Spot any similarities 

with the current WorldTour crop? 


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James Shepherd And Cor Vos 

Two Lives Entwined 

TWO LIVES 

ENTWINED 

THE GOLDEN AGE OF SWISS CYCLING 

The early 1950s marked something of a turning point in cycling. Not so much 

a global revolution, but an overturning of the long-established three-nation 

hegemony. The new European power on the rise? Switzerland. 

Words: James Shepherd 

Pictures: Cor Vos 

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Before 1950, riders from outside cycling’s 

dominant trinity of France, Belgium 

and Italy had only managed to 

podium in a monument 14 times out of 

a possible 594 and only three “outside 

nations” had managed to podium at the 

Tour de France. The brilliant Luxembourger, 

François Faber, has a victory 

sandwiched in between his two second 

places from 1908 and 1910. His countryman, 

Nicolas Frantz, went one better 

with two runner-up spots and two wins 

in the 20s. After them, only the German 

Kurt Stöpel and Leo Amberg from Switzerland 

managed to break the stranglehold 

of the top three nations. 

In 1950 though, a new nation 

emerged to try and break that powerful 

grip. If you look just past the winners 

from the formative years of road racing, 

it is little surprise that the new power 

was Switzerland. 

SWISS PIONEERS 

In the first edition of the Tour de France, 

Charles Laeser and three Swiss countrymen, 

Anton Jaeck, Paul Mercier and 

Marcel Lequatre, were among the sixty 

riders who lined up in Paris for the start 

of the six-stage race. By the end of the 

third day of racing all four had abandoned 

at least one stage. In fact, there 

were only twenty-five riders left in the 

general classification battle. However, 

in the first Tour, any of the entrants who 

had dropped out of the race as a whole 

could still compete in any of the further 

stages. Riders were even permitted to 

compete in a single stage, fifteen rode 

in stage four only. It was the shortest 

stage of the race and was won by Laeser, 

the first foreign winner of a stage of 

the Tour de France. 

The following year, the Swiss 

contingent was down to three. Laeser 

returned along with Anton Jaeck. They 

were joined by Michel Frédérick, a rider 

of some repute who had finished third 

in the second edition of Paris–Roubaix 

in 1897. Frédérick finished fourth on the 

first day, nearly 38 minutes behind the 

stage winner and defending champion 

Maurice Garin. He dropped to 14th at 

the end of the second stage and didn’t 

make the start line for stage three. He 

was never seen at the Tour de France 

again. 

However, the 1904 race was 

full of controversy. Nine riders were 

disqualified during the race for infringements 

such as making up the 

race distance in cars and trains. After 

the completion of the race the French 

cycling federation, the UVF, started an 

investigation into more allegations of 

cheating against other riders. In December 

of that year the UVF concluded 

their findings and a further twenty 

riders were disqualified, including the 

top three from the first stage. Frédérick 

was awarded the stage and therefore 

became the first foreign leader of the 

Tour and perhaps the only rider to never 

appear at a race after being awarded 

its lead. 

A decade later Oscar Egg, 

most famous for his successful attempts 

at the world hour record, won 

two Tour stages and finished 13th 

overall. In 1919 he won a stage at the 

Giro, being the first rider from outside 

Italy or France to do so. 1923 saw the 

classics specialist, Henri Suter, do the 

Roubaix-Flanders double. 

As the sport moved into the 

30s, Switzerland seemed not to be content 

with just stage wins and started to 

make a tentative challenge on the GC 

at the Tour and the Giro. At the Tour in 

1931, Albert Buchi finished ninth, becoming 

the top Swiss finisher at the 

race so far. He was bettered by Leo 

Amberg in 1936 who reached Paris in 

eighth. Paul Egli had won the first stage 

that year and became the first Swiss 

rider to win the yellow jersey. The fol- 

lowing year, Amberg became the man 

the next crop of Swiss cyclists would 

look up to by winning two stages and 

finishing third at the Tour. René Pedroli 

also won a stage to cap off a strong 

performance by Switzerland. Amberg 

would win a stage at his first Giro the 

following year where Karl Litschi finished 

eighth. Litschi won a Tour stage 

in 1939 but then he, Amberg and everyone 

else had to put things on pause for 

the second world war. 

The years after the second 

world war were a golden age for cycling. 

The Italians Fausto Coppi and 

Gino Bartali continued their dominance 

of the Giro, but soon faced tough opposition 

in the form of “the third man 

of Italian cycling”, Fiorenzo Magni. In 

France, the gritty self-proclaimed-butnot-actually-born-in-Brittany 

Breton, 

Jean Robic, won the first post-war Tour 

and his country would soon witness the 

emerging talents of Louison Bobet and 

Raphaël Géminiani. Belgium also had 

a man for the Grand Tours, Stan Ockers, 

and as ever they were strong in the 

top one-day races. The winds of victory 

were beginning to change direction, 

though. 

TURNING DOWN THE TOUR 

Ferdinand “Ferdi” Kübler was born in 

1919 to a poor family in the small hamlet 

of Radhof in northern Switzerland. 

As a child he would work in the afternoons 

after finishing school and when 

his formal education came to an end he 

had a job as a servant working from half 

four in the morning till nine at night. His 

work was hard and it was for a pittance, 

but Kübler was a grafter and he was always 

looking to better himself. He soon 

left home and got a job with a baker in 

the south of Zurich where he could be 

seen crashing through the streets on 

an old banged up bicycle, often with 35 

kilos of bread on his back. 

His hard work and endeavour 

led to his next step up when he started 

a job at a jewellers. His monthly income 

suddenly quadrupled. He moved back 

to his hometown and began a daily 

commute of 84 km which was completed 

on a discarded ladies’ bicycle. Before 

long his increased income allowed 

him to purchase a brand new Imholz 

racing bicycle. However, as was often 

the case for him, things didn’t go perfectly 

and his bike was stolen after only 

three days. A milkman from Adliswil 

hearing this hard luck story – and perhaps 

charmed by Ferdi’s friendly and 

outgoing personality – took pity on him 

and bought him a replacement. This 

allowed the young Kübler to doggedly 

continue to realise his dream of becoming 

a cyclist. 

He turned professional in 1940 

at the age of 21, but his racing was restricted 

to Switzerland due to the Nazi 

occupation in the rest of Europe. He 

concentrated on the track in his first 

years as a pro, winning the national 

pursuit title three times. Racing against 

the clock on the velodrome wasn’t his 

only skill though and he showed his potential 

as an allrounder on the road by 

winning the national mountain championship 

in 1941 and 1942. That potential 

was confirmed by winning the Tour 

de Suisse, also in 1942. With a limited 

number of races to enter during the 

war he also tried his hand at cyclocross 

and won the national cyclo-cross title 

in 1945. After this victory the war was 

soon going to be over, borders would 

open and the top races would be run 

again. Kübler was 26 and about to 

reach his prime. He was ready to take 

on the world’s best, but more bad luck 

was around the corner. 

At the finish of the Zurich–Lausanne 

race in 1946 he was involved in 

a terrible crash and lay unconscious 

on the road, his skull fractured in two 

places. He had to spend seven weeks 

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Hugo Koblet and Fausto Coppi 

Ferdi Kübler 

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in hospital, followed by three months 

of recuperation at home. His doctor’s 

parting words when he was signed off 

were, “We’ve patched you up but you’ll 

never be able to race again, never 

again!” 

Tough, determined and 

hard-working Ferdi was back the next 

year, finishing third in a new race 

formed to commemorate the 50th anniversary 

of the Swiss Cycling Federation, 

the Tour de Romandie. He entered 

his first Tour de France a month 

later and won the opening stage. After 

enjoying wearing the yellow jersey for 

one day, he gained a second victory on 

stage five before abandoning on the 

first Alpine stage three days later. In 

1948 Kübler won the Tour de Suisse as 

well as the Tour de Romandie and the 

organisers of the Tour de France were 

desperate to have him in their race. Always 

calculating and planning for a better 

future, he refused as he could earn 

more money in other races. 

1949 was the first year that 

Gino Bartali and Fausto Coppi would 

go head to head in both the Giro and 

the Tour. The structure of teams for the 

different races was more complicated 

than it is now – the Tour de France was 

then contested by national squads. For 

the 1949 edition of the race France, 

Belgium and Italy were permitted to enter 

teams of ten and the lesser nations 

squads of six. This would have helped 

the trinity maintain their dominance at 

the race, but such was Coppi and Bartali’s 

rivalry the Italian team was split 

in two with each champion getting five 

gregari each at their disposal. 

The Giro and the monuments 

were run along the same lines as today. 

Each man could recruit strong riders 

from around Europe to their own teams 

to work for them during the season. 

But to make matters more interesting, 

and possibly more complicated, Swiss 

riders were able to ride for a Swiss 

trade team for races on home roads 

and then sign up with a foreign team 

elsewhere. Kübler rode for the team of 

the Swiss bicycle manufacturer Tebag 

in his country, as well as appearing for 

Peugeot-Dunlop in races such as Paris–Roubaix. 

Taking advantage of this system 

and recognising the Swiss rider’s 

worth, Bartali signed Kübler to his Bartali-Gardiol 

team for his battle with Coppi 

at the 1949 Giro. The deal was he 

would help Ferdi try to win the Tour de 

Romandie at the start of May in return 

for his support during La Corsa Rosa 

which started at the end of the month. 

However, the ultra competitive Tuscan 

seemed to renege on their agreement. 

He led Romandie from start to finish after 

his strong squad won the opening 

team time trial. Bartali argued that Kübler 

just wasn’t strong enough and if his 

soon-to-be teammate couldn’t win then 

he might as well. Kübler saw things differently 

however. Bartali had won the 

second stage in a sprint against Kübler 

after the two escaped from the rest of 

the field and then he attacked again the 

next day, leading Ferdi to conclude that 

their deal had been broken. Further issues 

of a financial nature, something 

the notoriously penny-pinching Italian 

was familiar with, meant that Kübler 

never made the Giro start in Sicily. 

Coppi ended up thrashing Bartali, 

putting 23 minutes 47 seconds into 

him by the end. Their rematch in France 

as ‘teammates’ was hotly anticipated. 

Coppi had a great chance to complete 

the first ever Giro-Tour double, but if he 

and Bartali started tearing each other 

to pieces then riders such as Kübler 

would be there to take advantage. 

Ferdi started the race well by 

winning stage five into Saint-Malo. The 

route was primarily flat for the first two 

weeks but had five back-to-back days 

in the mountains before the last day 

into Paris. The race was led for most 

of the early part by the Frenchman 

Jacques Marinelli and then Fiorenzo 

Magni took the yellow jersey after winning 

stage ten. Kübler sat comfortably 

in the top ten until stage 16 to Briançon 

when Coppi and Bartali, together, blew 

the race apart. 

On the final climb of the day, 

the Izoard, the two Italians attacked and 

despite Bartali puncturing, and Coppi 

waiting for him, they finished over 5 

minutes ahead of the third placed rider 

Jean Robic. Bartali was the new race 

leader, just ahead of Coppi. Kübler 

was in eighth at over 14 minutes, but 

with opportunities in the days ahead to 

make up time. 

The next day was a disaster. 

The stage finished in Aosta (over the 

border in Italy) so the Italians were keen 

to further display their dominance. Ferdi 

didn’t want that to happen. He joined 

a breakaway that gained 10 minutes on 

the top two, but a series of punctures left 

his challenge in tatters. After using all 

his spare tyres and then suffering from 

another flat he had to wait for his team 

car for assistance, but that too had broken 

down. On the final climb, the Petit 

St Bernard, Coppi and Bartali launched 

their assault and again it paid off. Coppi 

put nearly five minutes on Bartali that 

day and more than ten on the best of 

the rest. Kübler fared even worse. He 

lost more than 40 minutes to the new 

yellow jersey and eventual winner and 

left the race during the following stage. 

He was now nearly 30 and many would 

have thought that his Grand Tour ambitions, 

as well as Switzerland’s standing 

in the cycling world was going to peter 

out. But they would have been ignoring 

Kübler’s dogged determination and the 

‘second K’, Hugo Koblet. 

THE PÉDALEUR DE CHARME 

Hugo Koblet was seemingly everything 

that Ferdinand Kübler was not. He was 

born in March 1925, so was six years 

Kübler’s junior, and into a cosmopolitan 

and relatively wealthy family who 

owned and ran a patisserie in the city 

of Zurich. His one sibling, older brother 

Adolf, took over the running of the 

family business when their father died 

in 1934 with Hugo aged nine. ‘Hugi’, as 

his doting mother would call him, swept 

the shop floor and of course, as is often 

the case with professional riders 

of a certain era, delivered bread from 

the shop on his bicycle. His fondness 

for his two-wheeled machine led to him 

and his brother organising races on the 

local streets. 

Aged seventeen he left the 

bakery and got a job as a mechanic 

at the Hallenstadion velodrome in the 

north of the city, a job that allowed him 

time on the track. He showed a lot of 

promise on the boards but his first win 

was a 10 km hill climb up the Hasenberg 

to the west of Zurich. That performance 

was noted by Leo Amberg, he 

of Tour de France podium fame, who 

took Koblet under his wing. Amberg 

convinced his young protégé to concentrate 

on riding the track. This paid 

off. He turned professional in 1946 and 

became Swiss national pursuit champion 

a year later, the first of seven such 

tiles in a row. He also formed a formidable 

pairing with Walter Diggelmann for 

six-day racing, earning them good money 

and winning the Six Days of Chicago 

in 1948 and the Six Days of New York 

in ‘49. It was during this period that he 

developed a love for the United States. 

He learnt English by watching American 

movies and later on in life would 

enjoy road trips across the country. 

Despite their different starts in 

life, Koblet and Kübler had many similarities. 

They both came from a track 

background and Ferdi also loved the 

States. He was a fan of cowboy films 

and collected Stetson hats. As well as 

being called Ferdi (though he used the 

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Germanic Ferdy) among his other nicknames 

was ‘Mr Cowboy’. They were 

also both friendly and unreserved, but 

their outgoing personalities were perceived 

differently. Koblet always had 

time for others and the French journalist 

René de Latour wrote of him: 

“He had not an enemy at all. 

His ready and kindly smile came from 

deep down inside, and one knows from 

the start that this was a man without 

rancor [sic].” 

Kübler on the other hand was 

often on the wind-up, but with a glint 

in his eye. The old story goes that he 

would tell rival riders and managers in 

his broken French; “Ferdy attack soon, 

you ready?” and “Ferdy big horse. 

Ferdy attack now. Your boys ready?” 

According to Raphaël Géminiani, 

often on the receiving end of these 

warnings, on one occasion he had had 

enough and replied, “Ferdy shut up or 

Ferdy get head knocked in.” 

Kübler and Koblet also had 

many differences. Ferdi’s hardworking 

and simple lifestyle was formed during 

his modest upbringing and didn’t 

change much over the years while Hugo 

embraced the new and exciting. His 

love of jazz and fast cars was at odds 

with the values of not just his rival but 

also most of conservative Switzerland. 

This led to cycling fans in the country 

taking sides and bitterly opposing each 

other. The relationship between the 

two stars was always peaceful though. 

Whenever Kübler would talk of Koblet 

he would always use the word “friend” 

and never “enemy”. They both realised 

they could form a mutually beneficial 

relationship. They had to: it was either 

that or be at war. 

The difference between the 

two which was most apparent was 

more to do with appearance than character. 

On the bike Kübler would get 

through races with a clunky, grinding, 

mechanical style, while Koblet would 

breeze through them with an effortless, 

silky grace. Kübler wouldn’t have minded 

admitting that he was no oil painting. 

His big nose gave rise to another of 

his nicknames, “The Eagle of Adliswil”. 

Koblet, with his matinee idol looks, was 

known as “Beautiful Hugo”. Keen to 

keep up appearances he would keep a 

comb, sponge and cologne in an extra 

jersey pocket, keeping them ready to 

use to look his best at the finish line. 

These antics and his habit of blowing 

kisses to the ladies led the French music 

hall artist Jacques Grello to give him 

his most famous moniker, ‘le Pédaleur 

de charme.’ 

Importantly though, Kübler 

was always bettering the younger man 

in their GC battles during the late 40s. 

In 1950 everything would change, and 

not just for the battle between Hugo 

and Ferdi but the one between the 

Swiss and the world. 

GIRO HEROES 

The 1950 Giro d’Italia was hotly anticipated 

by the public. Coppi and Bartali 

would be there to resume their own 

personal battle, Coppi was reigning 

Giro and Tour champion after beating 

Bartali into second at both the previous 

year. The two would face stiff opposition 

from Fiorenzo Magni, Jean Robic 

and Ferdi Kübler. 

All three Italians were in great 

form that year. Coppi had won at Roubaix 

and La Flèche Wallonne, Bartali 

had secured his fourth Milan-Sanremo 

and Magni had been victorious in 

the Tour of Flanders. Robic had been 

hard at it over the winter and had won 

the inaugural edition of the World Cyclo-cross 

Championships. The little 

climber would have fancied the route 

too, it had plenty of mountains and no 

time trials. Kübler’s run up to the race 

was less stellar, but he would have 

had realistic hopes of a podium spot. 

Koblet, still relatively unknown by most 

outside his country, was only entered at 

the last minute as a late replacement 

on the Guerra team. 

The race started well for Italy 

with an opening day win for the sprinter 

Oreste Conte. But with a hilly stage the 

next day the pink jersey would probably 

leave his shoulders and be up for 

grabs. It was Switzerland’s Fritz Schär 

who capitalised on the opportunity by 

taking second on the stage and the 

overall lead. Stage four saw the unfamiliar 

name of Hugo Koblet second on 

the stage standings. 

Two days later the stage was 

to finish in Locarno, Switzerland. It 

must have been a sign. With more than 

half of the stage to go, Koblet attacked. 

He was allowed to go for a while before 

the favourites started what they 

thought would be a standard reeling 

in of some foolhardy breakaway rider. 

But the debutante, in ‘time trial mode’ 

learnt from the track, was in the middle 

of brilliantly executing what would 

later become his signature move. The 

pack didn’t stand a chance and Koblet 

finished nearly two minutes ahead. He 

was up to third in the overall, Schär 

doggedly held onto pink and Switzerland 

celebrated. Three days later 

Koblet showed that he was more than 

just an opportunist breakaway rider. He 

attacked on the day’s major climb, the 

Pian delle Fugazze, with the Legnano 

rider Pasquale Fornara and both managed 

to stay away till the finish in Vicenza, 

where Koblet won the two-up sprint. 

Not only had he won his second stage, 

he was now in pink. 

Kübler by contrast had been 

ploughing along. He was having a solid 

but uneventful race, mainly staying with 

the main favourites in the mountains. 

He was ninth overall and not far off the 

likes of Robic and Bartali. 

The next stage, still in the 

mountains and with the Rolle, Pordoi 

and Gardena to go over, was the one 

which Bartali chose to make his first 

move in the race. His fierce rival Coppi 

had been in a terrible crash, breaking 

his pelvis before the climbing began 

and was out. Bartali, realising he now 

had a great opportunity to win another 

Giro was first over the final climb, the 

Gardena pass. He reached the finish 

in Bolzano with only two other riders 

and nearly three minutes over the best 

of the rest. Those two riders were the 

Swiss pair Kübler and Koblet. Koblet 

stayed in the maglia rosa while Koblet 

had moved into fourth. 

Over the next few days Bartali 

kept attacking the race leader, 

trying to shrink his lead, but Koblet 

swatted everything away with ease. 

The 25-year-old Swiss even increased 

his advantage by winning some of the 

bonus seconds that were awarded 

at the top of the major climbs. By the 

end of the 13th stage he now led Bartali 

by 7’12”. ‘Beautiful Hugo’ also now 

seemed to have the help of Coppi’s Bianchi 

teammates. After their team leader 

abandoned they would have offered 

their services to anyone for a fast buck 

and it seemed Koblet had paid out rather 

than the notoriously tightfisted Bartali. 

The proud Tuscan, incensed 

that the Italian Bianchi gregarios had 

“accepted Swiss gold over love of 

country” fought on but with only five 

stages left Koblet’s advantage was too 

large. At the race finish Koblet became 

the first foreigner to win the Giro d’Italia. 

Ferdi Kübler, finishing a Grand Tour 

for the first time, only just missed out 

on the podium by four seconds. And so 

began a remarkable run of Swiss success. 

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JAMES SHEPHERD 

TWO LIVES ENTWINED 

122 

123



KÜBLER AT LAST 

The next big race of 1950 was, of 

course, the Tour de France. Koblet sat 

it out and Coppi hadn’t recovered from 

his Giro crash, but the field was still 

strong. The Italian team had both Bartali 

and Magni, the French also looked 

promising with Louison Bobet and 

Raphaël Géminiani, Stan Ockers was 

there for Belgium and Kübler was ready 

for his third assault on the Grande Boucle. 

Kübler won his fourth Tour 

stage in the time trial at the end of the 

first week and it was a day that perfectly 

displayed the two sides of his character. 

As we have seen, he gained much 

in life when he took his time to plan out 

his moves. He accomplished his goals 

by following small steps. On the bike 

though he was often guilty of ill-advised, 

spur of the moment attacks that 

usually got him nowhere. This gave rise 

to yet another of his nicknames, ‘the 

pedalling madman.’ 

A bright start for Switzerland, 

but by the end of stage eleven the race 

was in crisis. 

Bartali had just won the stage 

into St. Gaudens, Magni was in yellow 

but come the morning there wouldn’t 

be an Italian left in the race. During the 

stage on the final climb of the day, the 

Aspin, Bartali and Jean Robic collided 

and both riders went down. The French 

fans at the roadside were furious and 

surrounded the Italian, hurling abuse 

at him before the race was able to be 

continued. Bartali won the stage but he 

was incensed. He claimed that during 

the scuffle on the mountain a knife was 

pulled on him. It seemed that it was a 

butter knife of one of the picnicking fans 

but that didn’t matter to the proud Tuscan. 

He withdrew the Italian team, including 

the new race leader Magni, and 

the Italian B team of young riders. 

Was Bartali genuinely concerned 

for the safety of his countrymen 

or did he see it as an ‘honourable’ way 

of abandoning a race he couldn’t win? 

It was true the Italians had been facing 

ill-feeling from the roadside fans for 

most of the race. It is also true that Bartali 

hated the thought of anyone but him 

winning, he would have baulked at the 

thought of helping someone else, even 

his teammate Magni, win. Bartali was 

the guy who was once asked for a sip 

of water by a dehydrated Hugo Koblet. 

Bartali gave him his bidon, but only after 

opening the top and emptying the 

water on to the road. 

Kübler was now in yellow 

though he refused to wear the leader’s 

jersey for the next stage out of respect 

to the Italians. He led by 49 seconds 

and had his chance to win the Tour, 

and if he did he would be desperate for 

it not to be thought of as a hollow victory 

due to the Italian withdrawals. He 

accomplished his mission by winning 

two more stages in the mountains (one 

against the field and one crushing time 

trialling display) to put him nine and a 

half minutes ahead of second placed 

Ockers at the finish in Paris. 

AN EXCELLENT YEAR 

The following year, 1951, would prove 

an extremely successful one for Swiss 

riders. 

First, Kübler won La Flèche 

Wallonne and Liège-Bastogne-Liège. 

It was the first time that this particular 

double had been done and it was all the 

more impressive when considering the 

two races were held on the same weekend. 

The organisers, Les Sports, 

had been looking at ways to raise the 

profile of La Doyenne. They first moved 

the race from summer to late spring 

and then decided to hold Flèche the 

day before it. On the Saturday Kübler 

had to contend with 220 kilometres full 

of cobbles and hills and a lead group 

containing himself, Jean Robic, Louison 

Bobet and Gino Bartali. After finishing 

first no one would have thought 

him capable of winning the main race 

the following day; 211 more kilometres 

of lumpy terrain. 

It seemed that assessment 

would be proven right as the Belgian 

rider Germain Derycke was descending 

towards the finish alone on the 

Sunday. Suddenly though, a maniac 

appeared, flying down the final climb, 

shouting and gesticulating at the team 

cars between him and the race leader. 

It was the pumped up Swiss champion 

and as he caught Derycke there was 

little question who would win the sprint 

for victory. 

He followed that up with a solid 

third at the Giro where Fritz Schär 

again wore pink and Koblet won a 

stage. Koblet was unable to reclaim 

his title and finished sixth, but he must 

have been saving himself for the Tour. 

Kübler sat out the 1951 Tour, 

but even though all the other favourites 

from the previous year were there, plus 

Fausto Coppi, Hugo Koblet put in one 

of the most impressive and dominating 

displays of Tour history. He won five 

stages and finished 22 minutes ahead 

of his closest challenger, Raphaël 

Géminiani. 

The first stage and yellow jersey 

of the race was won by Giovanni 

Rosi of the now dominant Switzerland. 

During the day Koblet hinted at what 

was to come by attacking from the off 

and staying clear for 40km. It was stage 

11 from Brive to Agen that will be most 

remembered though. He attacked with 

one rider, Louis Dèpres, after 37 km. His 

escape partner soon fell back meaning 

Koblet would have to spend over 100 

km on his own to win the stage. Despite 

the legends of that great era of cycling 

team time trialling in an effort to catch 

him he won the day with a minute and a 

half to spare, plenty of time to apply his 

aftershave and sort his hair out for the 

cameras at the finish. It was during this 

race that Jacques Grello nicknamed 

him ‘Le Pédaleur de charme.’ 

Kübler won the World Championships 

later that year by beating the 

Italians in Varese, a race the host nation 

thought they were guaranteed to 

win. More success was to come for the 

Swiss in the following years. 

Ferdi completed his second 

Flèche-Liège double in the spring of 

1952, then finished third again at the 

Giro, where Koblet finished eighth and 

Fritz Schär won a stage. The next year 

Koblet won a stage and finished second 

at the Giro while Fritz Schär won 

the opening two stages of the Tour, 

wore yellow for three days, finished 

sixth and claimed the first ever green 

points jersey. 

PODIUM BOYS 

Continuing the fine run of national form, 

1954 saw one of the most dominant 

displays from any country at the Tour 

and Giro in the same year. 

It started when Carlo Clerici, 

an Italian-born but naturalised Swiss 

rider and (normally) gregario of Hugo 

Koblet, put together one of the most effective 

fughe bidone’s [an Italian term 

for a breakaway that looks hopeless 

but winds up being successful – Ed] 

ever seen at a Grand Tour. 

On stage six to L’Aquila, Clerici 

was in a group that broke away from a 

seemingly uninterested peloton. Many 

of the riders were annoyed at the huge 

appearance fee that the organisers 

had given to Fausto Coppi instead of 

sharing their money round more widely. 

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Ironically the star rider in his rainbow 

stripes was in terrible form after eating 

some dodgy oysters the evening after 

his Bianchi team won the opening 

time trial. As the peloton, and Coppi, 

grumbled along through the stage the 

breakaway kept increasing their lead 

and Clerici eventually won the stage 

with more than 34 minutes to spare on 

the top GC men. He was by no means 

a world class climber, but the huge advantage 

was big enough to hold pink 

all the way to the race finish in Milan. 

Koblet who supported him well through 

the mountains won two stages and finished 

second, while Fritz Schär ended 

up ninth. 

Later that year at the Tour, 

Carlo Clerici rode to a solid 12th. Ferdi 

Kübler won two stages while finishing 

second, one spot ahead of Fritz Schär. 

Swiss riders occupied four of the six 

podium spots for the Giro and Tour, 

something Belgium and France have 

never managed to do to this day. 

DECLINE AND FALL 

Clerici never came close to matching 

his displays of 1954. In 1955 Schär was 

30 and would manage some decent 

results on home soil, but never see a 

repeat of his stage-winning, leader’s 

jersey-wearing days abroad. Nor ever 

finish a Grand Tour again. Kübler, the 

elder statesman, was 35. 

At the 1955 Tour Kübler rode 

Mont Ventoux for the first time. “The 

Beast of Provence” would appear at 

the midpoint of the race and with Kübler 

down almost half an hour in the GC 

he was hoping that the mountain would 

provide some salvation for him. On its 

lower slopes Ferdi was looking frisky 

and drew out a warning from Raphaël 

Géminiani that Ventoux “wasn’t a 

mountain like any other.” The story, 

since denied by Kübler, goes that the 

Swiss proudly replied, “Ferdy’s a racer 

not like others” and attacked 10 km 

from the summit. 

Whether he said it or not, it’s a 

matter of record that his efforts on the 

Ventoux were too much for the ageing 

star and Kübler soon became delirious, 

weaving up the road and foaming at the 

mouth. He refused the pleading of his 

manager running beside him to take it 

easy and ended up crashing numerous 

times on the descent. He reached the 

finish in Avignon 26 minutes behind 

the stage winner Louison Bobet and 

announced that evening that he was 

giving up racing. “He is too old, Ferdy, 

he is too sick; Ferdy killed himself on 

the Ventoux.” He left the Tour that night 

never to return. He did carry on racing 

till 1957 with his last major victory being 

Milano–Torino in 1956. 

Hugo Koblet raced on till 1958, 

time enough to win his third Tour de Suisse, 

one more stage at the Giro and a 

runner-up spot at the Ronde van Vlaanderen. 

He even won a stage at the 1956 

Vuelta becoming the third rider to win a 

stage at all three Grand Tours. 

In truth though his powers had 

started to wane in the summer of 1952, 

just one year after his magnificent Tour 

de France win. On the morning of a 

mountainous stage four of the Tour de 

Suisse, Koblet started suffering from 

cold shivers and a high fever. He had 

a ureteral inflammation and wanted to 

abandon the race. The authoritarian 

race director Carl Senn was not keen 

to let this happen. He put pressure on 

his star attraction to continue and told 

the race doctor to make Koblet fit for 

the race. The habitually positive rider 

happily went along with his orders and 

started the stage. The pace was hot 

that day and the sick rider quickly became 

exhausted, he had no choice but 

to step off on the final climb. 

He visited his family doctor 

soon after expecting to be prescribed a 

course of antibiotics but instead he was 

told that he had suffered from cardiac 

dilatation – bursting of the ventricle and 

valves, impairment of the function of 

the aortic valve and loss of a quarter 

of the cardiac capacity. Basically, his 

heart couldn’t pump blood effectively. 

It was unclear when the condition 

started. Was it the result of racing 

with a broken down body during 

his home tour or was there another 

reason? René de Latour wrote that he 

noticed his power had decreased after 

a trip to Mexico in the Autumn of 1951. 

Koblet visited various specialists to try 

and sort out his heart but everyone 

agreed he was never the same rider. 

Jean Bobet noted that he would start 

suffering an odd sickness at 2,000 m 

and as time passed that suffering would 

happen at 1,500 m then 1,000 m. “His 

face grew older and his personality 

sombre”, wrote the Frenchman. 

Koblet failed to finish the two 

Tours de France he entered after his 

1951 victory, his second place in the 

1954 Giro was achieved ahead of a 

dispirited peloton who were unwilling to 

put on a show for the organisers they 

were in dispute with, and the runner-up 

spot at the race the year before – while 

admirable for most – was the result of a 

dreadful capitulation on his part. 

Koblet had taken the lead of 

the race after his victory in the stage 

eight time trial. He led Fausto Coppi, 

his closest rival in the GC, by 1’21”. The 

stage 11 team time trial saw the lead 

cut to only 55 seconds but on stage 18 

he showcased his skills as the great cyclist 

he was by escaping on a descent 

and increasing his overall lead again to 

1’59”. 

There were three stages left, 

two in the mountains and the flat final 

run in to Milan. The nineteenth day of 

racing was over four climbs and ended 

in the Bolzano velodrome. Koblet 

attacked on the penultimate climb, the 

Pordoi, only to be caught and passed 

by Coppi on the slopes of the Sella. 

Again the Swiss rider descended like 

an eagle and was able to catch his prey. 

Coppi easily won the sprint by a few 

lengths, Koblet had nothing left in the 

tank, but the officials gave both riders 

the same time perhaps believing they 

had witnessed the new Giro champion 

graciously conceding the stage. Coppi 

must have agreed telling Koblet, “My 

compliments, the Giro is yours. You are 

the strongest.” 

While Coppi seemed downbeat 

his teammates were sure that their 

leader could still overhaul Koblet on 

the penultimate stage and would have 

been keen to get their hands on a share 

of his winnings. They spent the evening 

trying to convince Coppi that Koblet 

was weakening and could be taken on 

the final climb of the race, the Stelvio. 

The next morning “Il Campionissimo” 

still hadn’t been turned but then one of 

his gregarios brought him some interesting 

information. Ettore Milano had 

seen Hugo Koblet earlier in the morning 

and had noted his dilated pupils and 

haggard looks. Coppi knew better than 

anyone what this meant. Koblet had 

been hitting the amphetamines hard, 

he needed them to survive the race and 

probably hadn’t slept a wink the night 

before. Coppi would go for his fifth title 

after all. 

This was the time when doping 

wasn’t illegal and was therefore 

widespread and usually conspicuous. 

Fans and riders had different views on 

the morality of drug taking though. Fritz 

Schär’s nickname was ‘Pillenfritz’ due 

to his fondness for tablets of all sorts, 

but his moniker didn’t seem to have an 

impact on his popularity. Ferdi Kübler 

was a little more coy on the subject. He 

was challenged with “assisting” his performance 

on a few occasions and after 

his nightmare on Ventoux various drug 

products were found in his hotel room 

126 

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JAMES SHEPHERD 

TWO LIVES ENTWINED 

128 

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but he always denied being a doper. 

On the lower slopes of the 

Stelvio, Coppi’s team set a fast pace and 

Koblet looked weak but Coppi seemed 

unsure of whether to attack and soon 

found himself out of teammates. As it 

seemed he was running out of time he 

asked Nino Defilippis of the rival Legnano 

team to attack. The 21-year-old, 

possibly starstruck, obliged. Koblet just 

needed to follow Coppi’s wheel but because 

of his nature he was unable to 

contain himself and he went after Defilippis. 

He soon began to falter and 

Coppi, sensing his moment, bridged 

up to the pair and shot up the mountain 

on his own to become the focus of the 

iconic images of the lone Campionissimo 

between the walls of snow on the 

Stelvio pass. Due to a mixture of drugs, 

tiredness and desperation Koblet was 

unable to put on another descending 

masterclass into the finish in Bormio 

that day. He finished 3’28” behind Coppi 

and had lost the race. 

FINAL KS 

Ferdi Kübler had a long and happy retirement 

after stepping off the bike. He 

stayed in the sport for a couple of years 

by managing the Italian Gazzola team, 

which boasted Charly Gaul on its roster. 

After this he bought a flower shop in 

Zurich but made sure he stayed active. 

He became a ski instructor and then 

took up curling. His first marriage ended 

in divorce but he fell in love with an 

air stewardess he met on the ski slopes 

named Christina Leibundgut. After 

many years he convinced her to tie the 

knot with him and they married in 1976 

and had two sons together. Even in his 

later years people would recognise him 

and stop to ask him about his cycling 

days, get his autograph and have their 

picture taken. The friendly Ferdi would 

always be more than happy to give his 

time. In 1983 he was voted the Swiss 

Sportsman of the Century and in 1992 

he decided that golf would be his game 

and spent much of his later years on 

the golf course. He passed away in 

2016 aged 97. 

As with almost everything else 

in their lives Hugo Koblet’s retirement 

was very different to his compatriot’s. It 

would be fair to say that Kübler had a 

frugal, cautious nature. This may have 

been because he had to work very hard 

to get where he was, both on and off the 

bike. Koblet on the other hand breezed 

through life and when it came to finances 

he was of a more generous disposition. 

He was always spoiling his mother 

and would support his brother who ran 

a number of struggling restaurant businesses. 

His friends in the peloton who 

weren’t accustomed to the financial 

rewards of winning Grand Tours could 

expect racing kit and equipment from 

Hugo. 

Unfortunately this generosity 

led to him being taken advantage 

of. He would grant loans to slick talkers 

and never see the money again. 

In 1958 both Koblet and Fausto Coppi 

travelled to Bogota to perform in some 

exhibitions on the velodrome there. 

When they went to collect their appearance 

cheques though they found 

that they had vanished along with the 

trickster who had organised the event. 

Koblet involved himself with a number 

of business ventures with little success 

as he traversed the difficult transition 

away from professional cycling. He became 

the representative of some Italian 

brands such as Fiat and Alfa Romeo in 

Venezuela, but that didn’t work out so 

he moved back to Zurich and opened 

a petrol station. That also failed and he 

was soon facing bankruptcy. The pressures 

of the situation he was in started 

to affect his home life and contributed 

to the breakdown of his marriage. 

He was often warned of the 

pitfalls of not putting aside money dur- 

ing his career by his sometime track 

racing partner Armin von Büren. Koblet 

told him; “Armin, I do not love money the 

way you do, I do not care. I do not save, 

I spend the money, because I do not live 

long anyway.” On the 1st of November 

1964 Koblet turned up at von Büren’s 

door asking for 20,000 francs to pay off 

some of his debts, he also told his friend 

that his divorce appeal was due to be 

heard in two days. 

The next day near the town of 

Mönchaltorf south-west of Zurich a white 

Alfa Romeo was seen driving up and 

down the road, seemingly lost, searching 

for something. It made one last turn 

and accelerated up the road, faster than 

before, and instead of following the right 

hand corner it left the tarmac and came 

to an abrupt stop as it thudded into a 

pear tree. The driver was Hugo Koblet. 

He passed away four days later aged 39. 

James Shepherd 

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Sandy Knee Stars 

SANDY KNEE STARS 

Matt Ben Stone talks about one of his recent projects, photographing a 

mass-start bike race on the sand flats of South Wales. 

Find Matt on Instagram @mattbenstone 

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Battle on the Beach attracts riders of all 

disciplines and experience. Located on the 

Gower Peninsula, a spectacular spot even 

when the rain is rolling in and visibility is 

low – as it was on the morning of the last 

edition of the race. 

It was odd to see bikes and beach mix – a 

rare cycling juxtaposition. Needless to say, 

it is quite something to watch 1,000 riders 

stream across the horizon from a mass 

start to begin three laps fought out on a 

six-mile expanse of sand. 

The area is steeped in history, with 

previous land speed records taking place 

on the beach and the adjacent Pendine 

Sands. When the sea water is at low tide it 

runs a mile offshore and leaves a hard, flat 

sand surface stretching as long as the eye 

can see – exposing the barren beauty of the 

location. 

I quickly realised the race has a huge 

following – due in part to the fact that it’s 

open to anyone, no license needed. From 

give-it-a-go locals to international pros like 

the race winner, Terry Fremineur. It’s this 

diversity that makes the event so unique, 

with participants of all ages and abilities 

riding bikes ranging from fat bikes to cyclocross 

machines, via every conceivable 

type of mountain bike. 

As I went from one racer to the next shooting 

portraits, the main preoccupations were 

with how best to prep for the race. To 

compromise speed on the single track in 

favour of better performance on the sand, 

or vice versa? 

The race itself was buffeted by enormous 

tailwinds and some nasty rain showers, 

but despite that I made a promise to myself: 

next year I will be competing, not shooting. 

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Cobbles For Breakfast - 257 

COBBLES FOR BREAKFAST 

257 

PARIS - ROUBAIX 

Last April Paul Davy embarked on an epic 1,300 

km round trip to experience the Hell of the 

North. Leaving home in the wee small hours he 

drove from the North of England to the ferry at 

Dover and then from Calais to Roubaix. 

Arriving the day before the race, he 

visited a number of locations before deciding 

there was nowhere better than the Arenberg 

Trench to get the best insight into the race 

atmosphere. From there he dashed to the end of 

the race to ensure he was also able to capture the 

iconic velodrome and post-race shower shots. 

Here we present a taster of some of the 

impressions he was able to capture during his 

grand day out. 

If you like what you see follow 

@cycletogs on Instagram for news of 

the Kickstarter project “COBBLES FOR 

BREAKFAST 257”. 

Pictures: Paul Davy 

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Paul Davy Cobbles For Breakfast - 257 

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Paul Davy 


In Memory Of Michael Goolaerts 1994-2018 

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Briefings 

BRIEFINGS 

Words & Pictures: The Peloton Brief 

1. Girona Gala a continued success in 

third year 

We just saw the end of 2018 and with 

that the third edition of the Girona 

Gala for Qhubeka – our biggest edition 

yet. We raised more money, drank more 

wine and danced even longer, thanks 

in no small measure to the presence 

of Girona’s most famous and infamous 

Zumba instructor. We had some big-ticket 

items this year including a Canyon bike 

donated by Team Katusha-Alpecin and 

Canyon and a day in a team car at the 

Tour de France. Let’s raise a glass to all 

that helped make it happen, all that were 

there, all that were there in spirit and all 

the energy the community puts into it. 

2. Nic Dougall returns to triathlon 

Nicolas Dougall (26) has confirmed this 

week that he’ll shift his focus from cycling 

to triathlon (specifically Ironman 70.3) 

from April 2019. The announcement 

follows Dougall’s hint at a career change 

following his final professional road 

cycling stint at the Tour of Guangxi in 

October 2018. Dougall has been racing 

professionally around the world for more 

than five years for teams including MTN- 

Qhubeka and Team Dimension Data, 

but now plans to return to triathlon, 

which is his true passion. At 16 years old 

Dougall showcased his potential on the 

international stage having won the 16- 

19 age group title at the 2009 ITU Sprint 

World Championships in Australia, where 

he also posted the fastest time of the day 

across all age categories. "The weirdest 

thing is going to be thinking only about 

myself,” he says. “Almost every race I 

did as a cyclist was based around getting 

someone else to where they needed to be 

and now it's going to be all about me. It's 

exciting and scary all at the same time 

to only focus on yourself. Also not having 

to share a shower with eight other guys 

after the race is going to be pretty sweet." 

3. Carlee Taylor is just absolutely 

smashing it at real life 

We were so happy to catch up with the 

recently-retired Carlee, who is now living 

back in Australia. We just have to say 

Carlee is killing it like A BOSS at Zwift – 

working in the marketing and social media 

department – and we couldn’t be happier 

for her. The laughs and the humour are 

100% still there though, in case anyone 

was worried. 

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Briefings 


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Russell Jones 

Fans, Vans And Chilly Bins 

Fans, 

and Chilly 

Vans 

At last year’s World Championships, long-time Conquista contributor, 

Russell Jones, was granted an incredible level of access to the New Zealand 

squad. From his privileged position embedded within the team, he brings us 

the highs and lows of the Kiwi campaign. 

Bins 

Behind the scenes at Innsbruck 

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Words & Pictures: Russell Jones 

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Russell Jones 


Behind the scenes at Innsbruck 

Our phones ‘bing’ in unison. 

We are travelling back to 

Cycling New Zealand’s team 

hotel from the finish line of the 

U23 road race in the World 

Championships in Innsbruck. 

We are all four of us part of the 

same WhatsApp group, which 

is why our phones all sound 

off in a chirruping chorus. The 

purpose of the group is to keep 

track of the various movements 

of the New Zealand team and 

its support staff. 

It’s all going roughly 

to plan, a plan I first saw back 

in New Zealand some six 

weeks ago. Welcomed in by 

Cycling New Zealand, I am 

now witnessing first hand just 

what is involved in a campaign 

of this sort: what is required 

to field a team to take on the 

world in Innsbruck on a course 

touted as one of the toughest 

ever. 

“Here, it’s all on 

this,” high performance 

logistics manager, Bryan 

Simmonds, hands me a printed 

spreadsheet, “although it isn’t 

final yet, obviously.” 

Simmonds is charged 

with coordinating the seven 

staff and seventeen riders, all 

spread around the world. 

“The Road Worlds 

are always difficult,” he 

says. We have to book the 

accommodation twelve months 

in advance, but a year out we 

just don’t know how many 

riders have qualified, or where 

they’ll be. It’s very different to 

when we send the track squad 

away: they all leave from [New 

Zealand] and all arrive back 

there. With the road squad 

we also have to plan for little 

things like clothing lead time, 

anticipating who is going to 

be on the team to get sizes and 

logos right.” 

The squad has riders 

literally all over, from China to 

Girona, at the Tour of Britain 

and back home in NZ. 

The other backroom staff 

besides Simmonds are drawn 

from Cycling New Zealand and 

WorldTour professional outfit, 

Mitchelton-Scott. Jacques 

Landry, an assistant high 

performance director based 

in New Zealand, is to be team 

manager, with Craig Geater, 

a mechanic with Mitchelton- 

Scott, returning to DS duties 

for this campaign. 

Scanning the list, 

I’m privy to the final team 

announcements yet to be made 

public, information that will 

fire up the self-proclaimed 

experts in faceless forums 

and local media. However, as 

Bryan points out, everything 

is subject to change as there’s 

always a few spanners thrown 

in last minute; it wouldn’t be 

real life otherwise. 

POSSUMS IN THE 

HEADLIGHTS 

Landry is a Canadian 

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Russell Jones 


Olympian who turned to 

coaching back in 1999. As 

we discuss some of his career 

achievements, he says “no, 

this is not my first rodeo,” 

showing not a little modesty. I 

mention how the team line-up 

has changed once already: 

Sharlotte Lucas, the reigning 

champion of Oceania, who 

had publicly campaigned for 

her inclusion in the squad, 

has withdrawn citing lack of 

funding from the national 

body. 

“It was decided 

because Innsbruck is such an 

expensive place that all riders 

below WorldTour level would 

have to pay a contribution,” 

says Landry. “Cycling New 

Zealand would love to cover 

all the costs but it simply 

doesn’t have the funds to do 

so. The riders competing on 

the WorldTour are covered as 

they are racing internationally 

and we already know what 

that investment looks like.” 

With this in mind, 

Landry is honest about what 

is required of all the riders 

before they put their hand up 

to even don the Silver Fern. 

“The criterion 

for selection is to basically 

show competitiveness 

internationally leading into the 

World Championships, so to 

demonstrate that you are able 

to compete in internationallysanctioned 

races in Europe, 

not be just pack fill.” 

Cycling New 

Zealand have come under a 

fair amount of flak nationally 

regarding selection for the 

Worlds. Landry, however, is 

pragmatic. 

“The biggest 

problem, especially with 

regards to the junior categories 

and the U23s, is that if you 

don’t compete in Europe you 

have no clue what to expect. 

This does not just apply to 

New Zealand, I’ve seen it in 

Canada too. Moving forward, 

the idea is to gain experience 

through a campaign leading 

into the Worlds, which will be 

better for rider development 

than just going to Road 

Worlds where, if they are 

not prepared, they’ll last 

an hour or two and haven’t 

learnt anything and will 

return disillusioned and 

demoralised.” 

Landry also wants 

a more transparent selection 

process put in place. 

“Plus better 

managing of the athletes’ 

expectations, in regards to 

the notification of selection 

dates and the process, so as to 

ensure everything is as clear as 

possible. With the track team 

it is different, you hit the time 

and you are in, but with the 

road team it can be open to 

interpretation – and anything 

that is open for interpretation 

people will try and test.” 

RAINBOW TIME 

Behind me are the cheers and 

distorted PA from the U23 

men’s finish line, in front I 

spot Craig Geater across the 

melee of the team parking, 

leaning on the provided UCI 

car, joking with someone 

from another federation. Like 

Landry, it’s not his first rodeo; 

occasional nods followed by 

friendly jibes in all languages 

to all and sundry confirm he’s 

more than at home in this 

cycling inner sanctum. 

We wait for the 

riders to roll in. In the end, 

the reigning New Zealand 

U23 champion, James Fouché, 

didn’t travel, tired after a 

long season, leaving the last 

minute nod to Luke Mudgway. 

Moving mountains to make 

it to the start line, Mudgway 

had flown in self-funded from 

a race in China, unfortunately 

picking up a stomach bug en 

route. He has pulled out of the 

race early as a result. Of the 

other two, Spain-based James 

Mitri lasted a touch longer and 

Ryan Christensen is still out 

there somewhere, the Canyon- 

Eisberg rider’s legs not as fresh 

as he’d like from the Tour of 

Britain. 

The early baths for 

his riders leave Geater feeling 

frustrated. 

“Personally I 

disagree with the way the 

UCI allow WorldTour riders 

to ride the under-23 race. 

Some of these have come right 

out of the Vuelta and that’s a 

massive advantage, that along 

with all the help from their 

professional teams in terms 

of prep for this. And that 

showed, those riders came out 

and put the hammer down, 

destroyed the race. I don’t 

think it’s fair across the board.” 

Earlier in the week, 

while wunderkind Remco 

Evenepeol was sealing a 

WorldTour contract with his 

emphatic win, Josh Lane was 

NZ’s best finisher, nearly 19 

minutes back. Niamh Fisher- 

Black came home in the fourth 

big group in the women’s 

race, a more encouraging 

five minutes down. Brutal 

experiences for all the 

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Russell Jones 

Fans, Vans and Chilly Bins 

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Russell Jones 


youngsters, the ambition to 

acknowledge what’s required 

of them for the next step will 

hopefully not scare everyone 

off. I just hope they got their 

money’s worth. 

Tomorrow, less 

than one point behind Great 

Britain in the UCI standings, 

New Zealand will field three 

riders, Georgia Williams their 

designated leader. Eight riders 

will start in the orange of the 

Netherlands. It’s a big ask for 

the Kiwi girls to overturn 

those sorts of odds. 

“Georgia is national 

time trial and road race 

champion, and considering 

she fractured her hip the day 

before the Giro at the end of 

June, 11th in the TT this week 

was solid,” says Geater. “She’s 

a little bit underdone still, if 

the Worlds could have been 

pushed back a couple of weeks 

she would have been back on 

top of her game, but she’ll get 

in there for as long as she can. 

She knows the riders, rides 

with half of them, knows her 

way round, so that should add 

to her confidence.” 

Williams, although 

happy with her TT, is realistic 

about tomorrow - not that 

that’s going to stop her giving 

it a nudge. 

“It’s going to be 

tough but I know how they all 

ride, how they think and what 

their tactics are, so I’ll use that. 

There’s only three of us so we 

can look at the other bigger 

teams of eight riders to work, 

so that’s definitely another 

advantage for us. 

“It’ll split at that 60 

km climb, so we’ve just got to 

get over that then hang in as 

long as we can. I’ll be watching 

all of the Dutch and my trade 

teammates like Amanda 

Spratt, they are going really 

good. I’m not climbing as well 

as the top climbers, so I’m 

thinking I’ll try and get in an 

early break, get ahead.” 

PICK IT UP PACK 

IT IN 

Alberto the team mechanic is 

doing his best to get all of the 

bikes ready to go in the hotel’s 

basement storage room. This 

makeshift service course is 

littered with extension cables, 

plug adaptors and the usual 

mountains of bidons, musettes 

and rain bags. 

He stacks the three 

bikes into the back of the 

Cycling New Zealand Transit 

while massage therapist/ 

soigneur Delphine Leray 

wanders over with some 

picnic chairs for the riders. 

Logistics man, van driver 

and all-round fixer, Dirk Van 

Hove, brings the chilly bin/ 

esky/coolbox (depending on 

which country you are in) and 

we are off. Happy to help, I’m 

partnered with Leray at feed 

zone two, but first we head the 

70 plus kilometres to the start 

in Kufstein. Leray is another 

behind-the-scenes veteran - 

this is her fourth Road World 

Championships. She’s also 

been part of the Canadian 

Olympic and Track World Cup 

campaigns for the past eight 

years. She has an instinct for 

knowing just what to do and 

when. 

Geater arrives with 

the girls, Leray escorting 

them to the chairs where 

they start to pin numbers 

and clean sunnies. “It’ll be a 

cross tailwind to start, so we’ll 

probably see some crashes on 

the way in” observes Geater, 

sharing the UCI car with 

the Irish and South Africans 

today. 

The girls spin off to 

the start for the sign in. Leray, 

attentive as ever, is there to 

grab their gilets on the start 

line and ready to replenish 

their bikes with fresh bottles 

before the off. 

We see them again 

with 61 km to go as they 

crest the top of the hill. This 

is the easier and slower feed, 

compared with the fastmoving 

and flat city centre 

position. Leray has already 

named each musette and 

loaded it with each of the 

riders’ requested contents: 

carbo mix or plain water, 

caffeine or non-caffeine gels 

– no mid-race surprises. It’s 

stretched out on the climb so 

we can spot the girls early as 

they approach. Williams is in 

the chasing group, with Grace 

Anderson and Mikayla Harvey 

in the main bunch. 

“For the rest of the 

race they’ve asked for one of 

us to be positioned first with 

water, the second at the top 

with mix,” instructs Leray, 

passing me the water. Next 

time up, 39 km to go, Williams 

takes a water, Anderson and 

Harvey a mix from Leray, the 

race all over the road now, the 

winning move already made. 

Williams was right to keep an 

eye on those Dutch. 

“I’m super happy 

for Amanda,” says Williams 

of her trade teammate’s silver 

medal. “She’s worked so hard 

and really deserves it. It was 

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Russell Jones 


tough, in the first 20 km there 

was some moves going and I 

was up there with all of them 

but nothing was sticking. Then 

Mikayla put me in a really 

good position for the first 

climb but… I’ve had seven 

race days since June and am 

just lacking fitness.” 

Race over, her focus 

is the tight turnaround, back 

to Italy tomorrow morning for 

her team’s training camp, but 

full of praise for her younger 

teammates, “Considering 

they’ve both not done much 

racing in Europe they were 

both super strong.” 

“Grace and Mikayla 

went really well, better than 

expected,“ agreed Geater, 

philosophical back at the 

hotel. “A lot of the riders 

from big nations and a few 

big names went out the back 

when they hit that 60 km 

climb, but they managed to 

hang in there. They are not 

used to riding in such small 

roads with riders that are 

so aggressive, so they really 

handled themselves well 

and are definitely promising 

young talent. We all knew 

that Georgia is a couple of 

weeks from being on top form 

but she went well, 140 km, 

couldn’t quite get over the last 

climb with them but it was 

an exceptional ride and she 

should be happy with that 

considering.” 

The focus now 

on the last day, I walk with 

Patrick ‘Paddy’ Bevin to the 

race brief. Paddy has had a 

successful season so far, with 

TTT stage wins in Tirreno- 

Adriatico and the Tour de 

France. He’s come into the 

World Championships in form 

after claiming the points jersey 

and a fourth place overall in 

the Tour of Britain.’ 

A third in the team 

time trial with his BMC squad 

earlier in the week and eighth 

in the men’s individual time 

trial show the form’s still there. 

“Since Britain it was 

all about the time trial prep, 

they were the two big targets. 

The TTT, the last for BMC, 

and it was my first Worlds 

time trial at any level so I 

had a few unknowns, but it 

was good to get the first one 

under my belt with a solid 

performance.” 

He’s been here nearly 

a week now, plenty of time to 

recce the course. 

“I’ve been trying to 

unwind myself from the TT 

work. Four hours yesterday 

and we did a lap together 

today. It’ll be interesting 

tomorrow, it has the potential 

of being quite stressful going 

into that climb coming onto 

the course and it doesn’t let up 

on the city circuits either, tight 

and technical, which could 

shape the race more than 

just the pure climbing. We’ll 

be on deck all day, and a 250 

km road race where you are 

on deck all day is a different 

animal for sure.” 

BEDROOM 

MASTER PLAN 

The elite men are getting their 

pre-race briefing from Geater 

in the room he is sharing with 

Van Hove 

“It feels weird 

me over here,” says George 

Bennett, before jumping 

over from Geater’s bed and 

squeezing onto the couch with 

the other three. Dion Smith is 

using the stacked cardboard 

boxes of equipment as an 

elbow rest. No meeting rooms 

with PowerPoint strategy 

“Nah, we’ll turn 

onto that climb 

and what’ll happen 

is Valverde will get 

his big 

Spanish schlong out 

and say ‘Boys, now 

we are pissing!’” 

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Russell Jones 


plans here. 

Bevin, ever the 

analyst tactician, puts his 

opinion across. 

“It’ll kick off at that 

60 km corner and not stop.” 

Bennett has raced 

around here during the Tour 

of the Alps, placing fifth 

overall and coming second 

on the Innsbruck stage, and 

thinks that with 200 km still 

to go it’ll be maybe later. Sam 

Bewley has an answer that 

sends everyone into stitches. 

Either way, it’s 

obvious Bennett is up for the 

fight. He’ll either win or come 

nowhere. 

“Top tens are always 

nice but I think it’s time to 

really play for the win. It’s a 

special race and the value of 

winning it is so high. Hey, 

it might blow up and we are 

fiftieth, but I just feel better if 

we really race to win and that’s 

what the guys want to do, and 

that’s what I want to do.” 

Bizarrely, three 

wedding receptions are taking 

place tonight in the team 

hotel, so the boys are shifted to 

quieter rooms well away from 

the parties. One of the brides, 

adorned in an oversized pink 

meringue dress, is outside 

having a fag, watching 

Alberto’s late night prep for 

the last race tomorrow. When 

her younger groom comes out 

to persuade her back in she 

brushes him away as she lights 

another. 

A mechanic for 

the Mitchelton-Scott team, 

Alberto’s been here since the 

TTT, one of the WorldTour 

outfit’s three staff and two 

riders here for Cycling New 

Zealand. He’s tweaking 

Bennett’s gears to perfection. 

“The others are 

53/36 and 11-30 on the 

back, but George is 34 and 

11-32. I think it’s too much 

but this is my thinking – if 

you want to go better on the 

climb then push harder!” he 

laughs. Another experienced 

professional, Alberto is 

unfazed working on a BMC, 

a Bianchi and a Cube after a 

season spent spannering solely 

Scotts, “Not a lot is different, a 

bike is bike,” he winks. 

N.Z. B.I.G. 

Bennett’s Bluetooth speaker 

gargles from the side door 

of the Transit while the four 

pin their numbers on, sitting 

on the deck chairs outside. 

“Biggie Smalls, so we can 

offend as many people as we 

can,” Bennett laughs, cheekily. 

These notorious rhymes lost 

on the autograph hunters, 

grown men busily flicking 

through their catalogues of fan 

cards so to seize this moment 

of access not found elsewhere 

in the car park. Of the other 

nations, Team GB are over 

there nestled in the Sky bus, 

the Spanish in Movistar, the 

BORA – hansgrohe bus, well, 

you always know where Sagan 

is, just listen for the chanting 

crowd. 

The four Kiwis laugh 

along with the jovial flagbearing 

fanatics and above the 

East Coast rap the talk is of 

provincial rugby games from 

their youth, inescapable when 

growing up in New Zealand. 

“Yeah, we’re all good 

mates,“ beams Bewley. “We 

all live in the same town, 

train together a lot, hang out 

together, watch rugby games 

and go to dinner, all that sort 

of stuff. So, yeah, it’s good to 

race with your mates, and it’s 

always special to put the New 

Zealand kit on as well.” 

Bennett is ready but 

not psyched, yet. 

“Not psyched, nah, 

excited. It’s 260 km, if you 

came out psyched you’d run 

out of steam by 100 km, so, 

yeah, I’m just ready. Actually, 

I’m cold, I’ve just got to find 

some arm warmers first! Hey, 

what are you going to do with 

the gilets? Just chuck ‘em?” 

While he’s asking his 

teammates I’m envisioning a 

confused Tirolean bystander 

watching the Worlds circus 

zoom past during their daily 

stroll, bemused further as a 

black Cycling New Zealand 

gilet lands at their feet. The 

boys zip up and head off for 

the sign- on – Leray is at their 

side, making sure they have 

full bottles before the start, 

Geater and Alberto parked up 

sharing car 23 in the convoy, 

Landry packing up the picnic 

chairs to head to the first feed 

zone. 

ELASTIC BANDS 

AND BIDONS 

Different day, different 

race, different musettes, 

different feed zone. Leray 

checks through the rider 

requirements listed by Geater 

and starts to make them up. 

No caffeine until the last 100 

km, the first musette for the 

team to be picked by Bewley, 

while Smith and Bevin grab 

bottles as and when. It’s easier 

at the hill feed, plus they can 

ditch their bottles at the start 

of the hill and grab a fresh 

one for the next lap at the top. 

They first pass us down here at 

170 km to go, already strung 

out, either by the pace or 

perhaps possibly more by the 

encroaching overenthusiastic 

feed staff. A Belgian swanny 

takes control, shouting at 

some of the ‘smaller nations’ 

to back off. Although I doubt 

many understood the barrage 

of Flemish he let fly with, I 

suspect they did understand 

what he was getting at – the 

whole line dutifully retreating 

under orders. 

As the race moves 

on, the big screen in the 

distance keeps us informed, 

as does WhatsApp. The 

message comes through from 

the top feed that Bewley has 

finally packed, as expected 

at this distance. Time to pass 

the baton. Bevin alongside 

Bennett now, Smith dutifully 

grabbing the musette as they 

pass us, the bunch dwindling, 

the pace visibly faster now and 

his grimace backing that up. 

Unceremoniously, a 

Slovakian staff member rolls 

Peter Sagan’s spare bike away 

from the pits, the still current 

World Champion visible on 

the big screen passing bidons 

and gels from his musette to 

the souvenir hungry crowd on 

his way to the BORA bus. 

As time passes 

we get the message that 

both Smith and Bevin have 

packed. George is still looking 

comfortable as he heads past 

us. He’s fed from the hill this 

time. Bevin and Smith roll into 

the pits for a quick debrief, 

then back to the finish line 

to meet Van Hove. “Filthy” 

is Bevin’s one-word race 

assessment. Together with 

Bewley he heads onto the 

Mitchelton–Scott bus to watch 

the rest of the race, welcomed 

on as present and future 

teammates, and as ANZACs. 

Leray starts to empty 

the chilly bin. Our last feed is 

fast approaching so we only 

need a bottle each. George 

passes us, 30 km to go. Still 

in the main group, he looks 

focused but happy in the long, 

thinning line. 

Abandoning the feed 

we head to the team parking, 

Landry calmly navigating the 

only roads that are still open. 

I find Van Hove on his tiptoes 

at the finish line, straining to 

watch the big screen as the 

race plays out on the Höll [the 

deciding, super-steep climb of 

the race]. No sign of Bennett, 

but Landry’s pre-race tip, 

the Canadian rider Michael 

Woods, is up there. 

You know the 

ending, you’ve seen the finish, 

you’ve seen how it plays out 

and who got it. But that’s not 

this story. 

We wait for Bennett. 

The French next to us have 

three riders in already. A 

third group comes around 

the corner and he spots our 

black jerseys. Silent in the wall 

of noise. Van Hove instructs 

which way to the team 

parking, running behind him 

down the back streets to guide 

him to the picnic chairs. 

The boys are there 

to greet him with handshakes 

and bro hugs. The team’s only 

finisher, happy to relax at 

last, sits with his head back 

and eyes closed. All the time 

autograph hunters lurk ready 

to pounce. 

Bewley knows 

the moment to start the 

assessment. 

“Fark, started early 

today, hey?” 

“60 km in,” Bennett 

continues. “That climb. 

Reckon we did that well 

though, surfing around there, 

and Paddy, right after you 

moved me up I went full, that 

was real good. Must have 

taken some biscuits though?” 

“It did, but that was 

the play,” chips in Bevin. 

Bennett had also 

been in the play with 22 km 

to go, when the final selection 

started to split. 

“I was just waiting 

and waiting for the right 

move and I saw one that had 

every big nation in it: French, 

Spanish, Aussies, British, an 

Italian, so I tagged on the back 

of that but I was pretty under 

the pump there. Someone 

brought that back. Once you 

saw a move like that wasn’t 

going to stick then you just 

had to play the waiting game, 

so I just took it easy. 

“[The final climb] 

was real shit. Guys were 

unclipping, going across the 

road. I had to unclip and try 

to get going again. I lost the 

group then. I was definitely 

not the only one having to 

stop, heaps of guys were, one 

guy from Kazakhstan just 

cramped up and fell off!” 

While the support 

team work out which rain bags 

and bikes are going with teams 

for Lombardy and which are 

staying with the riders, Geater 

promises the boys a couple 

of cold Duvel’s he’s kept back 

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Russell Jones 


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Russell Jones 


in the minibar for them, 

although Bewley’s got a plan 

for the way home. “Anyone 

know where the Spanish are 

staying? Bro, we should so 

crash their hotel!” 

THE RIGHT 

DIRECTION 

Three DNF’s and an 18th 

place, does that really tell the 

story of the day? 

“Everyone rode their 

role and I didn’t expect any 

of the other three to finish 

this race,” reasons Geater. 

“So I’d say we’ve come out 

with a pretty good result. 

George will play it down and 

say it wasn’t good enough, 

but there was only about 25 

guys left at the end and as he 

said he got tangled up and 

lost momentum. As Sam was 

getting dropped there were 

guys going out left right and 

centre so it was a lot harder 

than it looked. Paddy and 

Dion rode really well, they 

gave it 100%. It would have 

been nice if they’d been there 

that last 20-30 km to help 

George but that’s bike racing. 

“We put in a pretty 

solid team around George, 

some of the best guys we 

have, and we only get a small 

amount of numbers so that’s 

what makes it difficult to 

match some of the bigger 

teams at those times in the 

race. It’s really the first time 

we’ve been able to go for a goal 

like that and we are getting 

closer and closer with the 

more points we are getting. 

We are certainly going in the 

right direction.” 

Landry draws a 

comparison to his native 

Canada, another small cycling 

nation, but also sees the 

possibilities. 

“Obviously George is 

disappointed and who knows 

what he’d have done if he had 

been better positioned. He 

looked pretty good. I think by 

then he was hoping to move 

his way up from the bottom, 

but he was blocked. He got in 

that move on the second to 

last lap up when the hammer 

was really starting to go 

down and, although people 

considered him as an outsider, 

in my opinion he’s got the 

legs to be up there with the 

top guys. Obviously he’s at a 

disadvantage because he had 

no teammates, Valverde had 

a couple to set him up, but 

then again Mike Woods didn’t 

either. It was really down to 

being in the right place at the 

right time and having the legs 

to be there, being in position 

when you know the climb 

is going to happen, arriving 

the freshest at the foot of that 

climb. 

“Looking ahead, 

with regards to the elite men 

and women, we don’t need to 

do too much as they are doing 

a lot leading up to these races 

with their trade teams. With 

the juniors and under-23s it’s a 

different story. We really have 

to support the riders more 

by setting up a programme 

and giving the younger riders 

some guidance through the 

ranks, nurturing, take on more 

of the prep for these races. The 

problem with funding being 

what it is in New Zealand, 

that’s tough to do. 

“It’s always an eyeopener 

for the juniors, but 

what we want to do next year 

is a better selection policy 

and better plan going into the 

Worlds, focusing on a block 

of racing beforehand so they 

get some experience. You 

don’t come to the Worlds to 

learn, you come to perform, 

so showing up and being a 

deer in the headlights is not 

learning anything. Being 

based in Europe is one thing 

but the step from racing in 

New Zealand is a huge jump. 

“The cost to do 

a three-week block is just 

about the same to do the one 

World Championships, but 

the benefits are huge. Getting 

them used to positioning in 

those bunches, fighting for 

position and owning those 

positions. 

“You can show 

videos but you don’t learn 

until you are doing it, and you 

won’t learn here at the Worlds, 

but you will in the Belgian 

kermesses - the real school of 

hard knocks.” 

Saying my goodbyes 

I try to squeeze past through 

the chanting crowd that 

surrounds the BORA – 

hansgrohe bus. Sagan might be 

defeated this year but certainly 

not by public opinion. I leave 

the New Zealand team to 

disperse back across the globe, 

hopefully first via the Spanish 

hotel. 

Woken the next 

morning by squalls of rain 

against my window, a quick 

weather app check says 

storms and a decent drop 

in temperature for the next 

few days. Twenty-four hours 

earlier, well, that would have 

been a very different rodeo. 

Russell Jones 

186 

187

POSTCARD FROM MALLORCA 

Words & Pictures: Tom Owen 

188 

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Tom Owen 

Postcard From Mallorca 

In the lounge-style seating area of the ferry, 

a coterie of noisy children run amok for the 

first six hours of the seven-hour crossing. 

They fall asleep, and then immediately we are 

about to dock in Palma de Mallorca. 

Groggy and grumpy, I make my way 

down to the car deck and unlock my bicycle – 

this good bicycle of mine that has, improbably, 

conquered the Galibier, the Glandon, a 500- 

mile tour from Bilbao to the Costa Blanca, 

plus more than 10,000 commuter miles 

in London. I put the panniers back on and 

respectfully wheel the bike off the boat before 

joyously hopping into the saddle and wobbling 

towards the port exit. 

It is almost midnight. My lodgings 

are 17 km away, just over the official city 

limits of Palma in Llucmajor. And there is a 

perfect bike path the entire way, because this 

is Europe, where things still make sense. 

I soar through the empty streets as 

the urban landscape of Palma thins away. 

There is an absolutely monstrous cathedral 

on the way out south – I’ve never heard of it 

before. Outside the city centre the bikeway 

diverges from the path of the main road 

which it had hitherto been hugging and sticks 

loyally to the edge of the beach. 

The lighting gets less and, instead of 

emanating from overhead stanchions built to 

light the road, is emitted by low-set glowing 

bollards. This creates pools of orangey light, 

with some darker stretches. 

The path winds along the edge of 

something like sand dunes. I feel the proximity 

of the airport of Palma, which famously has a 

runway that runs to just before the beach – so 

that, if that’s how you get your kicks, you can 

go and sit on the beach and watch planes take 

off tens of metres above your beach towel. 

A high wall separates the airport land to 

the left from the bike path. And on the other 

side, rocks and the sea. The air – despite it 

being mid-winter – has a warm edge and, once 

the bike gathers momentum, all the extra 

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Tom Owen 

Postcard From Mallorca 

weight makes it feel like it’s soaring along. I 

feel unstoppable and then, all of a sudden, I 

need very quickly to stop. 

In the other direction comes another 

cyclist. We are both sticking to the allocated 

bike lane, but it is too narrow for us to pass. 

I see him very late because of the high wall 

and my evasive manoeuvres are insufficient. 

We collide. It hurts a lot, instantly. I see a 

pair of Oakleys on the floor and think “What 

a coincidence, he has the same ones as me.” 

They are, of course, my sunglasses. The guy 

I hit stays down a long time. I worry about 

him and about the incredible pain in my knee. 

Eventually he gets up and dazedly points 

at the fork of my bike, saying something 

like “That’s proper fucked, mate.” I hadn’t 

noticed. His assessment is correct. 

We stand around in stunned silence 

a bit longer, grunting monosyllabic Spanish. 

He asks me where I live about six times – 

which in retrospect was probably the sign 

of a concussion but at the time was just 

bewildering. Eventually he gets back on his 

bike and wobbles off into the dark, while I 

carry-push my bike – with panniers, bar bag, 

frame bag – about a mile to the next hotel 

along the sea front. I call a taxi and pay him 

€20 to take me to my destination. 

What a brilliant start to a holiday. 

Tom Owen 

192 

193


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