So this kid just turns up on a old bike.....

tailwindhome

One the things I love about cycling are the tales of the clueless, unknown kid turning up for their first club race and tearing everyone's legs off.

Just read about Graham Webb in Ned Boutling's excellent 'On the Road Bike'

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Graham_Webb

Webb entered his first race aged 17, a 25-mile (40 km) time trial. Unaware of what he was supposed to do, shy and not understanding why competitors were starting individually as opposed to together in a bunch, Webb waited until he was called, by which point, he was late for his allocated start time; the time was calculated from the allocated start time instead of his actual start time as a penalty.

Wearing a t-shirt and pumps, Webb set off under the impression that he had to catch the riders that had started ahead of him in order to win. He was hampered initially as one of his pumps fell off and he had to wait for cars to pass before being able to return to collect his shoe and continue. Webb later commented that "I quickly caught someone and waited for him. And he was telling me 'clear off, clear off' – very unsociable, I thought. I rode on, went round the turn in the road, came back; and the chain jumped off between the block and the frame. So I had to get off the bike, and I'd got a whole tool kit with me, spanner, oil can, cloth for cleaning my hands and so on, and this was wrapped round my seat tube with a spare inner tube. I had to undo the back wheel, put the chain on, do up the wheel nuts, put everything behind the seat tube and carry on."[4]

The following Thursday evening, Webb went to his club meeting; as usual he stood painfully shy to one side. Eventually he was asked if he was Graham Webb, because if he was, he was the winner of the race. He had ridden the 25 miles in 1 hour 1 minute and 31 seconds. Had it not been for the penalty of the late start and mechanical trouble, Webb would have broken the hour on an ordinary sports bicycle; at a time when to ride 25 miles in less than an hour was still the dream of most experienced cyclists.

cesco

It's stories like these that make cycling awesome.

I may need to buy Boulting's book now!

Herbsman

Quality

ocdupalais

At the Good Friday meeting at Herne Hill ('94, 95, 96, 97...?) some track-side know-all (is any track without one?) was banging on about how this young lad (Archer CC) from North London who looked effortless against a bunch of seniors was potentially Britain's first Tour winner - "pure class", he said and we all laughed...
Forget the lad's name, but just goes to show that things don't always work out.
He's probably toiling away in some corporate job in some corporation right now - struggling with the party line...

Anonymous

OCDuPalais wrote:

At the Good Friday meeting at Herne Hill ('94, 95, 96, 97...?) some track-side know-all (is any track without one?) was banging on about how this young lad (Archer CC) from North London who looked effortless against a bunch of seniors was potentially Britain's first Tour winner - "pure class", he said and we all laughed...
Forget the lad's name, but just goes to show that things don't always work out.
He's probably toiling away in some corporate job in some corporation right now - struggling with the party line...

OMG don't just leave us hanging like that



Imagine if you actually listened to the people who told you you weren't good enough.

Bo Duke

sjmclean wrote:

Imagine if you actually listened to the people who told you you weren't good enough.

Its more dangerous to believe those who say you are good.

No_Ta_Doctor

See also the legend of Bernard Hinault. After five club runs as a 16 yr old he got his first race licence, turned up at a race on a borrowed bike too big for him, crapped himself about riding in the peloton and hung off the back, then near the end, went round it, attacked and won.

seanoconn

Bo Duke wrote:

sjmclean wrote:

Imagine if you actually listened to the people who told you you weren't good enough.

Its more dangerous to believe those who say you are good.

No it isn't. As long as you don't believe you just have to turn up to win.

jimmythecuckoo

I remember a similar thing. I turned up at my first club 10 in 1991, borrowed a jersey, had a basic Dawes Impulse road bike with heavy wheels...



...and then did a long 31

frenchfighter

That`s excellent! Thanks for posting.

morstar

jimmythecuckoo wrote:

I remember a similar thing. I turned up at my first club 10 in 1991, borrowed a jersey, had a basic Dawes Impulse road bike with heavy wheels...



...and then did a long 31

;-)

paul2718

sjmclean wrote:

OMG don't just leave us hanging like that

(He's talking about Wiggins....)

Paul

seanoconn

OCDuPalais wrote:

At the Good Friday meeting at Herne Hill ('94, 95, 96, 97...?) some track-side know-all (is any track without one?) was banging on about how this young lad (Archer CC) from North London who looked effortless against a bunch of seniors was potentially Britain's first Tour winner - "pure class", he said and we all laughed...
Forget the lad's name, but just goes to show that things don't always work out.
He's probably toiling away in some corporate job in some corporation right now - struggling with the party line...

A friend of mine was asked to do a lead out for a young Bradley Wiggins during that period. Dave launched himself off the front, expecting Wiggins to come whistling past him at any moment..... which never happened! After a volley from Wiggin's grandad "What are you playing at! He's only a kid" He was never asked again

andy_wrx

Isn't there a similar tale of an unknown Floyd Landis turning up for his first race on a clunker bike and in awful kit, getting sneered at, lapping the field ?

Le Commentateur

I remember Sean Yates turning out for a local 2-man TT accomanied by Wiggins as his partner back in... 2003, I think. It was a veterans TT but they were allowed a younger team mate. They promptly destroyed the course record, but the funniest thing was the scene earlier in the car park. Riders driving to the event with their bikes in the family cars were confronted by a CSC team car in the car park with a massive bike rack attached to the roof – enough to carry a whole team's bikes. That's how to intimidate your opponents.

davidof

There seem to be similar urban legends for all the greats. They can't all have been incompetent boy wonders, surely?

That said, there are a lot of knobs on very expensive bikes who are not that fast.

takethehighroad

Contador and Purito's stories are similarly impressive, involving rusty metal frames, and everyone wondering who this young kid is.

It's one reason Purito got his nickname http://inrng.com/2012/09/joaquim-rodriguez-purito-name/

knedlicky

davidof wrote:

There seem to be similar urban legends for all the greats.

Fredddie Maertens won his first race when 14 years old, in a field of predominantly 18-year olds, riding a second-hand bike. His father bought it from a hotel on the Flemish coast which hired out a few bikes to tourists.
A couple of years later, after the father noticed Maertens flirting with a girl instead of following the father’s rigid training regime, the father got his hacksaw out and cut the bike in half.
Don't know how they later reconciled and how Maertens got another bike, but Maertens was later twice RR World Champion.


Another parent who, in a moment of anger, tried to stop a son’s cycling career was Jean Stablinski’s mother.
The father had died when Stablinski was 14 years old and he then became the breadwinner for the family, taking over his father’s job in an iron foundry. Stablinski earned extra money by playing the accordion at local cafes on Saturday dance evenings.
With some of that extra money, Stablinski secretly bought his first racing bike, however when his mother found out, she wasn’t at all in agreement. In her eyes, the family were so poor, it was a case of squandering valuable money on a useless hobby, and she smashed up the handlebars of the bike so that, at least for a while, he couldn’t ride it.

Stablinski was later RR World Champion, some sources say due to assistance from his then-teammate Shay Elliot (Elliot and Stablinski reputedly worked well together in the WC race, purposely alternating attacks to tire out the other two riders in the break, and when Stablinski attacked two rounds before the end, Elliot didn't follow, as supposedly arranged between him and Elliot).
However other sources suggest this last Elliot-Stablinski arrangement hadn't been made, rather Stablinski additionally bribed the other two riders not to follow when he attacked two rounds before the end, leaving it all too much for Elliot to close the gap on his own.

All well before my time, but I've read Stablinski was perhaps the best tactical rider to have ever been, and also one of the best in terms of overall endurance and a real attacker. If so, shame he's hardly ever mentioned amongst cycling greats. Seems he never won GTs because in the mountains and in TTs he wasn't that hot, while he was also often in Anquetil's team, so usually had to play second fiddle then.

takethehighroad

As Paul Sherwen tells us annually, he's the only person to have plied his trade above and below the Forest of Arenberg, as he worked in the mines and rode Paris Roubaix

specialgueststar

knedlicky wrote:

davidof wrote:

after the father noticed Maertens flirting with a girl instead of following the father’s rigid training regime, the father got his hacksaw out and cut the bike in half..

Sven Van Hardbasrd got that half bike and rode it to victory in a 3 hour crit in the snow at Gronenounarde aged 12 against a field of seniors who were testing a new batch of Pot Belge. The remarkable thing was that at the start his trainer lace got caught up in a metal barrier and he dragged it around behind him for four laps before an official lent him a knife to cut it free. To save time he amputated his foot rather than try to cut the tangled knot. It was only when he was being towelled down with a coal sack that he realised that he'd lapped the entire field.

Crozza

SpecialGuestStar wrote:

knedlicky wrote:

davidof wrote:

after the father noticed Maertens flirting with a girl instead of following the father’s rigid training regime, the father got his hacksaw out and cut the bike in half..

Sven Van Hardbasrd got that half bike and rode it to victory in a 3 hour crit in the snow at Gronenounarde aged 12 against a field of seniors who were testing a new batch of Pot Belge. The remarkable thing was that at the start his trainer lace got caught up in a metal barrier and he dragged it around behind him for four laps before an official lent him a knife to cut it free. To save time he amputated his foot rather than try to cut the tangled knot. It was only when he was being towelled down with a coal sack that he realised that he'd lapped the entire field.

great start to a Friday morning!

salsiccia1

SpecialGuestStar wrote:

knedlicky wrote:

davidof wrote:

after the father noticed Maertens flirting with a girl instead of following the father’s rigid training regime, the father got his hacksaw out and cut the bike in half..

Sven Van Hardbasrd got that half bike and rode it to victory in a 3 hour crit in the snow at Gronenounarde aged 12 against a field of seniors who were testing a new batch of Pot Belge. The remarkable thing was that at the start his trainer lace got caught up in a metal barrier and he dragged it around behind him for four laps before an official lent him a knife to cut it free. To save time he amputated his foot rather than try to cut the tangled knot. It was only when he was being towelled down with a coal sack that he realised that he'd lapped the entire field.

That is mint. *applause*