I write this while sitting here, doped up with cold meds and fighting a nasty virus caught from our youngest. But, my reflections for this Friday night take me away from the depths of despair of Winter illnesses and cold unforgiving weather ....
It is funny how one's relationship with bicycles appears to follow different paths with the passage of time. One day last Spring, I found myself out on the wrong bike! We had gone away for the weekend to see my folks. Before leaving Ottawa, I had decided to put two bikes on the car - the 82 Bob Jackson and the 81 Raleigh - one a more relaxed day-tourer the other a pure race bike kitted out in Campag SR with a straight six-speed, corn-cob block. Whether it was bravado, machismo or just plain stupidity, I chose to ride the Raleigh the first morning out. No problem, I thought, I have been pounding the trainer all Winter and have been out a few times in Ottawa on various bikes. About twenty minutes out on a regular one-hour ride that takes me out onto Eastern Ontario country roads, I felt muscles begin to burn and I was busting it trying to fight both the gearing and a stiff headwind on the return portion of the ride.
In truth, it was way too early in the season for such a ride (made worse by the autoshifting which still haunts this bike). Moreso, I had been so caught up in trying to "ride" the bike that I had missed the glories of a late-Spring morning.
The next morning I rolled out the Jackson with its Brooks Pro saddle, mudguards, and mostly NR equipment. The Jackson has a relaxed Maillard Course block on NR hub and Weinmann - bomb-proof - concave clincher rims. The geometry is more forgiving than the Raleigh. It has the feel of a bike for a long ride in the saddle in relative comfort.
The sun was just coming up and there was a beautiful soft mist across the fields and portions of the road. Spinning along in more comfort and with a different sense of purpose, I had time to enjoy the overwhelming smell of the lilacs which were dotted along the country roads.
Ahh, this was the right bike!
As I have mentioned before, on many occasions, I never raced and yet from my teens had a passion for the racing machine. I liked the idea of pushing myself somehow (I have mostly always been a solitary rider as it is my time for contemplation and escape from the world). A sense of spinning at speed on a road machine. But, as I have got older ,the joys of that experience have diminished. I have nothing to prove to anyone (indeed there are few who would actually get up with me at 5:00a.m. for a ride), but feel unworthy to ride such a beast without letting it go through its paces.
But, things would really change in August of last year when the '49 Carpenter hit the road. Although a club racer in its own right, it is far from a thoroughbred with its mudguards, single-speed, Marsh bars (raised a little higher), and saddlebag. Yes, I bought that archetypal piece of British cycling history - the Carradice Longflap saddlebag! The need to ride at a comfortable cadence as a consequence of the single-gear had me feeling much more basic - I felt like I was out on one of those wonderful British cycling films of the 1950s or that I had just stepped out of a Paterson print. Could it be? Was I going CTC (Cyclists' Touring Club)? Was it taking me over? I had bought a Carradice! Almost instantly, I had put away my more flashy team related jerseys, left the HRM and the cyclocomputer in the drawer. I had bought baggy shorts and a pair of Sidi touring shoes and had gone back to clips and straps!!
Moreover, my EBay searches and watch lists were now full of the delights and eccentricities of the 1940s and 1950s - both British and Continental. Where past searches would have focussed on five or six-speed, alloy or titanium, Campag or Stronglight, clincher or tubular, names like TA and Williams, Chater Lea and Brampton, GB and Burlite, excited me much more. Most of these names have a place in British racing circles, but they were also equally at home on club rides and country rambles.
For the last three months of the season - right into late-November - the Carpenter was my bike of choice. And when passed one morning by a young chap, dressed in skinsuit and astride a C-F bike, I nodded, wished him the time of day. He looked down at my steed with a look of curiosity and amusement. His bike clicked and creaked, but my "old girl" just whirred. As he disappeared ahead of me, I had absolutely no inclination to take his wheel - why waste a perfectly good ride, I thought to myself, and why spoil the enjoyment of that special air that is part of a Summer's morning?
Was I truly going CTC?
After all, I had a Carradice behind the saddle!
Paul Williams, Ottawa, ON, Canada
Paul B. Williams, BAH, MPhil, PhD
Ottawa, Ontario, Canada
castell5@sympatico.ca