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tom simpson - bird on the wire. andy mcgrath. rapha editions/blue train publishing/bloomsbury sport hardback. 224pp illus. £36

so much has the british attitude to cycling success altered in the second decade of the 21st century, that were chris froome to stand on the second spot of the podium in paris at the end of july, it would be considered a major disappointment. in 1984, robert millar missed out on a podium spot at le tour by one place, but took the polka dot jersey, at that time, marking the highest placing by a british rider in the race's history. wiggins and froome have rendered millar's success but a popular footnote in british cycling history; nowadays, there are an impressive number of british riders competing at the sport's highest level and english has become the de facto language of the peloton.

in the 1960s i owned a blue anorak on which my mother had sewn a round patch advertising my purported allegiance to the beatles. i'd bought, with my very own pocket money, an ep (extended play; remember those?) of twist and shout on the parlophone label, a record that still hides amongst others in the attic. maybe one of these days...

however, despite a passing interest in the fab four and occasionally gerry and the pacemakers, because my brother liked them, i not only had absolutely no idea that anybody raced bicycles, but that an englishman was in the process of capturing both european victories and hearts. andy mcgrath's beautifully written and illustrated book 'tom simpson; bird on the wire' has filled an embarrassing gap in my velocipedinal education. as sir bradley mentions in his foreword...

"Here was a guy who had been British pursuit champion, and yet subsequently he went on to win races as diverse as the Tour of Flanders, Tour of Lombardy and Milan-Sanremo."

The abiding memory that most of us have of Tom Simpson is his legendary collapse on the slopes of Mont Ventoux and subsequent castigation as one of the more high profile cycling deaths involving banned substances. yet prior to his unfortunate demise, tom simpson was not only britain's finest cyclist/sportsman, but one of the sport's top riders. in this modern era, british riders have not only the benefit of integrating seamlessly into the international peloton, but ultimately have little or nothing to prove that they deserve to be there in the first place. that britain produces riders of quality is an acknowledged fact nowadays, but in the 1960s, that was decidedly not the case. nor indeed, was there the support culture offered by the likes of team sky and others.

"Simpson was the mine worker's son who went to France with £100 in his pocket and became Britain's first road cycling champion."

few others, such as barry hoban, vin denson, tony hewson to name but a few, had the temerity to do likewise. even in the peugeot days of yates, millar and roche, there was scarcely a panoply of directeurs sportifs and soigneurs eagerly cossetting their new found british contingent. that's not to say life was any harder for tom simpson, but there's little doubt that he pretty much ploughed his own furrow on the continental racing scene.

mcgrath provides both written and pictorial evidence of simpson's prowess on british roads, alluding to his growing obsession with cycle racing even during his school years. this was the formative period that presaged britain's gradual inclusion in the european racing scene.

In 1951, they organised a Tour of Britain race - Simpson played truant from school one day to see a stage finish in Nottingham. [...] (this) paved the way for the first British team at the Tour de France in 1955."

in 1959, simpson figured that he'd accomplished as much as he was likely to do so on this side of the channel. contacting two breton brothers that he'd met through track racing at fallowfield, they agreed to house him in saint-brieuc, a town in northwest france. his move to the continent was well-timed, in that it allowed him to avoid compulsory british miltary service, a potential two-year interruption to a burgeoning career that could conceivably have altered not only simpson's racing career, but that of the others who followed abroad in his tyre tracks.

"Dad, I don't want to be sitting here in 20 years' time, saying to myself 'I wonder where I would have been if I'd went to France."

with continental racing being substantially harder than the british domestic scene, despite winning his second race, simpson was forced to learn his craft the hard way, and not only because he had but few words of the language. as many young riders have discovered over the years, it's not only a case of having the legs, but an accompanying tactical nous.

"I am as strong as anybody in Brittany. All I need now is a head. I throw away too much energy."

on joining the rapha-gitane-dunlop team in 1960, simpson gained tour de france stage winner, brian robinson as a team-mate. simpson's jovial and lively character apparently made him easy to get on with, leading to robinson taking the youngster under his wing. simpson did not squander the opportunity to proffer a "barrage of questions" towards the elder rider. it is something of a cliché to write, but the rest can only be described as history, but one that mcgrath describes in exquisite detail. for bird on a wire enlightens the reader with an enjoyably conversational style with cover and chapter pages that superbly reflect the graphic design of the era.

the author has spoken with simpson's widow (subsequently married to barry hoban), with hoban himself, the aforementioned robinson, emile daems and jan janssen. the latter lived only an hour apart when simpson had based himself in ghent. but what really sets this book on a deserved pedestal but not in any way to undermine the accomplished writing of mcgrath, are the superb illustrations. in a time when magazines and the internet are awash with galleries of photos from each and every world tour race, the quality of those taken in the 1960s is a joy to behold. though the majority are in black and white, the book's large-format pages frequently surprise with impressive colour plates.

you need not be a simpson naif such as myself to delight in this marvellous book; many of a certain age will be well acquainted with the career of one of britain's favoured sons and i think it certain they will enjoy bird on a wire every bit as much as did i. had he lived, tom simpson would have been eighty this year and would scarcely have believed the difference between then and now. it would have been interesting to see how he might have helped shape britain's integration into the international racing scene, were it not for that sad day in july 1967.

the 1968 tour de france was billed as the tour of health, with jacques goddet writing in l'équipe "Dear Tom Simpson, you will not have fallen in vain on the stony desert of the Ventoux." in point of fact, we know that to be somewhat naive optimism. however, simpson's last days should not overshadow an incredible career, one carved from adversity and that ultimately, must be seen as the conclusion of this timely and most welcome book.

"...Altig and Anquetil [...] didn't like riders who went against what they wanted to do."
"How did he gain their acceptance?"
"When he won all those Classics."

sunday 11 june 2017