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star of the future
at this year's gran fondo ardbeg, one of the founding fathers of the ride, tom hunter was joined by his eleven year old son nick, who proceeded to give us old farts a hard time for many a long kilometre.
nick was chosen as one of the stars of the future to precede the peloton at the start of the tour of britain from glasgow green. and one of the rewards for being one of the chosen few, was to meet with cycling royalty, duffers himself. just reward indeed.
thanks to tom for the pic
and while we're in tour of britain stance, rapha have some neat discount offers on their website during the tour - gilets, jerseys and merino shirts. just tell them we sent you.
..........................................................................................................................................................................................................a day at the races
by now you'll know who won the first stage of the tour of britain, and probably before i did. after watching the start on glasgow green at 10:30am on tuesday morning, i did everything in the reverse order to yesterday, (bus, ferry etc.) arriving back on islay about 9pm.
every intention of writing up the expedition (everything's relative) on the ferry on the way home, but basically, i didn't. so when time allows there will be photos and stuff to appreciate. in the meantime, if you have the opportunity to get to the start or finish of any of the tour of britain stages - take it.
major thanks to both anthony mccrossan and brian smith from cycling.tv - wouldn't have been the same without you.
..........................................................................................................................................................................................................the local gig - part one
with no expense spared, took a calmac ferry to kennacraig and a citylink bus to glasgow, checked in at the premier travel inn, george square and prepared for the glasgow grand prix - a stars of the future race round the square, followed by the big boys who went much faster than i do.
commentary for both races was by an amalgam of duffers (very nice bloke), hugh porter, and the cycling.tv maestro, anthony mccrossan. i also met ex-motorola and currently cycling.tv commentator, brian smith. the racing was great and we just need someone to re-inaugurate (can you really say that?) city centre cycling like wot we used to get on channel four many moons ago
george square featured trials mountain bike riding and displays from madison (ultimate pursuits and shimano), memory maps (doesn't work on a mac), alpine bikes and cambrian tyres (continental).
the main race of the evening was won by a guy from the danish post team with an unpronounceable name (well, by me at least) with second place taken by a team shimano skils rider. since neither are british they were ineligible for points in the criterium championship, so third place guy took maximum points - malcolm elliot riding for plowman craven team, and at his age too. flipping brilliant:-)
click here for a slide show of pics from the evening.
..........................................................................................................................................................................................................tuneless no more
while mick, andy and the rest of the world eagerly await 'cobbles baby!', scott coady of bigringfilms, progenitor of 'it's the tour baby' and now the long awaited follow up, sent me the following regarding the delay over the latter:
'Cobbles Baby!' will be done in about two weeks. All music licensing issues have been cleared up and the film will definitely rock. I am very proud of the music in the film and I wanted to make sure I went about things ethically. When I had the original idea to use a certain piece of music in the film, and began pursuing the rights to use it, I had no idea of the odyssey that would take me on with some of the biggest record companies on the planet.
And, as a result, according to the six test audience responses, the piece of music we ended up with to anchor the film is better than my original version and I would have discovered that piece of music had I not gone after the first piece.
much as i hate the phrase, 'watch this space', watch this space.
..........................................................................................................................................................................................................rasmussen's cap
released this summer to those of us with polka dot aspirations - rapha climber's cap. yes you can indeed buy 'ordinary' caps for around a fiver where this one comes in at five times that price. but it's made from breathable cotton with a schoeler3xdry coating. this means it's breathable and water repellant - ideal for those sunday morning jaunts up alpe d'huez or a spin across the mortirolo. available in three sizes from the rapha website
..........................................................................................................................................................................................................this website is named after graeme obree's championship winning 'old faithful' built using bits from a defunct washing machine
..........................................................................................................................................................................................................as always, if you have any comments on this nonsense, please feel free to e-mail and thanks for reading.
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