Tour de France revisited

I was a bit geeky as a child and was always fascinated by the next thing, whatever that was.

In one summer holiday period I displayed an obsessive desire to be, in what I recollect as the correct chronological order,

1) In the US 7th Cavalry
2)Apollo Mission Astronaut
3)Racing Driver
4) Professional footballer
and, strangely,
5) A show jumper.

All of these career ideas were spawned by, following the same numbering, Saturday morning cowboy films, Cape Canaveral rocket launches, Le Mans 24 hours, an FA Cup Final and latterly an invitation to the Burleigh Horse Trials in Lincolnshire.

In my late teens I became interested in cycling.

It was another of those genetic traits inherited from my late Father, himself a very keen and well travelled cyclist following on from an affinity to pick up litter in public open spaces.

In the 1980's TV coverage of cycling was very limited. Only a few enthusiasts knew about the Milk Race in the UK to the Classic European Races and the National Tours.

That was until the big sponsorship by cereal manufacturers Kelloggs who promoted some great city centre criterium races with prime time commercial channel coverage. The viewing figures and sheer numbers of on-course spectators must have taken the programmers by surprise and to capitalise on this there was an up-scaling of coverage with  The Nissan Classic in Ireland and then Channel Four began their excellent live and highlights broadcasting of the Tour de France.

I began to compete in local races in the early 1980's and began to live, eat and sleep all things cycling, If not out training, taking part in events or sitting glued to the TV the best thing to do was to catch a live event out in the countryside or in a town centre. A few of us would ride miles, often setting out at first light, to be in a good roadside spot to catch the race as it passed by.

I did get to see a stage of the Tour de France in 1984, setting off on my own from the house near Paris where I was staying for a week with my younger sister, at that time nannying for a French family. It was quite an ambitious thing to do in a strange country, with only schoolboy language skills and a large scale map that covered from the Scottish Lowlands to Morocco.

That flash of the pre-race publicity caravan, motorcycle outriders and then the riders themselves was absolutely thrilling, albeit over in all too short a time. My 35mm holiday camera was in rapid use as the peleton came by and the pictures captured Bernard Hinault's right profile, Fignon's distinctive sweatband and , well, they were the only two exposures in focus. They are amongst my most treasured bits of cycling memorabilia.

My journey in cycling has been and still is quite a surprise to me.

I was a poor and very under-achieving competitor in a very brief foray into racing but have two small trophies for "Best in Club" for one particular year.

In my late twenties Self employment allowed me to sponsor a local cycle racing team in my home town over 15 good years before the banking crisis and recession. My son has started to compete and trains hard, You can find me following some distance behind.

I continue to enjoy the sport and hope to be fit and healthy to continue to ride out when I get an opportunity. In this way I have been able to live out an obsession, now the longest single one in my catalogue of obsessions and fascinations.

I was therefore quite taken with the achievement of one Alex Clarke, whose story has some paralells with my own.

He started off collecting and selling vintage bicycles in the US before acquiring a consignment of classic cycle team jerseys. These sold well through the internet and his natural thought was to capitalise on this demand and actually make replica jerseys using modern Merino Wool.

The baggy and obviously very hot woollen team wear, both shirts and shorts in the 1970's included some gawdy and striking designs such as Brooklyn, Bianchi, Dreher, Sammontana, KAS and Jolly Ceramica. One jersey design that Alex Clarke openly avoided was Molteni, the team of Eddy Merckx and before him Motta, Altig and Basso.

However he had an open mind and meeting a well known Italian Cycling Photographer convinced him that Molteni embodied the core values of cycling.

The Molteni team was financed not by a large pan-European Corporation but a family firm who made award winning sausages.

Clarke's new obsession saw him spend thousands of dollars of his own money on turning a plain and drab 1976 Volvo 244 Saloon Car into an authentic replica of the Molteni Team Car that accompanied Merckx and co on some of their greatest exploits.

The result is striking and I am, I admit, just a little bit jealous.