Cycling heros.. feet of clay

[KarlD]

I have been reading a bit about past cycling heros, as you know I am a bit of a racing cyclist and on the continent cycling is in their blood and there is a long line of cycling heros who are worshiped in countries like Italy france and Spain, names like Coppi, Bianchi, Merckx, Pantani, Indurain are all revered and celibrated for famous victories but the interesting thing is they all have feet of clay, they all were found to be largly powered by chemicals for most of the time or they had dodgy connections and they all had their moments of fame and glory and then ended up dying of drug overdoses or commiting suicide or having some horrendous late life crisis and dying forgotten in poverty, I don't know why it should be it doesn't seem to happen in other sports.Maybe you have to be a bit odd in the first place to be able to do things on a bike which are on the edge of the humanly possible.
I always remember watching one film of Pantani riding down L'alpe d'Huez with a motorbike camera following and he was going so fast and with such skill the commentator was saying as you watch this keep repeating to yourself the mantra 'If I was doing this I would be dead by now'

 

[Moooksta]

If I had a cycling hero it'd be MacMillan, Scottish inventor of the pedal bike and possibly the first man to have been arrested and fined five shillings for the first recorded bicycling accident.

He rode his new pedal bike from Dumfries to Glasgow and on entering the "dear green place" ran into a child and was done for it!! Sometime in the 1840's!

(And I'd like to quash any rumours that he also holds the record for being the first to have his bike nicked whilst in Glasgow!)

Come to think of it...Dunlop as well. He had this crazy idea of putting air filled tyres on a bike.

mooks out

 

[coaly]

Dunop wasn't the first though, but he brought it out at a better social climate, about 40 years after Bob Thomson's first vulcanised rubber pneumatic tire. Then it wasn't until the beginning of the 20th century before they caught on properly. I always thought Dunlop was from Northern Ireland, but it turns out he was Scottish.

 

[Moooksta]

Dunop wasn't the first though, but he brought it out at a better social climate, about 40 years after Bob Thomson's first vulcanised rubber pneumatic tire. Then it wasn't until the beginning of the 20th century before they caught on properly. I always thought Dunlop was from Northern Ireland, but it turns out he was Scottish.

Poor Bob had the right idea but at the wrong time!

mooks out