The Clouds Factory

May 2006 Given how much we had enjoyed our experience in Bath before Christmas, Mike, Sam and I agreed it was time for some serious riding and we needed mountains for that. After scouring the internet for ideas, we settled for the Granfondo delle Alpi, a relatively low key sportive in the Italian Alps, set between Bergamo and the border with Switzerland. Its patron was Gimondi and he was scheduled to ride part of it. As he is one of my childhood heroes, I relished the thought of meeting the legend so we registered. Then disaster struck. While playing football during a lunchtime kickabout, I was tackled hard on my right ankle and it swelled up really quickly to the size of a Zeppelin. A brisk, yet hoppy, visit to A&E revealed the break in the bone. This was six weeks before we would leave. Talking to the physiotherapist, she assured me that after resting it for a couple of weeks it would have been ok to start exercising the muscles around it and that cycling would be perfect as ...

November 2005 I finally bought an alloy bike with carbon forks, seatstays, chainstays. It was a Bianchi Nirone 7 with Campagnolo components, the Italian Job. At work we kept talking of more adventurous rides, of trying something that wasn't London based. With my colleagues Sam and Mike, we picked Bath. I knew the area as it was there I spent my first year in Britain back in 1990. I had mixed memories of the place. I spent a year there at the Foundation Course in Design and the architecture is remarkable. But I had my interview for the College in July 1990 at the exact time that Italy was hosting the World Cup and ironically my hometown would host Brazil (of all teams) and Scotland and the stadium was a mere 10 minute walk from my house... while I was 1,600km away of course! Back to the ride.

Affaritaliani.it : " They all drop, the only things that grow are nausea and non-voting, the only winner Matteo Salvini. And it is he, the other Matteo, the one with the earring (as opposed to Matteo Renzi, the PM), the new  phenomenon of  Italian politics. The day after the limited regional vote, in spite of partisan interpretations, like it or not this is the news." I'm puzzled by this. Salvini (of the Northern League) gets 19% of the votes in Emilia Romagna region and ZERO in Calabria, however he is hailed as the new political phenomenon. Renzi, leader of the Centre Left, receives 44.5% (49% coalition) in Emilia Romagna and 23.7% (61.4% coalition) in Calabria, yet he is the great loser.

Affaritaliani.it : "Calano tutti, cresce solo la nausea e il non-voto, vince solo Matteo Salvini. Ed è lui, l'altro Matteo, quello con l'orecchino, il nuovo fenomeno politico italiano. Il giorno dopo il mini-voto regionale, ad onta di interpretazioni di parte e interessate, volenti o nolenti è questa la notizia." Ma spiegatemi una cosa. Salvini/Lega Nord prende 19% dei voti in Emilia e ZERO in Calabria, ma viene dato come fenomeno della politica. Renzi prende 44,5% (49% in coalizione) in Emilia e 23,7% (61,4% in coalizione) in Calabria, eppure e' il grande perdente.

September 2005 By this point, 4 months into it, cycling fever had hit not only me but a few of my colleagues as well, most of whom had been riding a few years already. For that reason we decided to get together and tackle our first ‘sportive’... well, charity ride, as the choice of sportives in the UK was rather poor back then. We picked the rather tame London to Windsor Ride, starting in Richmond-upon-Thames. The course was to be around 65km, meandering through the Surrey countryside and finishing in Windsor. We met at my place in New Malden the night before and quite obviously a few bottles of wine made the rounds. We also had a good serving of pasta as we would ‘carb up’ for next day’s feat! After going to bed rather late, of course, in the morning we prepared and faffed about with the usual rituals of finding shoes, energy bars and gels, spare tubes, etc etc.

Uk bikes have front brakes on the drive side lever, continental bike the other way around. Nothing new there, cars are setup differently as well, no biggie... or is it? As a right handed person I find feathering on the breaks easier to control with my left hand as the right arm is stronger, hence my constant use of the rear brake even on descents, which is quite wrong as the bike tends to lock and skid at speed. I'm forcing myself to brake with the right hand now but it is weird. After so many years it feels as though my left arm is kept on a sling and my right arm is doing the steering and the breaking. Caliper brakes are designed to have the front brake on the left lever as the cable simply sweeps down into the slot on the right of said caliper, while from the right lever, when exiting the bar tape it has to bend a lot more to drop straight down. Conclusion, I might have to swap the cables and go 'continental'. Questions: 1. How are pros' bikes set up by th...

Having followed Felix Lowe through his blog on Eurosport for years under his pseudonym Blazin' Saddles and via his humorous yet savvy twitter account, picking his book to read over the summer was an easy choice. I was amazed to learn that, although one of the main voices in cycling in the UK, Felix had yet to turn pedals in anger prior to this adventure. This fact makes his feat, riding from Barcelona to Rome via Hannibal's Alpine route, all the more astonishing. Add to it the fact that his "rest" days were used to climb Alpe d'Huez twice in the same day, Ventoux (only once though) and various detours from the planned route, and you have a truly outstanding story. While other cycling books tend to be sensationalist with various doping tell-all blubber, this one is a refreshing account of a non-pro like any of us, albeit a lot taller than most of us. We've all spent countless hours recounting tales of pain and elation at conquering mean climbs, embarrassi...