Tag: British Competition Records

One of the men who has helped a lot of top Aussie riders progress is a certain Dave Sanders – but Mr. Sanders isn’t just a man who has read a lot of books and can work a laptop. He was a hard riding man in his day – back in the 70’s he raced in the UK in the Archer Road Club’s famous ‘Aussie Squad’ with Bradley’s dad, Gary Wiggins and recent VeloVeritas interview subject Murray Hall. Here’s his tale...

I forgot to say last night, for the first time in this Tour, I got a prediction right. I chose Casar out of the four man break, you could see it in his eyes, he wanted it more than any of the others. There's a great picture of him on the front cover of L'Equipe today - it's all there in his face, determination and pride; "maybe the other French guys can't win a stage, but I sure as hell can!" Cafè au lait (have you noticed that Mertin has shown me how to get accents above the letters now?) and a Cognac, nine euros!?! "Eef you cannot steeff les touristes, then oo' can you steeff, hien?" Still, it was a good coffee, a grande measure of cognac and the toilets were free of Lasa Fever.

It's 9.30 and I'm just up, Kris sleeps in the camper van. He says it's more comfortable, but I think it's because I snore so badly. It was interesting at breakfast today; the guys were talking about what they did before they were full-time pro cyclists.

My buddy, John Hardie is a 65 time Scottish grass track champion; his hero 'back in the day' was Danny Clark. When he heard that 'Six Day King' Danny Clark and me were breakfasting together at Copenhagen, it wasn't long before the email arrived with the questions he wanted me to ask the great man.

In a solid 12th place at the British Road Race Championships in Lincoln was 21 year-old Scot, Sean Flynn, riding for top Dutch development team SEG Racing, in what was one of the team’s last races before sadly, it folded. We caught up with Sean not long after another fine ride, this time in the last race of the European season, the  188.5 kilometre UCI 1.1 Ronde van Drenthe.

Two riders away all day from kilometre zero, they get caught with six K to go, Giant dominates the finale, Kittel wins. And that was that – but ah, yes, it did rain for the finish. I guess the boys deserve a bit of R & R after yesterday’s mini-Ardennes death race - but a two man break holding the 194 man peloton off until they could almost hear the finish flag flapping? But as they say in the USA; ‘KUDOS’ to Bideau and Barta showing those Pro Tour wheels suckers how it’s done.