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  1. #1 le tour!!!! 
    grumpy old sod jape's Avatar
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    How many of you are as mad as I am and watch le tour de france every year on TV? It is late night early hours of the morning here but I cannot stop myself. I used to ride a lot in Europe, these guys are just a phenomenon of fitness and skill. Yes, professional cycling is commercial, year round, but bloody hell, three weeks and whatever your discipline of cycling you have to go up (and down) bloody great mountains, across cobbles, sprint, time trial, all within a percentage of time. I find it amazing, inspiring and fascinating. Before I did my back in I used to cycle the whole four hour length of the broadcast on my exercise bike! Now I just sit on the couch with a sandwich and a drink and a cigar but I can still dream!
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  2. #2 Re: le tour!!!! 
    Senior C-Moto Guru euphonius's Avatar
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    Heartily agree, though watching the tour here in China is probably less satisfying for armchair expats than for you in Oz or elsewhere. First, the broadcast is not in realtime, but in excerpts that start after midnight, and of course the commentary is in Chinese. Perhaps there are some satellite channels carrying the tour in real time, but international satellite TV is still highly restricted. Here in Shanghai, you can get a dish and receiver for various services originating outside China, and buy a black-market "cracked" card to decode the signal. But the providers are always updating their encryption, so your card may last anywhere from a month to a half year. I did this for a while but almost never turned the TV on, so I've stopped. Now my only choice is CCTV, also known as the throat and tongue of the C*mmunist P*rty.

    So I try to follow via latour.com and other websites, but it's not quite the same to see little stick-figure animations showing the status of riders in the peloton.

    I still cycle daily in Shanghai, using the bicycle to go almost everywhere. I save the Jialing for forays out of town.
    jkp
    Shanghai
    2010 JH600 "Merkin Muffley" (in Shanghai)
    2000 KLR650 "Feezer Ablanalp" (in California)
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  3. #3 Re: le tour!!!! 
    Moto Scholar moilami's Avatar
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    Oh come on give me a break. Runners and bicyclist are the most crazy people I know! I have never ever understood how they can run or drive the bicycle like they do, it is something totally unbeliavable, yet I respect them highly for being able to do so. Anyway, I don't want to watch them from TV, my head begins to hurt enough seeing them in real on the road where I don't have a choise to not see them.
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  4. #4 Re: le tour!!!! 
    grumpy old sod jape's Avatar
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    I admit to crazy, until I smashed my back I ran 10km daily and cycled for many years so I have done plenty of it Mikko, it is exhilarating to cycle freely through the countryside (or cities as JK does and beat the traffic), and truly once you get fit you don't feel it! In my next life I am going to be a tri-athlete and small plane pilot.
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  5. #5 Re: le tour!!!! 
    C-Moto Guru milton's Avatar
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    I used to do a lot of cycling in and around New England. I had a racing bike, always helmeted and with cleats. After a brief spring break-in, we usually do a century over weekends in summer. New England is hilly but very scenic. Flat tire is the only annoying thing about the sport.
    Paddling strenuously on a bike for over 45 minutes you surely reach a "runner's high" quickly without too much stress on your knees. It is highly addictive. On a motorbike, you get a sore back. :-)
    A while ago almost purchased a folding bike. The scheme was to escape quickly out of Shanghai in a car with the folding bike in the trunk and bike around after reaching a scenic spot. Then I discovered a motorcycling/touring crowd in Shanghai and joined them. Only motorcycling ever since.
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  6. #6 Re: le tour!!!! 
    grumpy old sod jape's Avatar
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    Yeah, when I was a kid in the sixties, everyone boy or girl had a pushbike and we all rode them to school and everywhere. never thought of walking. Safer world. Thus we never had that adult fear of effort and stayed fit for years. We all built our own from parts at the dump or did paper rounds and so on to buy a good one later. I still remember fixing a folded piece of cardboard to the front fork with a clothes peg so it buzzed as I rode, placing ball bearings into grease, learning about derailleurs for the first time and the invention of bloody quick release wheel fittings your mates would kick surreptitiously as they went past in cross-country race, so you lost your wheel on the next bump ... aaah nostalgia. Nowdays my heart pumps wildly and my back goes into spasms before I get to the end of my bumpy 80 meter driveway and I turn round and go home.

    I went around parts of France, Belgium, Luxembourg, Germany, Holland when I was 15/16 with a couple of mates, staying in Youth Hostels and so on for six weeks. an adventure on a very few bucks! A few hills made us walk and a few headwinds or rain made us stop for a rest. Met up with 16 year old girls on bikes too ... woohoo. No hurry, no cost almost. I think you could still do similar today in some parts but hey, most people wouldn't be able to do a kilometer without a heart attack these days, too unfit. And in most countries the roads are full of idiots.
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  7. #7 Re: le tour!!!! 
    Senior C-Moto Guru euphonius's Avatar
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    Ah, nostalgia!

    Jape's and Milton's experiences are pretty similar to mine in northern California, and I think it's an excellent point that an early life suffused with bicycling indeed left "our generation" with a notion that great distances could be covered with human energy. I never, ever gave a second thought to riding 30 or 40 or 50 miles (aka 80 km) to go somewhere, and would occasionally cycle the 100km to the Golden Gate Bridge and into San Francisco. In those days we wore helmets only when racing, but these were little more than leather hairnets.

    Today's young people see the world in very different terms. My nieces and nephews would never go anywhere unless there's someone to drive them, and because of this their bodies will consider sustained physical effort to be exceptional, rather than ordinary. I fear this will not do them any favors as they age. Not that I'm some hardbody triathlete; in fact I'm a bit soft around the belly and a few kg over what I should be. But I can still swim 3000m in under an hour, and shame pretty much everyone else in the pool, regardless of age (ah, modesty!). And I can present myself pretty much anywhere in Shanghai, a city of maybe 25 million, in an hour of riding or less; most rides are in the 25-35 minute range, and I do these without a second thought, even on hot or rainy days. Jape's comments prompt me to realize that very, very, very few people, particularly "today's youth," would consider a 35-minute ride by bicycle to be a reasonable thing to do. For me it's sheer joy, followed by a great sense of accomplishment.

    Incidentally, and this surely counts as making a virtue of necessity, cycling safely but quickly through traffic is an exhilarating experience that can be compared to downhill skiing, whitewater kayaking and maybe even some types of motorsport. Traffic flows very much like water, though it provides no cushion when you hit it. You need a heightened sense of attention, monitoring scores if not hundreds of vehicles all moving in their own space at their own speed around you, each piloted by a driver lost in his own world of thought, experience, behavior, and mood. To be able to "read the water" is a refined art that comes only with years and years of experience. As I pedal, I often sense local riders trying to keep pace with me, and sometimes they can offer a burst of power that exceeds mine. But inevitably, my experience and ability to read the traffic gets the best of them, and I leave them panting in my dust. Fitness matters, and I work hard to keep mine, but often nothing counts more than one's ability to read instantly the constantly changing opportunities and threats and risks that traffic poses. It's a lovely sport, city riding, and a practical one at that.

    One of these days I'll post some helmet video of me shooting the rapids down Huashan Lu into Xujiahui!

    And finally, Le Tour! Spurred by Jape, I watched a bit of tape-delay coverage of Stage 5 this morning, and what a thrill. I'd hate to think what would happen if one went down, but the helicopters are making video coverage absolutely sensational. The filming is getting better and better. I love when the chopper flies low over a field along the course, and zooms in tight almost at ground level while moving along at the same speed as the peloton. And I love the shots taken from above the peloton, especially when it meets a traffic circle and half the riders go right while the other half go left, only to merge again on the other side. Having ridden in a peloton many times, it's astonishing to have this birds-eye view showing how the peloton is like a single, living organism. And I love when a chopper hovers over some local castle or other landmark, and the narrator -- an authoritative sportscaster called Sun Yan -- gives a nice bit of history and context.

    And then there are the motorcycles! What a lark to be a Tour de France mobile videographer, shooting from pillion on what look to be very nice big bimmers. The shots they give are amazing, and get us right into the thick of the peloton or a breakaway.

    Where was le Tour before helicopters, motorcycles and high-speed wireless broadcasting? These have made the sport truly a treat for a worldwide audience!

    One more word on CCTV's announcer, Sun Yan. She's been announcing the Tour for CCTV for many years now, and surely must rank as one of the most influential sports broadcasters anywhere, reaching an audience in the tens of not hundreds of millions every day for a whole month. She rarely appears in camera, but her voice is one of cool and uncompromising authority. It's a real testament to CCTV that they rely on her, year in and year out. Here's her glamshot from CCTV's Tour website.

    Last edited by euphonius; 07-08-2010 at 08:22 AM.
    jkp
    Shanghai
    2010 JH600 "Merkin Muffley" (in Shanghai)
    2000 KLR650 "Feezer Ablanalp" (in California)
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  8. #8 Re: le tour!!!! 
    grumpy old sod jape's Avatar
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    That is a classy lady, and I mean that in the best way, she has that age-old imperial look, not that it would be an asset in that way these days!
    We do have fun we older buggers, you with the downhill and me with the Kangaroo slalom! (thanks to Craig for that term, I like it)
    Thanks for the story mate, enjoyed reading it. I am glad that you enjoyed stage 5, clever lad, time travel eh, hope you placed a bet on it then! It was stage 4 mate! Relatively slow and normal - you should have seen the one the day before on the pave'!
    Last edited by jape; 07-08-2010 at 08:32 AM.
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  9. #9 Re: le tour!!!! 
    Moto Scholar moilami's Avatar
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    It is funny to see how "universal" kids can be around the world. I can very well relate to what Jape wrote. When I was a kid we did all the same things (except did not travel to Europe with bicycles), though we never wore helmets. None wore helmets when bicycling in those times. The bicycle was faster than going by foot. That's it what it was. And hell yeah thanks of the nostalgia shot Jape. Curiously enough by the way novadays I don't do bicycling because it is too fast. Haven't done in many years. If I want to go slow and silently I go by foot.
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  10. #10 Re: le tour!!!! 
    SabineHartmann SabineHartmann's Avatar
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    hey Moilami, no offence, I always read you writing about tours, but when will we see pictures of your ride through Finland?
    this face you show on your profile is not you,
    after 241 posts it is time now!!!!!
    with courious greetings from Beijing
    Sabine
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