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higher calling road cycling's obsession with the mountains. max leonard yellow jersey press hardback. 325pp illus. £16.99

"But even if you do 'get it', it's not all that clear what you actually 'get'

higher calling - max leonard

there is a rationale to be applied here, but i'm not altogether sure that it will provide the results ultimately desired. you see, as a sub-culture of the human race, cyclists, though occupying a small portion of the whole, are something of an oddity. it is, however, an observation that rings true only from the outside looking in; from our point of view, everything appears just ginger peachy; normality rules ok.

but, to return, albeit briefly, to that rational thought process, a group of blokes and/or blokesses dressed to the nines in bright polyester, lycra or perchance sportwool, often old enough to know better and riding on plastic bikes in close formation, probably isn't the sort behaviour one expects demonstrated in public. delving further into this subculture only makes matters worse. an early morning changing routine in village halls, before steaming full throttle across an out and back distance of ten miles or above is surely not normal? and that's to say nothing of those intent on defying gravity ever upwards on bicycles with every extra gram excised when there is actually no real need to do so.

there will be many reading this review who still wonder what all the fuss is about. how does the above constitute a social oddity? isn't everyone else just out of step?

ultimately, that may be the unsaid, unwritten conclusion of max leonard's excellent and well-researched book higher calling. part of that conclusion seems based on a degree of pragmatism. as eccles, from goons was once quoted as saying "everybody got to be somewhere.". thus mr leonard's personal predilection for riding uphill can be logically justified.

"I'm naturally a skinny person, so as a bike rider I'm never going to win a sprint and I'm not built for the cobbled Classics of northern France and Belgium."

and perhaps that's the simplest solution to the conundrum; that those of us who absolutely must ride our bikes, have need of a higher purpose (pun not intended), a purpose that can be most readily equated to our own physical disposition. personally, i used to figure i could climb and to a certain extent that's at least partially true. but the perennial need to plough into rain inflected galeforce winds has brought on delusions of rouleurship

as they say, each to his own.

however, it seems that mr leonard is not entirely satisfied with this simplest of answers and has need of exploring further the desire to ride a bike uphill for as long and as fast as each of us is possible. because, think what you might, it's still not normal behaviour; well, not by normal standards.

max leonard spends the opening chapter atop europe's highest paved road, on the col de la bonette. strangely, for a committed and self-admitted grimpeur leonard does not have pedalling as his principal purpose. on this occasion he has joined the task force whose job it is to keep the upper reaches clear of snow. boiling water for a cup of tea...

"It had taken a long time to heat. We're at 2,715 metres and although that means water will boil at lower temperatures (around 90 degrees C at these heights) the altitude means the gas pressure is low and the stove's flame weak."

he then goes on to demonstrate a grasp of reality by the authorities that perhaps does not match with the distinctly not average velocipedinist.

"They are places that can be said only properly to be there for four or five months of the year. In Europe's highest mountains, if a climb doesn't lead somewhere important ... then most of the time ... it is shut."

of course, the fact that the french authorities deem it prudent to finance the annual snow clearance of several of the country's highest peaks and passes can hardly be listed as justification for uphill bike riding. in mitigation, max leonard makes no attempt to do so. however, in a welcome detour round the ultimate objective of higher calling, he lays to rest the myth that climbs in the tour de france were categorised according to how easily they could be negotiated in a citroen 2cv.

"...it was only upon the race's resumption in 1947 that the mountains were divided into categories. However, this is still a year before the advent of the 2CV..."

despite mr leonard's admission that mountain cycling is amongst his most favoured reasons for riding a bicycle, like most of us, he has at least the perspicacity to realise that those who do so for a living are several orders of magnitude better at it than he, you or i. in an effort to gauge this difference in physical ability, he enlists the expertise of cannondale-garmin (as was) professional and good friend, joe dombrowski.

"Joe, while not a native of the Andes - he's from Virginia - is lucky enough to be good at high altitudes."

however, lest you think max is an obsessive drawn to the sporting and faux sporting aspects of uphill, chapter nine, entitled counting sheep would disavow you of that misapprehension. for my money, this chapter is the book's crowning glory, describing as it does a slowly departing world existing at altitude, one that has little or nothing to do with bicycles. the chapter also allows mr leonard to exercise his undoubted ability as a wordsmith.

"Distant reliefs fade, become silhouettes, and the pale concrete of the Second World War bunkers that litter the desolate ridges starts to shine."

for while we ruminate over the whys and wherefores of selecting the inner ring and one of the rear wheel's larger cogs in the search for legendary status in our own lunchtimes, there are people for whom altitude is a way of life. for them, george mallory's oft quoted reply when asked why he climbed everest, "because it's there", holds a greater level of truth than it did for mallory. and in an increasingly technological and economically obsessed world which includes carbon fibre and electric gears, that way of life has already diminished.

leonard's portrayal in this manner is exemplary.

max's writing style is comfortably self-deprecating, often humorous and a bit of a breeze to get along with. there's a not indistinct possibility that, in setting out to examine the cyclists' reasons for riding up very tall european mountains, he actually poses more questions than provides answers. but, to be perfectly honest, that cheers me no end. i can think of nothing more disappointing to have the essence of grimpeurship defined socially, mathematically or even worse, by the strictures of rational logic.

if there was a definable answer, that it was the butler who actually did it, i'm glad i missed that. in this particular instance, the ride was far more interesting, intriguing and enjoyable than any preconceived destination that may have been expected at the journey's start. higher calling is probably a dark horse for sports book of the year award.

wednesday 24 may 2017

twmp ..........................................................................................................................................................................................................