“Do one thing every day that scares you.” (Schmich, 1997) The following essay by the American journalist and newspaper columnist Mary Schmich was originally published in the Chicago Tribune in June 1997. Although Schmich makes no reference to cycling, her outlook nevertheless captures the spirit of cycling perfectly. Every single time I contemplate riding my bicycle I feel […]
For many cycling enthusiasts conquering an ascent, whether it’s a local hill or an Alpine climb featured on the Tour de France, is the epitome of cycling. The winners of Grand Tours are often decided in the mountain stages and the title of King or Queen of the Mountains evokes the idea of an existential […]
“I’m old school and I believe that many cyclists still seek a bike that’s made to last. I continue to believe that being durable is a positively good thing!” (Andy Blance, co-founder of Thorn Cycles) The Thorn Audax is a nippy bike. It is remarkably lightweight for steel (approximately 10.9 kg) and has a gear […]
“On an antiquated, ridiculously heavy frankenstein’s monster of a bike, I rode up agonising hills and down wild descents. I was last home and felt it for days. And here’s the thing: my mind, my imagination, my sense of history and somehow my spirit of solidarity were all reinspired and reinvigorated, just as my craving […]
“Political economy came into being as a natural result of the expansion of trade, and with its appearance elementary, unscientific huckstering was replaced by a developed system of licensed fraud, an entire science of enrichment.” (Outlines of a Critique of Political Economy, Friedrich Engels, 1844) I. Brewer’s thesis Benjamin Brewer‘s paper, Commercialization in Professional Cycling 1950-2001: […]
Marx, the Wood Theft Law, and commodity fetishism While editor of the newspaper Rheinische Zeitung, Karl Marx wrote a series of articles (in 1842) about a proposal in the Rhenish provincial assembly, on behalf of the forest owners, to stop the traditional practice of gathering (dead) wood by the peasants. Here, in debating the Wood Theft Law, an […]
“The Commission did not hear from anyone credible in the sport who would give cycling a clean bill of health in the context of doping today.” (Cycling Independent Reform Commission: Report to the President of the Union Cycliste Internationale, March 2015) “he [Brian Cookson] needs to be talking about other things because this sport is not […]
“As capitalist, he is only capital personified. His soul is the soul of capital. But capital has one single life impulse, the tendency to create value and surplus-value [i.e. profit]…” (Karl Marx, “The Working Day”, Capital: Volume One) “Marx does not advance a moral ‘right’ to an unscathed existence or something similar against the impositions […]
See also my page: Sheffield Hills The end of Stage 2 of the 2014 Tour de France is an ascent of Jenkin Road in Sheffield. Here’s what cycling journalist Matt Westby says about this hill: “Sheffield’s Jenkin Road may not have the glamour of the great climbs of the Tour de France, but what it lacks […]
Anaemic On A Bike 