barry

petro

Got to get your Petro designed 'Worms' t-shirt. Available here.

not minor but...

...Major. 

style and substance

After reading the Richard Williams piece in the Guardian this week about the Velodromo Vigorelli, I found these photos of Fausto Coppi on said track among my collection of cycling images. Seeing them again reminds me exactly of why I first became fascinated by a cyclist that I am too young to have ever seen race. In fact, it was the image that came first, a black and white photo of a man who encapsulated style, who had an effortless cool that was timeless and who had that something else too, that thing you can't quite put into words. Seeing a picture of Coppi before I knew it was him, what I did know was that he would always look 'right', on the bike and off, transcending time and trends and fashion in a way that very few can ever do. But icons need to be multidimensional and road racing is an unforgiving pursuit that never actually gave a flying fuck about style. It is us the cyclists who covet it. Obsess about it even. Pros too of course. "Who's got the best style?" is always a valid question. Just one that the record books, the top of the mountain pass and the finish line never bother with. So I was glad that when I began to find out all I could about Coppi, his palmares, the nature of many of his wins, his entire story more than matched the images that I couldn't get enough of. Style AND substance. A rare combination indeed.

embrocation props

I'm not sure if anyone, outside of a very small circle that comprises of my girlfriend, my brother and a couple of friends, reads my blog. But I'm guessing that if they (you?) do, then they (you?) are already well aware of embrocation cycling journal, in both its print and online form. I've been a fan for a while now but have stupidly yet to buy a copy, relying instead on embrocation's online presence, in the form of an always excellent website that recently went pro, a blog and plenty of twitter tweets. As a print obsessive, I need to get hold of the mag and cannot think of  a single reason why I haven't done this already. The point of this post however was to mention that there is a nice little interview with embrocation's creator Jeremy Dunn here. Lots of DPS teasers from the latest issue accompany the interview too, where I learned that both of Jeremy's parents were teachers, just as mine were. Nice.

velodromo vigorelli

There's a nice piece on the Guardian's sports blog today about Milan's legendary velodrome. Written by Richard Williams, it's well worth a read.  

six-day