Welcome to your Wednesday live blog, brought to you by Jack Sexty, Simon MacMichael and contributions from the rest of the road.cc team.
Live blog: Belgian Cycling fed apologises to CX World Champ Mathieu van der Poel for fan abuse, Jeremy Vine “sick of the danger of cycling in London”, Landis Pro Cycling team to race on gravel + more
All today’s news from the site and beyond…
Wed, Feb 06, 2019 17:40
SUMMARY
6 February 2019, 17:40
Trek appoints former pro Kathryn Bertine as their Ambassador for Equality in Cycling
Big news! Proud to take on a new role & join forces w/@TrekBikes @TrekSegafredo & @TrekFactory as Trek’s Ambassador for Equality in Cycling.
Not as a racer. As a keynote speaker & activist. Which is kinda like racing. But this time, toward the finish line of equality. pic.twitter.com/fObdJF41Vo
— Kathryn Bertine (@KathrynBertine) February 5, 2019
The former Wiggle High 5 pro will now be a keynote speaker and activist for the US bike brand on equality in cycling.
6 February 2019, 17:40
Pau Sherwen memorial takes place this afternoon at Manchester Cathedral, all welcome
A Memorial Service for former professional racing cyclist and cycling commentator, Paul Sherwen will take place tomorrow (6 February) at 2.30pm. Members of the public are welcome to join Paul’s family and friends as they celebrate his life. #PaulSherwen #cyclist #cycling pic.twitter.com/Uu5XpunBHP
— Manchester Cathedral (@ManCathedral) February 5, 2019
The legendary cycling commentator will be remembered in a memorial service at 2.30pm today at Manchester Cathedral. All are welcome to join.
6 February 2019, 17:40
The popular Monsal Trail could be turned back into a railway line
Forbes online reports that the Monsal Trail in the Peak District, used by over 60,000 cyclists a year and many more walkers, could be turned back into a railway line. The Campaign for Better Transport is calling on the government to spend £4.8 billion to bring 33 former railway lines back into use, and the Monsal Trail works would take place as part of the second phase of the plans due to start in 2026. The nine mile route is hugely popular as a recreational trail, with cafe’s and bike repair shops amongst other thriving where railway stops used to be and numerous cycling, running and walking events using it each year, including the Eroica Brittania vintage bike sportive.
6 February 2019, 17:40
Maths teacher rides 488 miles in 24 hours to take world indoor cycling record
Sam Boatwright of Silsden, West Yorkshire claims to have broken a world record for the farthest distance rode on a static bike in 24 hours, riding 488 miles to eclipse the previous mark of 470 as announced on his Facebook page. Boatwright has previous for endurance challenges, having ran 50 miles a day for 50 days back in 2012, raising some £30,000 for Help the Heroes along the way according to Keighly News. His latest feat was actually a sort of insane training session for his Epic Triathlon challenge coming up this summer, where Boatwright will attempt to break records for a channel crossing, the Land’s End to John O’Groats cycle and then also attempt the running record on the way back down. It sounds extremely audacious, and if you want to sponsor him or find out more you can do so at samboatwright.com.
6 February 2019, 17:40
Re Sam Boatwright - the previous record belonged to...
Well done @sam_boatwright1 for breaking my (unofficial) 24 hour @wattbike World Record of 470 miles
— Mark Beaumont (@MrMarkBeaumont) February 3, 2019
…none other than Mark Beaumont, the fastest man to cycle around the world. His unofficial indoor record stood at 470 virtual miles before it was broken at the weekend.
6 February 2019, 17:40
G kicks off 20-19 season at Vuelta a Valencia
Nice way to start the year!! Other than the last 500m…pic.twitter.com/hlriyI4S0c
— Geraint Thomas (@GeraintThomas86) February 6, 2019
The defending Tour de France champ took part in the opening 10.2km time trial this morning, and is part of a star-studded lineup at the five stage UCI race.
6 February 2019, 17:40
Floyd's Pro Cycling announce new sponsors and an interesting race schedule, including the Dirty Kanza gravel epic
The unconventional team have now added Biemme clothing, Louis Garneau and Worthy Brewing craft beer as sponsors, and have announced they will send riders to the 200 mile Dirty Kanza gravel race and also the Leadville 100 this year. Primarily they will be competing on the UCI Continental circuit, read our full story on the new team from back in October here.
6 February 2019, 17:40
Ride London... are you in?
allot results for the 2019 Prudential RideLondon-Surrey 100 are beginning to drop…
Good luck everyone! #RideLondon pic.twitter.com/lPIFC21Dw3
— Prudential RideLondon (@RideLondon) February 6, 2019
The ballot results are starting to appear today, so keep an eye out for the post if you’ve put your name in the hat.
6 February 2019, 17:40
Charity banquet organised in memory of Italian cyclist who was killed by a lorry driver in 2016
The event which aims to raise awareness of road safety in London will take place on the 14th March, which would have been Filippo Corsini’s birthday, and all funds raised will go to the London Cycling Campaign. Corsini, an Italian prince, died after a collision with a lorry in 2016. The coroner recorded a verdict of accidental death when it was ruled the driver wouldn’t have been able to see Corsini as he overtook the HGV.
Guests will be served a spring banquet at the Petersham Nurseries Café glasshouse restaurant for the fundraiser. Tickets are £150 and available here.
6 February 2019, 17:40
Jeremy Vine posts extended footage of dangerously close white van pass on Twitter, saying he's "sick of the danger of cycling in London"
Since people asked me “what the hell was that thing with the van this morning?” here is a longer clip which shows what happened. I was saved by the lack of a manhole/pothole … always happy to get tips if you can help me stay safer on my cycle pic.twitter.com/yIdjo41UVp
— Jeremy Vine (@theJeremyVine) February 5, 2019
As we reported yesterday, the broadcaster posted some worrying footage of a white van squeezing past him in a bus lane to save himself all of half a second… and now he’s posted more footage asking Twitter just actually what he did wrong and why he should be on so much danger for cycling to work, after some of the reactions on social media to yesterday’s incident were actually critical of his riding: “why should I have to be in such danger just trying to get to work? I’m sick of the danger”, says Vine at the end of the clip.
This reply also shows us how far we have to go before we’ll all be safe on the roads…
If cyclists actually paid into the road system you might have more empathy , but you don’t , like many other virtue signalling left field groups , you want a safe space without paying for it .
— Inbalance (@Reachingout4you) February 5, 2019
Others were quick to put this confused person right, including ‘The Cycling Silk’ Martin Porter QC…
There I am afraid speaks a potential juror explaining why people are not dealt with properly for dangerous driving https://t.co/EWOxznuU3r
— Martin Porter QC (@MartinPorter6) February 6, 2019
6 February 2019, 17:40
Flectr, the brand behind aero wheel and crank reflectors, are now back on Kickstarter with high-vis rim reflectives
Due to popular demand according to Flectr themselves, they’re now crowdfunding once more for some reflective rim strips (read our review of the wheel reflectors here). They wrap around the underside of your rim so can be seen from both sides, and are super thin so they don’t affect the wheel performance. A pledge of €15 will get you one set for an estimated delivery date of April 2019, and €26 will get you two sets. It’s proved popular and they’ve already doubled their crowdfunding target, head over to the Kickstarter page if you want to back them.
6 February 2019, 17:40
New SRAM Red eTap AXS: new 12 speed groupset is here
It wasn’t exactly a secret, but now we’ve got all the juicy details… bigger cassettes, 2x and 1x and a unique flat-top chain, read all about it here.
6 February 2019, 17:40
Seville's bike lanes proving a huge success
Read more about how Seville is promoting cycling here https://t.co/THsdOGWfxQ @cycling pic.twitter.com/HoDurIXDhh
— UCI (@UCI_cycling) February 6, 2019
The UCI reports that the introduction of bike lanes in the city over the last 15 years has transformed the city’s previously clogged up streets. Manuel Calvo, a consultant for the team behind the Plan de la Bicicleta de Sevilla, said of the transformation:
“It was risky, but now I advise all local governments to deliver bike projects in the first two years of office. You have to do everything in the first two years. It starts working and then people see it works and are supportive of what you did.
“It’s not expensive infrastructure. We have a metro line that cost €800 million. It serves 44,000 trips a day. With bikes we are serving 67,000 trips a day.”
6 February 2019, 17:40
Belgian federation apologises to Mathieu van der Poel for abuse by fans
Belgian Cycling has apologised for the way some of the country’s fans who travelled to the UCI Cyclo-cross World Championships in Bogense, Denmark at the weekend treated the winner of the men’s elite race, Mathieu van der Poel of the Netherlands.
The Dutchman reclaimed the title he won for the first time in 2015 and denied his great rival Wout Van Aert of Belgium a fourth successive rainbow jersey – although the victor was reportedly the target of abusive gestures and even had beer thrown at him.
Belgium’s national governing body for cycling said in a statement that it “strongly supports the internationalisation of cyclo-cross. That is why it is unfortunate that we noticed that some spectators – luckily, a small minority – do not share the same view. Unsporting and insulting behaviour doesn’t favour anyone, and certainly not the Belgian delegation.”
The statement continued: “The fact that our riders had to concede the title to Mathieu van der Poel on Sunday afternoon, after a sporting battle with a perfectly correct race, is part of the laws of the sport. For Belgian Cycling, the Dutchman won the world title.
“We sincerely congratulate Mathieu van der Poel, not only for the way in which he got his second world title, but also for all his great performances during the past months.”
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Jack is group editor across road.cc, off.road.cc and ebiketips, overseeing all three sites in the F-At Digital group to make sure everything’s up to scratch. He’s been writing about cycling and multisport for over a decade, arriving at road.cc via 220 Triathlon Magazine in 2017. He worked across all areas of road.cc including tech, news and video, and also contributed to eBikeTips before being named editor of road.cc in 2021 (much to his surprise). Jack has been hooked on cycling since his student days, and currently has a Trek 1.2 for winter riding, a beloved Bickerton folding bike for getting around town, and an extra beloved custom Ridley Helium SLX for fantasising about going fast in his stable. Jack has never won a bike race, but does have a master’s degree in print journalism, and two Guinness World Records for pogo sticking (it’s a long story).
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Latest Comments
hawkinspeter 1 minute ago
Regulation isn't required for the illegal e-motorbike issues - they're already illegal to use on the roads/pavements, so it's a question of enforcement. Tougher (or at least some) traffic law enforcement is required, but the police should focus on the biggest problems which to my mind are drivers who are not paying attention or speeding etc.
mdavidford 4 minutes ago
I think that's a crown farthing, isn't it?
chrisonabike 11 hours ago
"All that's required is an to roads policing" - that's a big all... Although no doubt the "idiots just keep coming" aspect does apply: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cz9lel2wz93o "Man charged after car crashes through bowling alley" - luckily they only skittled over skittles.
chrisonabike 11 hours ago
Almost any change to roads and streets is accompanied by a period of heightened danger, and in the UK "look out for cyclists" will need to be learned... practically. And over the time it takes for cyclists to become a regular feature. OTOH once (if...) good designs are in and frequent enough such that drivers encounter them AND the cyclists on them regularly (another big if) I don't think they should be much more difficult than a footway to deal with. These things are all over NL - don't have the collision stats but they should. (NL isn't perfect but collecting info on the safety of designs to feed back into better designs as required is part of the "sustainable safety" philosophy - if they're really a killer I think they'd be altering these.)
wtjs 12 hours ago
I'm in the happy position of agreeing with everybody here! I've never considered a bike with a stand, yet I'm impressed by the ingenuity and adaptability of this axle. I tow a Yak Bob with a Robert Axle, employing my El Cheapo Vitus gravel bike and I just have to be very careful where I stop. Hedges are generally a dead loss, and I seek walls, telegraph poles and signposts and generally lean the widest part of the Bob against it. One very awkward task is removing the two steel pins which lock the trailer arms onto the special mounting slots on the Robert axle, and when you have one out, the sodding weight in the trailer can twist the whole caboodle and bend the Bob fitting before you can get the other out and unhitch. I doubt if a stand would help with that. You can imagine that this combo is a real pain when you have to get it over the bridge at railway stations, and it nearly resulted in Merseyrail nearly parting me and the trailer on the platform from the bike on the train. It's a long story for another time. Another axle example recently featured on here, with a 12mm front axle bearing the Herculean weight limit of a monster American front rack.
HoarseMann 14 hours ago
This has nothing to do with the type of bike - it's the type of behaviour that's the problem. Banning the sale of such bikes will not curtail the behaviour. They'll just find another type of vehicle and continue to drive dangerously as there's such a lack of enforcement. I'd sooner see them ban the bally. But really, all that's required is an improvement to roads policing.
AidanR 14 hours ago
The EAPC Bill is welcome, but full of holes. What's to stop an overpowered but temporarily limited e-bike being sold and subsequently delimited? This is often a trivial process.
Sredlums 15 hours ago
@KiwiMike Yeah, in my over four decades of riding all over Europe I've never 'been for a ride in the countryside'. That must be it. Or, and I know this is a wild concept, you just accept that I just voiced my personal experiences and never missed a kickstand, like I wrote. Anyway, what's the big horror of laying your bike on its side for the very few occasions where there is nothing to lean your bike against?
mdavidford 15 hours ago
They may have looked, but did they see?
jackcycles 16 hours ago
Ds2025: where they are going wrong is that they are crushing the motorbike rather than the person sat on top of it. If they did the latter this issue would be solved in less than 24 hours.
9 thoughts on “Live blog: Belgian Cycling fed apologises to CX World Champ Mathieu van der Poel for fan abuse, Jeremy Vine “sick of the danger of cycling in London”, Landis Pro Cycling team to race on gravel + more”
It isn’t only cyclists who
It isn’t only cyclists who don’t get justice in our legal system. Two pedestrians mown down by a driver high on canabis and he can’t even be named because he’s got rich parents, both police, and he’s under 18. https://metro.co.uk/2019/01/30/son-wealthy-couple-killed-two-audi-crash-cant-name-8416176/?ito=article.tablet.share.bottom.twitter
We seriously need a thorough review of road laws.
burtthebike wrote:
WTF he didn’t even get charged with any “Death by … Driving” offences, despite both dying instantly, that looks awfy like some serious strings being pulled in my simple thinking
As for not naming him, is that not the norm when under 18
EK Spinner wrote:
For anyone who has low blood pressure, these are pertinent quotes from the Metro’s article:
1.
“The court heard how the boy had even been stopped by police just weeks before the tragic crash and had also been at the wheel after taking cannabis.
The youth was awaiting a hearing before magistrates when he knocked down and killed two men who were crossing a road to return to a hotel.
The JPs were told that the boy, who lives with his family in a £1 million home in affluent Ascot, Berkshire, had admitted a charge of driving a motor vehicle with a proportion of a specified controlled drug above the specified limit.”
2.
“He was given a 24-month supervision order, a £105 fine, which his parents said they would pay, and banned from driving for two years.”
3.
“Sentencing the boy, presiding magistrate Penny Wood said: ‘We need to tell you that our initial thinking was to sentence you into custody. It can’t be right to drive your car and knock down two people, innocent pedestrians and kill them.
‘However, there are no charges in relation to the standard of your driving on that day. But we can begin by saying so it can be heard by anyone in the court, that we take this extremely seriously.’”
brooksby wrote:
What the actual shit?
Should be a lifetime driving ban at the very least. Driving is a privilege and that kidult should not be given another chance to kill. However “privilege” does come from “private law”, and that’s clearly what’s at play here.
burtthebike wrote:
Absurd that a 17-year-old can legally drive but can’t legally be named when he screws-up with the car. Utterly inconsistent. If you aren’t adult enough to be identified, you aren’t adult enough to be trusted with a motorised vehicle.
They should either raise one age or lower the other.
Also, it’s another case to compare-and-contrast with the Alliston one. Double the number of fatalities, but no custodial sentence. And ‘cannibis’ seems on a par with ‘no front brake’ as far as compounding factors go.
What proud parents they must
What proud parents they must be…
or maybe they are just pig, scum in uniforms.
The Flectr rim reflectives
The Flectr rim reflectives are overpriced and similar to an Instagram ad I saw a few months back which gave me an idea for something similar. I purchased 1m of 50mm diamond grade white reflective tape and cut it into 40mm lengths and bent them in half and stuck them on my front rim exaclty like the Flectr idea, total cost £3. Diamond grade reflective is what they use on the side of vehicles so will long lasting.
Riding on the road is
Riding on the road is wonderful until, in one moment is spoilt or destroyed.
I had a lovely 80miler ride last year in the summer on my own. I went early to miss traffic and arrived at my cafe. On my return the wind was on my back the sun was shining, a lovely relaxed ride until 6 miles from home where I had to use a 1 mile section of A road. I was welcomed with a driver flying passed @60mph with 6 inch gap between my elbow and his wing mirror. Whole ride spoilt because of this punishment pass.
There is a massive boom with indoor training, wonder why?
Ride London yet again
Ride London yet again informing people of rejection by sending out a load of unwanted paper bumph, despite being asked not to on my application.
Apparently, I can still get a place if I raise an unfeasibly large amount of money for a mainstream charity. Got to fund the CEO’s salary somehow, I suppose. No thanks, would rather do ten rides for my local hospice instead.