Welcome to Wednesday’s live blog, with Jack Sexty, Simon MacMichael and the rest of the team.
Live blog: “When I die” – ex-pro Phil Gaimon’s powerful YouTube film about vulnerability of cyclists; Horrific TdF crash; fallout from THAT Channel 5 documentary + more
All today’s news from the site and beyond…
Wed, Jul 10, 2019 17:26
SUMMARY
10 July 2019, 17:26
RuPaul, the unlikely active travel advocate
You’re not stuck in traffic, you are the traffic. pic.twitter.com/nXQlBPImEy
— RuPaul (@RuPaul) July 9, 2019
The most famous of all drag queens provided this helpful reminder on his Twitter account yesterday, hopefully opening the eyes of some of his million-plus followers. Wonder if he dresses down to cycle through NYC?
10 July 2019, 17:26
The #BottleCapChallenge and bikes
If you aren’t familiar, this latest online challenge requires the nominee to remove a bottle cap, usually with a roundhouse kick, with the full bottle still left standing. A few cyclists have been taking it to the next level though, including the girl off of skipping/juggling/bunny-hopping on rollers Ruby Isaac…
#bottletopchallenge on another level @KWALANDA look at this.. #k24sportshub @K24Tv pic.twitter.com/Zj6hSqGOs4
— Kinyua Babake Reagan. (@kinyua_kinyuaji) July 8, 2019
Meanwhile… #bottletopchallenge #BottleCapChallenge Thanks to the steady hand of @AdamBlythe89 for helping make this happen. And to @Eurosport_UK for the polo top and natty cap. I just felt good, had proper warm up plus I was orange belt at judo in 1983. pic.twitter.com/dvYdM4eRMl
— Matt Stephens (@RealStephens) July 9, 2019
10 July 2019, 17:26
Breaking: cyclists aren't the scourge of the streets
So it turns out the ‘documentary’ on Channel 5 last night was so poorly executed it’s not really worth giving it any more publicity (a colleague commented that he suspects more journalists than regular viewers actually bothered to watch the whole thing), but here’s a select few relevant tweets that we liked instead…
Here I am, scourge of the streets. With my bananas (underripe), bread (medium-sliced), and milk (semi-skimmed).#scourgeofthestreets pic.twitter.com/wu0tJcOR5A
— Dave Walker (@davewalker) 9 July 2019
Sad to hear the dangerous nonsense being broadcast on @channel5_tv. People who ride bikes aren’t the ‘scourge of the streets’. They’re Mums, Dads & kids helping make the UK a healthier & more liveable place. Pls share my friend @Chris_Boardman’s video to send C5 a v clear message https://t.co/vbj6ZQO6BS
— Will Norman (@willnorman) 9 July 2019
I invite anyone involved in the making of this gammontastic incitement to vehicular violence to join us on bikes & show us how not to be a scourge. How about 8am on Wednesday, as your riled-up viewers angrily drive to work? Hang your heads in shame, you specious shitmunchers.
— Prestwich Pootler (@pootlers) 9 July 2019
From the same people who brought you “Can’t Pay, We’ll Take It Away”, a programme dedicated to humiliating people whilst they struggle with debt problems.
The whole network is trash! Poorly made filler TV to appease red-faced gammons balancing their dinner on their beer bellies— Emily⚡️ (@just_barely) 9 July 2019
10 July 2019, 17:26
Would-be Scourge of the Streets participant David Brennan reveals why he declined the invitation
Please don’t watch @channel5_tv programme tonight about cyclists & drivers. If you feel the need to watch it, keep this comment in mind from Firecracker Development Producer when she tried to get me to take part: ‘I totally understand that it’s far more nuanced than an Us V Them’
— David Brennan (@magnatom) 9 July 2019
Brennan co-founded the Scottish cycle advocacy group Pedal on Parliament, and has outlined why he refused to appear on the show last night while sending Firecracker Films a quick email…
I have sent the following email to @FirecrackerFilm…. Hi xx
I thought I would message you tonight following your, Cyclists :Scourge of the Streets? programme. I wonder if, following tonight’s programme, you can justify trying to involve me in it using the following statements:
— David Brennan (@magnatom) 9 July 2019
10 July 2019, 17:26
Le handlebar jaune...
Yellow handlebar for the Yellow Jersey, @alafpolak1.
Une guidoline jaune pour le Maillot Jaune. #TDF2019 pic.twitter.com/2JjYXmp9q7
— Tour de France™ (@LeTour) July 10, 2019
10 July 2019, 17:26
Maurten release unbranded sponsor-friendly packaged products
So, you’ve turned up to your cat3 Tuesday night crit race, but your sponsor’s energy product just isn’t going to deliver you to the sprint finish in optimal condition. You can’t be seen with a rival’s better product, but you need those BC points. Oh, the conundrum! Maurten might just have the unbranded answer to your problems.
They’ve just released their Hydrogel drink in completely unbranded packaging, which they say will help pro athletes (and you) to subtly use their product without annoying any sponsors.
It reminds us of the time that Castelli sold a ‘Pro Edition’ of the Gabba, which came with a black Sharpie so that you could black out the logos.
Need to get your hands on some of this unofficial stash? Thankfully, you don’t need to turn to the dark web, you can get them here.
10 July 2019, 17:26
Horrific crash for Cofidis rider Pierre-Luc Périchon as he hits bollards and is sent over the handlebars
Thankfully, no serious damage done in this crash for@PerichonPLuc @TeamCOFIDIS – captured by a camera on team-mate @Natnaelb2‘s bike on #TDF2019 Stage 4 pic.twitter.com/2XdlsmoC4B
— Velon CC (@VelonCC) July 9, 2019
In this video captured by an on-bike camera belonging to his teammate Natnael Berhane, Périchon fails to see the warning sign held up by a marshal ahead of the bollard in the middle of the road… and is sent flying over the handlebars. Berhane was also knocked off, unable to avoid Périchon or his wayward bike.
Velon say no serious damage was done, and indeed both riders managed to continue and finish the stage. With Jakob Fulgsang coming off the worst from the numerous crashes we’ve had so far in the early stages of this year’s Tour, we’ll be hoping for an incident-free stage five, a 175km hilly jaunt from Saint-Dié-des-Vosges to Colmar. Less than an hour into the stage, a four-man breakaway has emerged featuring Tim Wellens and Simon Clarke, with a 1:40mins lead over the peloton at the time of writing…
137 KM
The peloton trails by 1’40” approaching the first challenge of the day: the Côte de Grendelbruch.
Le peloton compte 1’40” de retard à l’approche de la première difficulté du jour, la Côte de Grendelbruch.#TDF2019 pic.twitter.com/2AKslgBJBm— Tour de France (@LeTour) July 10, 2019
10 July 2019, 17:26
Bike parking boost for London
With cycling at record levels, @willnorman and @TfL today announced a £2.5m funding boost to meet the growing demand for cycle parking. 1,400 new spaces will be created in residential areas over the coming year, along with upgraded cycle parking outside at least 10 stations pic.twitter.com/IZJo7oXyWJ
— Mayor’s Press Office (@LDN_pressoffice) July 10, 2019
1,400 new spaces were announced today by Will Norman and Transport for London.
10 July 2019, 17:26
No pasta??
Dinner tweet! stage 4: avocado, beetroot, falafel salad – roasted chicken, dried fruits, grilled pumpkin, gnocchi – polkadot cheesecake. #TDF2019 pic.twitter.com/fWM3zVvRkT
— Thomas De Gendt (@DeGendtThomas) July 9, 2019
This doesn’t look like what we’d imagine your typical post-stage refuel for Tour de France riders to look like – although we could definitely go for multiple portions of that polka dot cheesecake…
10 July 2019, 17:26
Dunoon Dirt Dash brings a new gravel event to Argyll
Dunoon Presents and Wild About Argyll team up to bring a new gravel bikepacking event to Dunoon on Scotland’s Adventure Coast in September. The Dunoon Dirt Dash is a 2 day, one night, reliability trial presented by Charlie Hobbs and Markus Stitz. off-road.cc have all the details here.
10 July 2019, 17:26
Going full gas...
We were completely confused by this initially, but on further inspection it appears to be an exploding CO2 canister that caused this unfortunate triathlon transition.
10 July 2019, 17:26
Peter Sagan wins stage 5
Victory for @petosagan!
Victoire de Peter Sagan ! #TDF2019 pic.twitter.com/y2tTt5rG6s— Tour de France (@LeTour) July 10, 2019
His first stage of this year’s tour – full story to follow.
10 July 2019, 17:26
Katusha-Alpecin to fold - riders reportedly told to look for new contracts after TDF stage 4 last night
According to L’equipe, the team members were informed last night that they should start looking for new contracts. It’s also been reported that the UCI hasn’t received the team’s registration for the World Tour next year, which all but confirms their withdrawal – more to follow.
10 July 2019, 17:26
“When I'm killed” – ex-pro Phil Gaimon’s powerful YouTube film about vulnerability of cyclists
Phil Gaimon – the former professional cyclist whose ‘Worst Retirement Ever’ series on social media has made him something of a cult hero – is back in the spotlight, but on a far more serious issue.
The 33-year-old former Cannondale Pro Cycling rider, who hung up his wheels at the end of the 2016 season, had a video prepped for a while about the dangers cyclists face on the roads.
Titled ‘Share This When I’m Killed by Someone Driving a Car’ he has decided to share it now following a rise in the number of cyclists killed in road traffic collisions in the US, and in New York City in particular.
Commenting on his decision to make the footage public now, Gaimon said: “I made this video a few months ago and was waiting for a good time to share it.
“I finally realized there won’t be a good time. It’s just going to hurt, but it has to go up.”
It’s a very powerful, and sobering, watch.
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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
Gm_Crop 6 hours ago
I'll counter that by saying the Bryton 750se I have drives me nuts at times. Inconsistantly picks up on routes created on Komoot and the app re-syncs every few seconds when trying to set up the device and sends me back to the home screen. The most infuriating one is that I turned live track on. Once. It now won't turn off and repeatedly flags up the live track is starting, and then disconnecting every few seconds whilst riding. I haven't timed it but it wouldn't suprise me if 10-20% of the time the the screen is covered with an error message. That's been about 6 weeks now. Other than that it's great :/
IanGlasgow 6 hours ago
RE: Police launch road safety operation... by clamping down on cyclists using footbridge Meanwhile in Glasgow, Police Scotland are riding their motorbikes over the pedestrian and cyclists only bridge. https://x.com/FietserGlasgow/status/2065106152917012523?s=20
Rendel Harris 8 hours ago
@Paul J Van Schip certainly seems a bit of a dick, but he's a European and multiple World Champion on the track, pretty sure you don't get there without having some talent in your legs.
Bill H 8 hours ago
Poor Vincent cannot get over the simple fact that given the choice people prefer dedicated cycling spaces, rather than pretending to be cars like vehicular cyclists.
pbunyon 8 hours ago
What is the point of the fancy air sensor if it can't account for changing weather conditions?? If all you care about is a delayed approximation of aerodynamic watts in steady conditions, you don't need any special sensors for that. Just your speed on a decently flat course is enough to approximate rolling resistance and drivetrain losses. And the rest must be aero. If you assume a less aero body position at the same watts, your speed will drop while rolling resistance also drops, which means approximated aero watts goes up. And that's enough to demonstrate what you've shown in your testing protocol ("I sat upright and the number went up a little while later").
chrisonabike 9 hours ago
Your correction is accurate - it's almost always been "the (lack of) thought that (doesn't) count". "Massive" - less than a billion a year spent on active travel (trying to catch up / building a network across the entire country) Not massive - 6 billion every year (2026-2030) spent on road *maintenance* of existing "already built, goes everywhere, very convenient" road network for inactive travel Ultimately the reason "cycle infra" is *needed* is those unbelievably colossal amounts spent every year (and for more than a century now) on making mass motoring not just viable but apparently the "best choice" for most journeys. As the Dutch and others have shown, the majority of people *are* prepared to cycle and even mix with very light, slow local motor traffic *if* cycling is also made safe and convenient for the whole of their journey (including secure parking at both ends). (The history of the financial drivers of the current situation are a complex topic but note that while people complain about "crumbling roads" and underfunded motor infra - with some reason - by us continuing the fuel duty escalator freeze (for example) we're actually helping motorists pay *even less* for that activity / subsidising more of the cost of driving than ever.)
belugabob 9 hours ago
yes, but people will still object - which was my point.
Astralstroll 11 hours ago
So ' Priority of Road Users' and 1.5 metre clearance at 30mph has been been reduced to 'sharing'? NCN route 2 here in South Hams is an absolute scream with white vans, tractors and total idiots who refuse,or are totally incapable,to reverse on high Devon banked lanes ...means you have to get off and pedal back to a passing place....could be at that all day...so I don't bother...
Mr Anderson 12 hours ago
@MaxiMinimalist Agreed. The big problem I see now is today's parents grew up being driven to their schools, and therefore, see private motor vehicles as the only viable form of transport. The vast majority of UK infant and primary schools have a catchment area that is within easy walking distance from home to school. Yet, the traffic caused by pupils being driven to/from school is astonishing. Banishing the "School Run" should be a priority for all schools.
MaxiMinimalist 13 hours ago
When I was a kid (that was during the previous millenium when phones were connected to a plug in the wall), I rode my bicycle to school, music academy, sport grounds, parties even during the winter. The government didn't have to spend, correct that, didn't have to think of spending massive amounts of money to build cycling specific infrastructures. Over the past 3 or 4 decades, cars have grown bigger, taller, safer (for their drivers) and faster. Meanwhile, motorists have become abusive, aggressive, hypersensitive to people moving on two wheels, aka cyclists. Spending billions upon billions on new infrastructure won't address the crux of the matter. Sadly.
15 thoughts on “Live blog: “When I die” – ex-pro Phil Gaimon’s powerful YouTube film about vulnerability of cyclists; Horrific TdF crash; fallout from THAT Channel 5 documentary + more”
Until this documentary was
Until this documentary was publicised, I’d forgotten all about Channel 5 even existing. I still didn’t watch it, though.
I’m nominating this line (as
I’m nominating this line (as quoted above) up for best insult of 2019.
“Hang your heads in shame, you specious shitmunchers.”
Could hardly believe what I
Could hardly believe what I was seeing in the channel 5 doc. Woman is pulled, while being spoken to by the officer was repeatedly trying to use her mobile and after being told not to it seemed the phone was still uppermost in her mind.
fixation80 wrote:
I didn’t watch the garbage TV program, but it’s exactly that kind of driver behaviour which epitomises the main issue with the law and car drivers today. Break the law and there is simply NO punishment worth worrying about:
Three points is an annoyance, six is bearable for most
A fine affects people in different ways but a couple of hundred quid won’t worry most drivers, half a grand might make you think a bit more carefully, maybe..
Being made to go on an awareness course is a total relief/joke overtaking the penalty points
If someone drives to or for work and has dependents, then every driver knows a judge probably won’t enforce a ban
The law is simply not appropriate nowadays. It might have been great or more suitable in previous times/years (?), but nowadays with so much traffic on the roads and air pollution where it is, the law doesn’t appear to represent the 21st Century very well at all.
If I were Queen and had a magic corgi, I’d ban petrol or diesel cabs and ubers straight off the bat, electric vehicles only or no taxi licenses issued. I’d have a width limit put on new cars (a land rover disco is near enough half a metre wider than a honda CRV (inc. wing mirrors). And of course, I’d change punishments for driving offences including ensuring that holding a driving license is something to be treasured and not a right.
On the Pierre-Luc Périchon
On the Pierre-Luc Périchon crash – that looks really nasty!
I’m amazed he walked away from it.
Had a similar experience to
Had a similar experience to Phil Gaimon, of going around a bend on a country road to see two cars, side by side doing 70mph coming towards me. I was incredibly lucky that there was a field entrance I could fall off into.
Shared on fb, and maybe C5 might like to make another documentary, this time from the cyclists’ point of view.
Re setencing for driving
Re setencing for driving offences, clearly the courts need to be more severe but one thing that strikes me as logical is that anyone who gets a driviing ban should be made to redo their driving test. The standard of many drivers is apauling and I’m sure many of them would have difficulty passing a test. However this seems perfectly reasonable to me as they have clearly demonstrated that their driving is not up to standard and they should therefore have to prove that it is before being given a licence back.
iandusud wrote:
Why should they ever be given their license back? Once you’ve proven yourself incapable of doing it safely then you should lose the right permanently.
Quote:
Um… Gnocchi is pasta isn’t it? Delicious, stodgy pasta, especially when cooked in a saffron broth with chorizo, red onion and topped with roasted cauliflower and cherry tomatoes…
IanEdward wrote:
Um… Gnocchi is pasta isn’t it? Delicious, stodgy pasta, especially when cooked in a saffron broth with chorizo, red onion and topped with roasted cauliflower and cherry tomatoes…
Nope – they’re potato dumplings. You’ve made me hungry now with that description now (as a veggie, I’d skip the chorizo – maybe throw in some olives instead).
Loved the fact that, despite
Loved the fact that, despite the taxi drivers being so concerned for cyclists’ safety, with one of them even gritting his teeth in anger at the lack of a cycling helmet, not one of them had a seatbelt on. You couldn’t make it up….
Mark_1973_ wrote:
Perhaps because they don’t have to. From Gov.uk:
When you don’t need to wear a seat belt
You don’t need to wear a seat belt if you’re:
a driver who is reversing, or supervising a learner driver who is reversing
in a vehicle being used for police, fire and rescue services
a passenger in a trade vehicle and you’re investigating a fault
driving a goods vehicle on deliveries that is travelling no more than 50 metres between stops
a licensed taxi driver who is ‘plying for hire’ or carrying passengers
Not sure why, but I’m absolutely fine with this!
Kendalred wrote:
Yes, but the point being that neither are helmets mandatory for cyclists, so getting hot under the collar about someone not doing something they don’t have to do while you’re not doing something you don’t have to do either is seriously hypocritical. But then, that’s humans for you. Probably our defining characteristic.
burtthebike wrote:
Yeah, sorry, I kind of missed the irony.
I didn’t bother clicking the
I didn’t bother clicking the clip on the CH5 twitter post above, but the face of the guy (I’m assuming he’s a taxi driver) is exactly the kind of face I usually see peering out of their car when they’ve given no space, or not waited a few seconds longer. I wish there was a way to educate people about just how dangerous their actions are, and how pointless, they’re not going to get there any quicker, but short of forcing people to get on a bike once in a while they’re never going to learn.