Hidden Treasures
What is lurking between the sheets?
We’ve been discussing books a lot recently on the DNF podcast. Cycling books of course. I like seeing other people’s cycling bookshelves and I’d asked Stu, one of my co-hosts on the podcast, to show me his.
It wasn’t quite an ‘I’ll show you mine if you show me yours’ willy-waving type of scenario, because everyone has already seen mine. Its size and girth is formidable and intimidating. Stu showed me his anyway.
As always when I see pictures like this I revert back to the way things were when you were looking for swaps of Premier League stickers in the playground at school.
Have, have, have, need, need, have, have, have, have…
In this case, I had the lot. Apart from one.
“What’s that one Stu, down the bottom right” ?
I think I’m old enough now where I can get away with saying stuff like “I’m sure I’d heard of it before, I’ve probably just forgotten”. So in this case, I’m sure I’ve heard of this book before, but I’ve probably just forgotten. Unfortunately, I’d also forgotten to ever buy it which is very unlike me.
At this point our mutual DNF podcast co-host Harry piped up in the Whatsapp group and said that this is the book that Rapha based their entire image on. Stu and Harry would know because they both used to work there.
And sure enough, their story checks out. Another book on my shelf is called The Extra Mile, which is a big fat chunky book documenting the story and the history of the Rapha brand. It sounds very dry, and it is in parts. It’s also strangely compelling.
I don’t know the Rapha founder Simon Mottram. I’ve never met him. I don’t feel particularly passionately about cycling clothing or clothes in general. But every time I hear Mottram speak or read what he’s written, he has a habit of reminding me why I love cycling in the first place. And every time I happen to pick up that book and read any section of it I find myself nodding along thinking ‘fucking yes, that’s it, they get it’ and feeling like I should really get out on the bike more.
Here is Mottram talking about the genesis of Rapha and confirming what Harry had just told me:
THE MOST GLARING PROBLEM WITH CYCLING TWENTY YEARS AGO was the awful clothes that I could buy. The ill-fitting primary or Day-Glo coloured ‘sportswear’ made of polyester fabrics quickly became sweaty and smelly. Fashion and menswear in particular had taken massive strides forward in the 1990s, but no one in cycling seemed to have noticed.
I was looking for a different aesthetic and the answer came to me when a good friend gave me a French book about the Tour de France for my birthday which became the inspiration that has always informed Rapha’s approach to photography and storytelling. Two things struck me about Le Tour de France Intime. First of all, there were almost no pictures of bikes, it’s simply the most fantastic portrait of a dozen or so of the best riders from the 1950s to the 1990s.
The author Philippe Brunel realised that cycling is an intensely human sport, and that the riders are its most interesting subjects. It made me realise why I love racing, it wasn’t about technology, it was the human side. The photographs showed riders lying on a hotel bed, sitting on trains, having massages, being supported after a crash. There were portraits of hollow-eyed heroes and gaunt faces. The second thing that struck me is how cool they looked. I remember thinking why don’t the racers today look like Gianni Motta with his string back gloves or Eddy Merckx nonchalantly looking like he’s just walked off Glastonbury stage?
Christmas is quite close. It can be a perilous endeavour to buy yourself a Christmas present just before Christmas and I have gotten in trouble and ruined Christmas for myself by doing exactly this before.
I bought the book anyway. I’m safe enough. People stopped buying me cycling books as presents a long time ago. They’ve (more or less correctly) just presumed I have them all.
And there it is. The English language version of Le Tour de France Intime which dropped in the door this week.
Something often happens to me when I buy second hand cycling books off of strangers on the internet. Perhaps if this happens to other people you might let me know. It can’t just be me. Quite often when I buy one, there are little extras thrown in. The person selling it has obviously just taken the opportunity, while they have the attention of a certifiable cycling geek, to get rid of more cycling-related tat and has just stuck it in the front cover on the way into the jiffy bag (wahey!)
On this occasion, the person who sent me An Intimate Portrait of the Tour de France also decided to send me this:
