Bob the Bike Man

Contact Bob via bobthebikeman@btinternet.com.

You will find me also on www.birminghamcyclist.ning.com

Bob’s on his bike…

…in aid of The Little Sisters of the Poor, St. Joseph’s Home, Harborne, Birmingham.

For nearly 135 years the Little Sisters of the Poor have ministered to the aged and infirm at their voluntary aided convent and residential home in Harborne. Now in these times of economic stress they need our help more than ever. In order to maintain and improve standards no organisation can be complacent and St Joseph’s is no exception. To this end they need to raise funds for a new lift and security system.

I have agreed to act as the focus of this fund raising effort by undertaking the London to Paris Cycle Challenge over three days in the summer of 2009.

This challenge will be my first long ride and my first abroad since taking up cycling (after a gap of 40 years!) to regain fitness following cancer surgery three years ago. At the age of sixty-one this commitment will require many miles of training to develop stamina, speed and the ability to meet time targets – no good arriving late for the ferry to France!

A bit of history…

My first bike was a sit-up-and-beg, freewheel no-gears machine with rod brakes and, as far as I remember, cost the princely sum of one guinea (£1 1s 0d in old money). Having outgrown this, the next bike (still a sit-up-and-beg) sported a three speed Sturmey Archer hub gear system. I cannot at this distance in time remember the make. It was kept at my grandparents place in Horncastle, Lincolnshire and I rode it all around that area in the long summer holidays of the early 1960s.

At school we all hankered after proper racers with drop handlebars so I set to and started to save. After what seemed an absolute age and with considerable help from my mother, who ’subbed’ me at least £5 0s 0d of the £25 0s 0d (approx) purchase price, I became the proud owner of a Viking Hosteller.

I rather wish that I still had it - a beautiful machine. It was fitted with a five speed Simplex derailleur and I twice rode up to Lincolnshire on it. The first occasion I split the trip into two days and stayed overnight with cousin Sally Fidler at Nanpantan near Loughborough (there’s a folk song in that somewhere!).

Whilst with cousin Sally, her brother John gave a me a guided tour of Taylor’s bell foundry in Loughborough, where he worked. I believe it is one of only two remaining such foundries in the UK and still uses horse manure in its mould mix, a fact that amused me greatly as a teeenager.

The second time I managed the ride of some 100 miles in just one day. No cleats, no toe clips! Brookes saddlebag weighed down with a heavy yellow oilskin cape which, when worn, (and I had to in absolutely torrential rain and a howling headwind on the fenland stretch of the trip) draped over the handlebars and acted like a giant wind anchor. Boy you had to pedal to make any headway!

College and then work took me away from cycling and I didn’t return until three years ago when I bought a Claud Butler Roubaix. After around forty years off a bike the first things I noticed were how big traffic islands are and how quickly the traffic circulates around them (didn’t have many of those back in the 1960s) and how quiet buses are coming up behind you (no rear engined jobs when I was at school).