Endless recession, news cycles that get bleaker by the day and bike racing that veers between dope-fuelled spectacle and by-the-numbers processional. For cycling fans, modern life can be a bit rubbish. Which has led many to think, wouldn’t it be nice to take yourself somewhere far away, go to sleep and wake up in a simpler time?
Stumble over the right hill in the Peak District last month and you might just have found a valley where time had stopped at the stroke of midnight, new year’s eve 1987. L’Eroica Britannia is a festival of cycling that’s resolutely stuck in the past. Now three years old this summer’s event saw more than 50,000 cyclists flock to the market town of Bakewell to recreate cycling’s heroic past, a time before Lycra, carbon and Strava KOMs.
To understand how this temporary timewarp sprang into existence, we need travel back in time ourselves to the small town of Gaiole in Tuscany at the very beginning of the millennium. That year, a small Gran Fondo – a sportive-style amateur race – was held dedicated to the great champion Gino Bartali. Not only had Bartali won both the Tour de France and Giro d’Italia multiple times, but during the Second World War he distinguished himself by helping hundreds of Jews escape persecution under the fascist regime in his native Italy. If this wasn’t risky enough, knowing that the authorities would be reluctant to interfere with the national champion, he also smuggled messages for the resistance hidden inside the tubes of his bicycle across the country’s frontier while ostensibly out on a cross- border training ride. Sports commentators love to describe athletes as heroic but to call Bartali as such is no hyperbole. Winning a handful of Grand Tours barely registered among the greatest feats Bartali achieved during his lifetime.
The ride celebrating Bartali was a huge success, but organiser Giancarlo Brocci wasn’t content. Wanting to do something truly unique for him, he struck on the idea of trying to recreate, as closely as possible, the heroic age during which his idol had raced. In laying out his manifesto, Brocci stated, ‘We wanted to teach young riders to measure themselves against those who were the authentic roots of cycling. We wanted to go out and test our limits, rediscover the taste for adventure and the unexpected, the journey, history and culture.’
The event he devised also had an important additional goal. The cobblestone pavé farm tracks of Flanders that provide the theatre for the spring Classics have long been protected as an important cultural and sporting asset by the Belgian authorities. Meanwhile, over in Italy, the dusty, unmade back roads crisscrossing Tuscany that had provided the stage for epic battles between riders such as Bartali and his great rival Fausto Coppi, were in danger of being buried forever under a sea of smooth black tarmac.
Gravel grinders
Enlisting other enthusiasts who shared his passion for cycling’s halcyon days, Brocci devised a route covering the ‘strade bianche’, as these rough gravel roads are known, around the Chianti region. To add to the challenge, only bikes and equipment from before 1987 would be permitted. ‘Using a vintage bike is fundamental to the experience, it shows us how difficult cycling was. The duels from that era were heroic precisely because the exertions of those cyclists were extraordinary. I’ve always insisted on L’Eroica having a tough element, a challenge to overcome,’ Brocci explains.
What started as a small group of dedicated enthusiasts and collectors, enticed largely by word of mouth, quickly ballooned until the event began attracting several thousand riders. Having starting as an amateur event, a pro race was added to the programme in 2007. It quickly became one of the most fiercely contested and unique races in the calendar. Its success eventually helped the historic strade bianche gain protected status, ensuring they would be preserved undisturbed for future generations.
During those early years, one of the foreign riders tempted to make the pilgrimage to gravel roads of Tuscany was Yorkshire-based cycling nut Gian Bohan.
‘I was part of a group of riders travelling around to sportives when one year we found ourselves at L’Eroica,’ he tells BikesEtc. ‘We instantly fell in love with it, not only the bikes and history, but with the atmosphere, the community, the food and culture. Basically, everything the event stood for. After attending for a few years, we were all in the pub back home when someone suggested, “What if we bring the event back to our local roads in the Peak District?”’ When Bohan and his friends sobered up, the idea still seemed like a good one and three years of planning later, the first L’Eroica Britannia took place.
Creating a route as exciting as the Italian original proved easier than expected with the Peak District as a canvas. ‘Even though we thought we knew the area well, as we started heading out to plot the route we found more and more amazing riding,’ Bohan explains. ‘We’ve got our own strade bianche in the form of the Monsal Trail, which crosses a viaduct and follows former railway tunnels blasted through the hillside along with wild stream crossings and little-travelled, unpaved back roads to traverse.’
Built to last
With the course mapped out, rather than simply copy the Italian model, Bohan and his friends decided to draw on our island’s own cycling heritage to create an event with a uniquely British feel. While Tuscany has its Chianti wine and Pecorino cheese, L’Eroica Britannia enlists local suppliers to lay on a spread of ales and home-grown produce for riders and spectators, while brass and swing bands provide the soundtrack. The cultural differences aren’t purely restricted to the entertainment and refreshments either. While many retro racers fly around the 100-mile course aboard vintage lightweights, an equal number elect to ride the shorter routes on a variety of different British bikes celebrating our industrial heritage.
Last year, Nottinghamshire-based sculptor Phil Neal saw a poster for the event. ‘I was instantly attracted to this idea of going back in time, finding an old bike to rescue and restore, then seeing if it would still be up to the job,’ Neal tells BikesEtc. As luck would have it, he found the perfect candidate – a 1938 Humber Sport with unique twin-legged, duplex forks, poking out of a skip in Sheffield. ‘It was an absolute rust bucket but I was intrigued,’ he adds.
‘Living near Nottingham, this part of the country was the centre of the cycling universe for about 60 years. During the war, most of the factories that made bikes were enlisted to make armaments and afterwards never returned to making bicycles, while many that did survive were bought up and incorporated in the Raleigh marque. I’ve never had a modern bike – for me the attraction is always with the pre-World War Two bikes. It doesn’t matter how much you polish away at them, there’s always enough metal to get you around the course. They really were built to last!’ grins Neal.
Navigating a steep mechanical learning curve along with hours spent scouring eBay and local bike shops looking for parts ensued. Few of the traditional small local outfits run by crotchety but infinitely knowledgeable old-timers have survived the onslaught of the big chain retailers, whose staff are less likely to be able to tell a cotter pin from a cup-and-cone bottom bracket, making fixing up an antique cycle even more of a challenge. ‘There’s a shop called Geoffrey Allison in Worksop that makes ends meet by selling model railway gear, but in the drawers behind the counter they have boxes of tricky-to-find, unused old-stock bike parts. It’s been owned by the same family for over 60 years. They’re phenomenally knowledgeable and patient, it’s a treasure trove,’ Neal reveals.
Once bitten by the bug, retro riders quickly become obsessed with matching every item exactly to the era of the bicycle – and that extends to the clothing. While the bunch at the Italian event is decked out in a sea of vintage merino jerseys and aviator goggles, the British equivalent sees many of the riders turn out in tweeds and plus-fours. It’s indicative of a historical tendency among British riders to concentrate more on the social and community aspects of their sport rather than just the competitive side. Many modern cycling clubs can seem like replica pro-teams, but during cycling’s previous British heyday, racing came a distant second to the simpler pleasures of socialising and exploring the countryside. At the turn of the last century many clubs could count on several hundred members to turn out on their regular weekend runs. This spirit of camaraderie and mutual support, rather than competition, is something that harks back to the original event in Italy. ‘We are a family of enthusiasts and collectors. People may be happy just looking good with their vintage gear and old bikes, but I always insisted on L’Eroica having a tough element, there has to be a challenge to overcome, I want everyone who comes to have the idea of accomplishing a goal, something within their abilities, but still a real goal.’ explains Italian founder Brocci.
While the British event remains an amateur-only affair, the idea of community and achieving a personal goal remains at its heart. For Neal, who lost a foot in a motorcycle accident, this will be getting his vintage tandem into immaculate working order and competing one of the shorter routes along with his girlfriend.
‘I don’t belong to any cycling clubs although I have friends who do,’ he admits. ‘It all seems to be about who’s fastest and having all the latest fancy kit. If you look at the clubs from the pre-war era, some would have as many as 500 riders turning up for a ride, with a picnic half way around. It must have been a magical social occasion. That appeals to me so much more.’
Progress and passion
Progress is inescapable. For cyclists, this means we can now go further and faster in greater comfort than ever before. When Gino Bartali won the 1938 Tour de France, he was the last winner ever to record an average speed below 20 miles per hour. Nowadays, that’s about average for a quick club ride. However, not everything left at the wayside by the onward rush of technology is without value. L’Eroica celebrates the spirit and ethos of cycling’s bygone era. For the riders dragging themselves uphill and down dale on their vintage bikes, it offers a chance to recreate a more heroic age, if only for a few days.