Germany’s Jens Lehmann’s first international success came with the silver medal in the Worlds Individual Pursuit in 1989 behind the legendary Viatcheslav Ekimov; but he was still winning Worlds medals in 2002 - Individual Pursuit bronze and Team Pursuit silver.
With few Scottish events to choose from, Kyle Gordon decided he should take things into his own hands and travel a bit to get a race – but maybe he took things a bit too far? Saint Petersburg, formerly ‘Leningrad,’ Russia on the Baltic Sea’s Gulf of Finland…
We recently ran or tribute to the late, great 'Big Bert' Oosterbosch. It was so well received by our readers that we thought we should re-run a piece from a few years ago which pays tribute to another Dutch chrono and pursuit king - the late, great Roy Schuiten.
It’s our privilege to have interviewed Mr. Ian Hallam; two Olympic Team Pursuit bronze medals, a Worlds Individual Pursuit silver, a Worlds Team Pursuit silver, two Commonwealth Individual Pursuit golds, a Commonwealth Games Team Pursuit gold, Commonwealth bronze in the Kilometre and 20 Kilometre, and 25 British track titles.
Rolf Gölz might not be a name that readily comes to mind, but from 1983 to 1993 the man from West Germany filled his palmarès with Olympic and World medals, National championships, Tour stage wins, Classics and a list of other race wins. Ed Hood caught up with Rolf for a chat over old times.
In Part One of our interview with Shaun Wallace we covered up to the end of his international pursuiting successes. But there were more honours to come on the big stage before he slipped the tyre covers on for the last time...
Shaun Wallace was a multiple British champion, twice Worlds silver medallist and three times a Commonwealth Games silver medallist as well as a world record holder on two occasions. High times we caught up with the man; he was at home in San Diego where he settled 22 years ago to ‘escape the winters.’
Rejected by the US system, Marion Clignet said ‘ciao’ to Chicago Illinois and ‘bonjour’ to Brittany. The US Federation’s loss was the French Federation’s gain with the girl who the USCF thought was ‘too much of a risk to have on the team, as an epileptic,’ bringing home six world titles and two Olympic silver medals to the land of her parents’ birth – she still enjoys dual US/French citizenship – but is now firmly rooted in La Republique.
The career of John Patston lasted three decades; he represented GB at The Worlds, was a multiple Division and National Champion and medallist, he won Star Trophy races, the Cycling Weekly Campagnolo ‘25’ Trophy series and in 1975 he notched-up 63 wins; 42 on the road and 21 against the watch. And despite being a bank manager, a pillar of the Establishment, his rebellious streak got him into trouble with the RTTC more than once, with the inevitable suspensions following.
I have been hard on the Filippo Ganna, putting in print that perhaps he would never rank among the all-time gallacticos of pursuiting, but the big Italian is proving me wrong so I thought I’d go back and look at the man’s career from day one to where he is now; that’s one of the best chrono men and the best pursuit rider on the planet.
Here at VeloVeritas whilst we have the utmost respect for John Archibald and his performances we didn’t seek any pre-Worlds interviews from him, his sister Katie, Neah Evans or Mark Stewart. We felt that the ‘they just need to turn up and ride then bring home the rainbow jerseys’ vibe was putting them under pressure – of which they would experience more than enough in the cauldron of Pruszkow. We let the dust settle post-Worlds, gave John a call and found how it went...
Ashton Lambie recently slashed three seconds off Jack Bobridge’s Pursuit World Record at Aguascalientes on 31st August of this year in the Pan Am Championships with 4:07:251. His progression is an interesting one – from ‘ultra distance’ to gravel racing to grass track and now, the fastest track endurance rider in history. Here is his tale...
Scotland’s Mark Stewart may have thwarted Cameron Meyer’s plan to take home a gold medal from the velodrome but the slim Aussie bounced back to take the individual time trial title on a hot day around the testing 37.8 kilometre circuit at Currumbin Beachfront. Taking silver was one of the remarkable brothers, 23 year-old Harry Tanfield, who finished 30 seconds behind the flying Meyer but two seconds ahead of Kiwi rower turned time tester, Hamish Bond.
VeloVeritas has already spoken to brother John about his men’s individual pursuit silver medal and now it’s time to hear what sister Katie has to say about her Games campaign where there was women’s individual pursuit gold in a Games record, points race silver behind Wales’ Elinor Barker and rides in the women’s scratch – where she finished fourth behind Amy Cure of Australia – and on the road in time trial and road race.
‘The best Commonwealth Games performance ever by the Scottish cycling team’ – that’s for sure. VeloVeritas hopes to speak to all of the athletes concerned and we’re proud to start with individual pursuit silver medallist, John Archibald.
John Archibald has ‘done the business’ when it comes to qualifying for the individual pursuit at the Commonwealth Games on the Gold Coast, Australia come the spring. But Scotland has another young man chasing qualification for those lung shredding four kilometres, Mr. Kyle Gordon; we had a word with him after his recent adventures in Europe.
John Archibald has proved to us during season 2017 that he’s the fastest man in the country against the watch with fastest rides ever at 10 and 25 miles in Scotland. With a series of quality four kilometre rides in Portugal and Switzerland, Archibald has proved that he can indeed adapt to the boards, bankings and all that time sitting about waiting...
VeloVeritas first spoke to 24 year-old Aussie Jordan Kerby three years ago; he was 2010 world junior points and team pursuit champion but then turned to the road. Success came quickly and he won the 2013 Australian U23 Road Race Championship. There followed a forgettable spell with Michael Rasmussen’s ill fated Christina Watches team before he moved back to Australia, winning the 2014 Australian U23 Time Trial Championship. We caught up with Jordan shortly after his Worlds success where he rode the third fastest time ever in qualifying then beat reigning world champion Filippo Ganna of Italy in the final.
Who’s Filippo Ganna? Just the World Individual Pursuit Champion, that’s all. But don’t worry, we’d never heard of him either, until he won it. The rot first set in when the UCI ‘unified’ the professional and amateur pursuit titles in 1993 and cut the distance back to 4000 metres – the pros had previously contested the title over 5000 metres. But wet rot gave way to even nastier dry rot after the Beijing Olympics when the UCI announced that the individual pursuit was being chopped from the Olympic programme.
Scottish bike racing; let's face it, no matter how well you do in the Super Sixes, or how quick you can go around West Ferry, you're going nowhere if you stay in Auld Scotia.
It's here. Le Tour de France 2012 Prologue. The endless analysis is finally over, there's rubber on tarmac, folks hanging over barriers and commentators getting their facts wrong, already.
It wasn’t just the Covid, it was more the quarantine we would have had to endure that kept us away from the Flatlands for the 2021 Gent Six Day and 2022 Opening Weekend; but like Kiss said; ‘We’re back, back in the New York Groove’ – let’s make that the ‘Flanders Groove.’
Apart from the Tours of Yorkshire and Britain we only have one UCI race in the UK, ‘The Rutland CiCLE Classic,’ an event which anticipated the current ‘gravel craze’ by a decade and more. We thought it would be interesting to talk to the man behind the race, Colin Clews.
Ciao, come sta? Viareggio on the west coast of Italy, 06:30 Saturday May 15 and VeloVeritas is on the Giro - well, not quite, we have our credentials to collect from the Gazzetta camper van, this morning at the stage start in Carrara. The trip down wasn't too bad, Edinburgh to Luton, then Luton to Pisa - there was an hour's delay at Luton, but we were on Easyjet, so no one gets too stressed.
Maybe it was all those minds thinking; 'I hate split sessions' that made the access panel in the track jam? In fact, it was an electrical fault, caused by someone who didn't understand the procedure for shutting the big sliding panel in the track's back straight that meant the Saturday afternoon session was cancelled.