Top 6 Cyclists

This Top 6 feature began, as I'm sure longstanding readers will remember, as a poetry item in which someone, and it was inevitably nearly always me, selected a Top 6 poems by a favourite or major poet.
The website was called David Green Books to make the world aware, if it cared to be, of my books- okay, booklets- of poems. That became a books website as I began to review other books of poems and any other books I felt like. And, then, it became my 'blog', although, lordjesussaveus, I didn't intend to be a 'blogger'. But it's a little while since we had the Top 6 of any poet. Please send me one if you feel the urge or inspiration to do such a thing.
But this week I had reason to refer to the tremendous document I was presented with as a 'This Is Your Life' album on my 50th birthday a couple of years ago and in it was this photograph, which I find it hard to believe is me, on what was presumably my first bike. The bike that I began on before flirting with cycling as a sport as a teenager and then reverting to in my thirties with great dedication, enormous stamina but no electrifying speed. It's all over now. It's been over for a few years really. It was tremendous while it lasted and the most enjoyable thing one could have done - the countryside, the effort, the concentration, the mediocre achievement and, mostly, the lie in the bath afterwards.
But I am not, even though pictured here, one of my own Top 6 cyclists. According to the rules of the game, one isn't supposed to name any but the six and I'll adhere to that while paying tribute to my biggest influence, my father, Phil, who organized and kept the stopwatch meticulously for many years while keeping riding to the age of 74 and counting, and my nephew, Chris Chadwick, who decided he'd just nip up from Land's End to John O'Groats last year for the sake of it. I took the opportunity to introduce Chris to the great Phil Griffiths at the Tour of Britain in London this year. Phil is a droll and witty man in his way but when told that Chris had done the End to End, he just asked 'why?'.
Ah, yes, Phil. Good question. I'm not often short of a clever remark when one is required but I wish I'd asked, 'but you went to the Commonwealth Games in, was it, 1974. Why?'
Anyway, that's all sorted, then. Top 6 cyclists. There's lots of different sorts of bike riders. The track is a dull, muscular and attritional game. I was a quaint old time triallist with some regard for the clubman but the grand tours provide the enormous heroes if and when we are ever allowed to distinguish the rider and his personality from the drugs they're taking.
Early top hero and dynamic little exponent of the 25 mile time trial on every course available on Sunday mornings within a wide radius of Gloucester in the 1970's was Ted Tedaldi, who was all that a junior schoolboy could want of a hero. A bit of style and swagger and he even said hello to me. The claret and gold of Gloucester City CC were never worn with more panache.
Panache and sometimes, it has to be said, vainglorious time spent in full view of the television camera was Jacky Durand's raison d'etre, if you'll excuse my French, as he made countless attempts to escape the peloton in the Tour de France and any other race he found himself in. The best story about him was when a younger rider went back to ask Jacky's advice in the Tour. Should he attempt a lone break or not. I don't know what else he was expecting the answer to be.
The young me idloized the dark-haired winner of the day, Eddy Merckx. I had a goldfish named after him. It's impossible to compare sportspersons from one age to another but the race most bike racing supporters would like to see would be Eddy v. Lance. Without drugs, if that would ever have been possible.
Mark Cavendish is currently sensational and should remain so for a few more years yet. Never previously a devoted admirer of the art of the sprinter, he has changed my mind. It's brilliant what he does and every accolade should fall to him. The economic crisis is not going to cause a revolution in this country but if he's not Sports Personailty of the Year then there is no point in having it.
Janet Tebbutt wasn't Beryl Burton by any means but we saw her through Gloucester one night in the early 70's on her way to setting new figures for Land's End to John O'Groats for a lady and you'd never meet such a modest and charming lady even if they weren't a sensational bike rider. Although my 12 Hour record appears to show that I beat the great Andy Cook three times out of three because he packed every year from 1994-6, it's probably a greater honour that I rode in the same races as her. And then, of course, she kept on doing it after I was finished.
And with only one choice left and yet a host of candidates to choose from, it's never easy but let's have Gwen Shillaker, who showed me more than anyone how to ride a 12 Hour. I mean, I didn't exactly have a pink bike to match my outfit but I saw how, throughout the long afternoon, while piling up a respectable mileage, she waved and smiled and was nice. I think we had a bit of a laugh towards the end of my best rides, too, once we knew the result was in the bag. She was where I learnt it from.
I would still, honestly, rather be a cyclist than a poet.