Cycling
Is any sporting event more brutal than the Tour de France?
That great Frenchman the Marquis de Sade would have been justly proud of the Tour de France had he lived…
Graham Robb deserves to be a French national treasure
Philip Hensher is enthralled by Graham Robb’s evocative new history of France
Letters: What happened to bells on bikes?
Jesus wept Sir: Sam Dunning’s brilliant exposure of the corrupting links between Jesus College, Cambridge and the Chinese Communist party…
The ceaseless self-pity of cyclists
I know that all must have prizes in the Victimisation Olympics these days, but when I heard a bicycle-rider on…
The real sporting star of this summer
Think of a punishing distance for a bike race. Double it, multiply by ten, throw in two of the world’s…
The Richard Freeman affair casts a cloud over British cycling
For those with neither the time nor inclination to plough through a PhD in the intricacies of the scandals surrounding…
The war on cars is backfiring
For most London-based politicians, there’s a threat that’s worse than Covid. You’ll begin to notice it as we ease out…
Letters: Is cycling really conservative?
Veritas vincit Sir: Professor Dawkins eloquently and engagingly defines true truth for us (‘Matters of fact’, 19 December). It seems…
Come back, doggers, all is forgiven
Bring back the men having sex in the undergrowth. This was the thought that occurred to me and my friend…
Jeremy Vine: Save our cycle lanes
‘Stopping the diary/’ wrote Philip Larkin, ‘Was a stun to memory,/ Was a blank starting.’ I never really understood those…
How do we stop the Lycra dads using our stable yard as a toilet?
The cyclist pulled into our gateway, got off his bike and grabbed hold of the electric fencing. Installing game cameras,…
You wait ages for an ambulance, then five come along at once
‘I need an ambulance!’ yelled the builder boyfriend into his mobile phone as the cyclist lay bleeding from a head…
The abominable selfishness of the Surrey middle classes
‘Have you met the man who keeps his horses in this field?’ said one silver-haired lady to the other, as…
This is not a natural disaster, but a manmade one
Should our future permit an occupation so frivolous, historians years from now will make a big mistake if they blame…
We don’t have lockdown in Surrey
The man was unloading cycles from the boot of his car just as I was about to take the turning…
A young Rwandan scholar left a profound impression on me
In the Rwandan Genocide Memorial gift shop I bought a handy Kinyarwanda–Kiswahili–English phrase book. The tipping point in the decision…
When Brexiter meets Catalexiter
After the hostel breakfast, I stood on the tropical grass lawn smoking the first fag of the day and mulled…
The lessons I learned cycling across Rwanda
The backmarker of the peloton was Eric, a tall, stick-thin Rwandan. Under his cycling helmet he wore a baseball cap…
Why do we still use the Qwerty keyboard layout and not Dvorak?
‘Can you fly down this evening?’ she was asked by her boss in the Delhi office of the BBC. ‘Yes,…
You can’t possibly hate cyclists more than they hate each other
I’ve cycled for primary transportation for 53 years. Accordingly, I’m not naive about the degree of resentment — nay, loathing…
Save me from middle managers dressed up as Spiderman
‘You’ve got your essay on your back, then?’ said the stable yard owner as I headed out with Darcy on…
Survival of the sneakiest
Could there be a better metaphor for the corruption that now pervades all top-level sport than the use of motors…
Cycling in Lycra is bad for the soul
Cycling in funny clothes is bad for the soul
Girl about town — on a bicycle
The old ditty got it wrong: it should have been ‘Maybe it’s because I’m not a Londoner that I love…
Cycling is about much more than winning — and David Millar’s The Racer is quite a ride
In 2004, French police officers searching the home of the professional cyclist David Millar found some syringes and empty phials…
