Andrea Hofling - how I got hooked.
When we first got into cycling as a past time and as a sport last century (it was the nineties), we set up our own cycling club (or gang if you like), consisting of most known cyclists in our street. We started to collectively watch the Tour de France on the TV (what little ITV would show us in those days). On the day of the finish in Paris we would pig out on French food and champagne while cheering our favourites to mark the occasion (not that they were ever able to hear us).

2002 sprint action

Then we discovered Herne Hill Velodrome. Alan, who was a special needs teacher had begun to take ‘his kids’ for track sessions there and and he reported back to us that there was a really exciting track event on Good Friday held at the velodrome which we should definitely go and see. We would be able watch the real thing live with all the atmosphere of a real cycle race with big stars right on our door step. So one Good Friday we packed our picnic baskets and set out for the adventure.

When we got over the excitement of seeing cyclist on their thin racing tyres clinging to the walls of the bowl at the steep ends, we found out that they also had no brakes and only one single fixed gear! This meant that they had to push the pedals ever so hard to get started, and spin as fast as they could, not unlike a hamster in his wheel, once they had gathered speed. When they wanted to slow down, they could not just stop pedaling either, because the pedals would just keep going! To top it all off, their feet were strapped into the pedals, so they had to be held up by an assistant before the start, and once they stopped, they needed something to lean up against. It was a lot for our brains to take in!

And how they raced, and boy, was that exciting. There were individual time trials, group races, such as ‘Devil take the Hindmost’, Derny events, that is moped paced races, and duels, where two riders tried to out sprint (and outwit) each other.

In the ‘Devil’ a whole bunch of riders complete as many laps as it takes until only the winner is left, by eliminating the two last riders across the line each lap. It’s fast and furious.

The Derny events provided their own excitement by producing incredible noise, considerable speed and exhaust fumes, not to forget the Derny riders with their old fashioned pin head helmets and handle bar mustaches. Meanwhile the cyclists were jockeying for positions behind the derny. Sometimes each rider was proceeding in the slipstream of his own derny, in which case it was probably a case of the fatter or wider the derny rider, the better the cyclist’s chances. A strange discipline indeed, & for some reason very popular in Japan, were they are called keirin and people bet large sums of money on the winner.

All the while the crowds are going mad and contribute to the mayhem by banging the boards stuck to the railings surrounding the bowl, as loud as they can to egg on the riders to go faster.

Sometimes riders would come really right up onto the high banking. Especially in the ‘duels’ where riders practice the art of going slowly in order to force the opponent to overtake them, so they can shoot down into their slipstream and then surprise them just before (or on) the finishing line, the riders would sometimes do track stands so close to the railings that we could have touched them! Ingrid who had developed a particular penchant for Michael Huebner’s flair, enormous thighs, (and pony tail) must have exercised some will power to resist. As it was she just expelled shrieks of excitement every time he came round (as did almost everyone else).

Over the years we saw them all, Michael Huebner, Jens Fiedler, Marty Nothstein, Frederick Magne, Graham Obree and recently Stuart O’Grady. And not to forget our perennial local star, the equally handsome and charming Russell Williams, who was always an enormous crowd pleaser.

At the end of the day, we would nurse an unexpected (for the season) sun burn and slightly sore hands from all the banging. Picnic Baskets empty we would return home happy with our day of close up authentic cycling mayhem.

Andrea Holfing