Monthly Archives: November 2012

Beryl: A Love Story on Two Wheels – radio play about the greatest cyclist of an era, possibly ever

Posted on by

So at last Maxine Peake’s play about Beryl Burton made the airwaves this afternoon.

I was traveling so I have had to listen to it myself in my hotel room on the i-player this evening – link here.

Followers of my blog know I have been building up the Beryl story since May (Click tab “Beryl Burton” for other posts and material). I had this horrible moment about a week ago when I read the synopsis on line and I thought it might just be terrible and a bit twee, focussing on a manufactured love story between Beryl and Charlie and my buildup would be in vain.

But what made it work for me were the recordings of Charlie and daughter Denise chatting about Beryl as if she was just round the corner and had popped out for a ride, almost like the day she died. It brings that authenticity and honesty I can respect, bringing to life some of the stories from the book “Personal Best” on which it is based.

Such a dominant figure in the cycling history of the period, but spoken of which such affection by the two people who knew her best, even if it is clear she was far from easy to live with. Yes it was a love story.

Aficionados will be cross at some of the corny sound effects to make radio drama accessible and I can assure you that there weren’t crowds, loudspeakers and commentators at 1960s time trials, if there had been maybe Beryl would have been the star she should have been. But I am forgiving, they were needed for the narrative to work and it is hard to portray a superstar at a sport that was invented for its anonymity! If I have one complaint it would be that her achievements still didn’t really come across, she really was such an athlete she is so hard to sum up.

But all in all a really good effort and its placement on Radio 4 will have gone a long way to telling the world about our hidden heroine. I have only seen feedback on twitter so far tonight, but overall it is really positive.

Please give it a listen, and if you can get a copy of “Personal Best” do so, it fills out the rest.

A butterfly of a bike emerges from its chrysalis – 1963 classic fixie

Posted on by

Wrapped bicycle frameCrossed flad head badge Freddie Grubb FixieOne of the great frustrations from moving house has been embodied in a cardboard box, just one amongst so many. But an odd shape, long and flat.

It arrived a week before we moved and I allowed myself a single peek into the box before very reluctantly I packed it away.

So having unpacked everything domestic over the last two weeks I treated myself to a session in the shed and I carefully brought Freddie Grubb number 11773 into the light after its respray and refurbishment for its 50th birthday (and mine).

A thing of rare delight, a 1963 English steel track frame which has been in my first club, the Godric CC for its entire life. I acquired it in the 1970s and after a short racing career in grass track and rollers I mistreated it for almost 30 years.

But now as I gradually pulled the packaging away I broke into an irrepressible beaming smile.  This is my classic and I am really looking forward to the gradual build. Watch this space for more updates.

Freddie Grubb Fixie

Fixie 1963Frame number 11773

I wandered lonely as a cloud

Posted on by

Autumn skyBeautiful skies on Sunday’s walk.

And the temptation – because the tiny sign to the left of the trees means there is a path up there. One I haven’t walked or ridden yet. One for the future.

Promise you won’t tell anyone?

Posted on by

BerkshireI wanted to publish a small gallery of favourite photos from the Berkshire village where I have lived for the last ten years as a farewell and a memento.

I had never heard of Finchampstead when I got a job in Guildford but friends encouraged us to consider Wokingham as a place to live because of its environment and its schools. Quite by chance my wife found a house and a school place for our son out in Finchampstead. It was formerly a tiny village with origins as a hamlet in the Royal Windsor hunting forests. But in the 20th century it grew rapidly as housing was carved out of the woods but there is a real legacy of woodland with its country parks and National Trust woodland, not to mention the remaining Crown estates which provide the magnificent mountain biking at Swinley Forest, just a few miles away.

As well as all the great things that go with family life I found one really unexpected thing in Finchampstead. Don’t tell anyone but I actually started enjoying walking. The environment has a lot to do with it but of course the most important stimulant was my furry sidekick. So just a few seasonal favourites from the last five years of walks , culminating with the leading actor himself in the autumn’s leaves, our last walk before we packed the car.

Finchampstead, Wokingham BerkshireBerkshire AutumnBerkshire, Wokingham

California Country Park, FinchampsteadCalifornia Country Park WokinghamBerkshire, EnglandDog California Country Park Finchampstead Wokingham Berkshire

A long and winding Belgian road starts here

Posted on by

Wallon BrabantInternet access has finally arrived chez Mayne so I can begin to blog again. And it allows time for some musings about where we might be going, just as we and our dog Murphy explore the landscapes of our new home.

So it’s time for a new category of posts to go alongside the cycling and travel that have made up most of the year so far.  Until now I have been blogging about Belgium from the perspective of a visitor, a bit of a tourist in Brussels.

And now, at last, I am suddenly catapulted into the life of a Belgian resident after a year of talking about it. Perhaps we are a bit conservative because we have decided to live about 20 kilometres south of central Brussels, just as we lived 50km from London in England. We know it’s not Berkshire, but there are some comparisons in its relationship to the big city up the road. We considered very seriously living in the city and going for the metropolitan life but we fell for the network of small towns and villages to the south of Brussels in the province of Wallon-Brabant (Walloon Brabant), the French speaking area closest to the capital.

But it is very different from the city of Brussels and it is very much part of country life in Wallonia, or at least we hope so.

So alongside the cycling and travel posts that have featured in the blog to date I will be  embarking on some new “Life in Belgium” posts which I hope readers will enjoy and if nothing else they will add to the diary element of the blog. Click on categories to choose similar posts, or indeed to ignore them and stick to the regular material. And there will be lots of cycling mixed in as I go exploring.

Author Peter Mayle set the standard for this sort of writing years ago with his brilliant “Year in Provence” books. I hope I don’t fall into the trap of offering detached amusement about local personalities and contractors just because they do things in a different way and we are in a rural area, but we did enjoy the fact that the chap delivering the wood turned up yesterday in his tractor to dump a huge pile on the drive. That’s how it should be in the country.

So in the “season of mists and mellow fruitfulness”* welcome to the first of many posts from Wallon-Brabant. (*Keats)

Trees in countryside, BelgiumMist, trees and moon, evening in Belgium

Cannot beat cycling to work on a forest road with a layer of golden beech leaves #magiccarpet

Posted on by

Brussels Belgium Chemin Des Tumulii

The middle of one of my new commuting routes, before I hit the roads of Brussels (sigh)

Blogging in temporary suspense

Posted on by

Belgian telecoms companies being a law unto themselves I have no internet at home at the moment. It seems it takes as many technicians to get a line to a rural spot as it does cyclists to fix a puncture.

Haven’t quite mastered posting via my Blackberry so I am stuck with the dilemma – start blogging after work or go home to my wife who is struggling to put together a new house?

Hardly a choice is it, but I am building up some nice material for the dark winter nights!

Follow me on twitter @maynekevin but otherwise a cheery holding photo from Brussels – great street art!Mural Rue de Bon Secours