Superficially, multitools are very attractive. They’re small, light and there’s definitely a Swiss Army Knife wow factor as you unfold the various blades, revealing one handy function after another. And this… for removing a stone from a horse’s hoof! But just as you wouldn’t want to sit down to the twelve course tasting menu at [...]
![ModulaCageXL_800x600[1000x700]](http://thebikeshow.net/wp-content/uploads/2012/06/ModulaCageXL_800x6001000x700-e1339695021885-300x162.jpg "ModulaCageXL_800x600[1000x700]")
Touring tip #4: Star water carriers
Not long ago, someone discovered that cycling water bottles (or bidons) contained a toxic chemical called BPA that was potentially seriously harmful to human health. Some, though not all, bidons are BPA-free, but even if they are, it doesn’t stop them making your drink taste all nasty and plasticky nor providing an excellent long term [...]
Touring tip #3: Pump me up!
As a young cycle tourist in the late 80s and early 90s I used to get a lot of punctures. Fortunately, at that time the charts were full of tunes featuring lyrics about pumping this or that up and I was able to pass the time while fixing punctures by singing them to myself. Pump [...]
Touring tip #2: the Lifeventure insulated mug
When you’re heading off on a cycle camping trip, you’ll need some kind of cup to drink from. Unless, of course, you prefer the rugged Bear Ghrylls drinking-from-waterfall-with-cupped-hands look or you take your inspiration from Ray Mears and prefer to fashion a sturdy and sustainable container for your beverage by weaving together a mess of [...]
To Coventry: Birthplace of the Bicycle
Coventry has a very good claim to be the birthplace of the modern bicycle, the “Rover Safety” invented in the 1880s by John Kemp Starley, one of the city’s many bicycle makers. Someone very happy to make that claim is Steve Bagley, Head of Collections at the Coventry Transport Museum. We go for a ride around the city and a trip back in time.
Touring tip #1: Why Ordnance Survey maps are best and how to get them for free
The British Isles are blessed with the world’s best maps for travel and adventure, made by the expert cartographers of the Ordnance Survey. There’s nothing like stopping by the side of the road, leaning your bicycle up against a dry stone wall and wrestling with a rapidly, uncontrollably unfolding paper map, like a waiter at [...]
To Copenhagen, City of Cyclists
A trip to the Danish capital of Copenhagen, city of stylish cyclists, where Jack Thurston meets Mikael Colville-Andersen, the force behind Cycle Chic and Copenhagenize. We talk about how a single street photograph set him on a new path of bicycle advocacy, fashion and city planning consulting. And lots and lots of blogging.
A Century of Italian Cycle Sport
At the start of the second week of this year’s Giro d’Italia, we take the long view of cycle sport in Italy with John Foot, professor of modern Italian history at University College London. His book Pedalare! Pedalare! tells the fascinating story of how Italy fell in love with the bicycle and how cycle sport took a central role in national life.
Dunwich Dynamo XX: 30 June 2012
“I pushed my soul in a deep dark hole and then I followed it in.” A line sung by the young Kenny Rogers in 1967, the summer of love, over a psychedelic haze of backwards guitar, feedback and acid trips. It brings to mind my first Dunwich Dynamo. If it felt like a journey into [...]
Merckx, Merckx, Merckx
Cross Elvis Presley with Muhammad Ali, raise him in a grocery shop in post-war Belgium, put him on a bicycle and what do you get? The greatest cyclist of all time: Eddy Merckx. Cycling journalists Daniel Friebe and William Fotheringham have both treated us to new books about Eddy Merckx, the Cannibal, winner of 525 professional races, five Tours de France, five Giri d’Italia and countless Classics. He was world champion and broke the hour record. We talk about his career, his motivations and the challenges of telling the story of the greatest racing cyclist who ever lived.
Voting Bike at the London Mayoral Election
Bike blogger Mark Ames (ibikelondon.blogspot.com) joins Jack and Jen to talk about this week’s elections for London Mayor. Is there a cycling vote? Which candidate is best? Views from blogger Danny Williams, journalist Sonia Purnell, Julian Sayerer of Londoners on Bikes and Mustafa Arif of the London Cycling Campaign
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