POWER struggle at British Cycling threatens members' rights

TWO former high-ranking officials of British Cycling have expressed their concern that the balance of power will shift from National Council to the Board if draft proposals designed to appease the government are approved at a hastily arranged Extraordinary General Meeting scheduled for July 22.   The England Regions with by far the largest share of membership stand to lose out the most.

It is feared that the new look Board will allow government to exert greater influence on the sport. And that the Board may no longer be answerable to the 125,000 strong membership represented by National Council, an historic right of this membership organisation.

At present HQ representatives are touring the Regions to outline details of the draft proposals. This is to enable members to mandate their representatives on how to vote at the EGM.

It is vital the membership insist that capable cycling officials are elected to that Board, say my two sources. 

But the response from members was poor at the South Region meeting last month, with only six people out of a membership of 11,000 turning out.

I understand that a cycling media reporter  was denied sight of the proposals when he asked BC HQ for a copy.  Which begs the question what are they afraid of?

Is this the fallout from last years’ bad press and the grilling by a Parliamentary committee which made Britain’s number one Olympic Sport a laughing stock?  

There was the furore in the Press over the legally permitted use of an otherwise banned powerful drug by Bradley Wiggins for his breathing allergies just before three of his Tour de France starts - including the historic 2012 edition which he famously won.

It was established this was legal. But was it ethical?  Given Sky’s oft repeated mantra that they do it clean, they only had themselves to blame for the public interest in this story. 

There followed more angst  when suspicion was raised – in the Daily (Hate) Mail -  casting aspersions on the contents of a jiffy bag flown from BC headquarters in Manchester to Team Sky in France. UK Anti-Doping began to investigate “possible wrong doing”.

BC officials appearing before the Parliamentary Committee pleaded that they were bound by confidentiality not to reveal the jiffy bag’s contents. But this only further heightened suspicion.   Finally Team Sky revealed that the contents were an over the counter medicine for Wiggins’ allergies.

But when asked for the medical records to support this claim, the MPs learned from BC’s Doctor that his lap top containing the records had been stolen! (Unbelievable)

 

On top of this, British Cycling were facing accusations of sexism and bullying by a number of leading women internationals, and were finally forced to admit it.

So all in all, a public relations disaster for British Cycling and Team Sky who made things worse by their poor handling of the whole affair.  

So that brings us to the here and now.

The hastily arranged EGM in July appears to have been called to pacify UK Sport and Sport England who not surprisingly want BC to put their house in order if they are  to continue to receive the £millions in annual funding from the public purse.  

However, it is feared the changes called for in the board’s structure will lead to a greater focus on elite cycling and the Olympic medal programme than on development of the grass roots cycling.

Who are my two anonymous sources?  Let’s just say they played a major part in dragging the national governing body out of crisis some 20 years ago, helping to set British Cycling on course to become the most successful UK Olympic sport of the new Millennium.

Here is what they told me:

The current BCF Board and the current Senior Management are fiercely preaching major changes to the make-up and constitution of the BCF.

Regional meetings are currently taking place with the Board advocating the below mantra. All these changes are being introduced to appease both UK Sport & Sport England.

 British Cycling/BCF is a members organisation (currently membership 125,000) and it's objects are 'to promote and control the sport and pastime of cycling in all its forms amongst all sections of the community', 'to support and protect the interests of their members, by all such lawful means as the National Council of the BCF think fit'

The current Board and Leadership just want to secure it's funding from UK Sport to concentrate on its elite programme concentrating on the athletes/coaching at the top of the pyramid.

These are the changes that the Board is rushing through with an EGM taking place on July 22nd:

As it stands, the National Council is the superior democratic body in BC and comprises the elected representatives of the members, through their clubs and up through the elected National Councillors.  In essence, the Board is ultimately answerable to the National Council.  The proposals being advanced by the Board will reverse this relationship.

The proposal to halve the number of National Councillors makes sense to enable better informed discussion – but only if voting rights are removed from Board members.  There is also a discussion being prompted about the rights of Past Presidents to attend and vote at meetings of the National Council.

There is going to be a discussion about imposing terms of office on National Councillors.

The proposed new structure of the Board includes only four members elected by NC but gives Scotland and Wales the right to appoint one Director each.  This is a fudge to get a total of six Board members from the cycling community (out of 12) because UK Sport and Sport England will, apparently, allow us to elect no more than one third of the total. 

What it does do, however, is give the right to elect or appoint one director to Scotland (who have eight percent of the membership) and to Wales (who have five percent) while also allowing both countries to vote for the other four places at National Council – reserving NONE AT ALL FOR THE ENGLAND REGIONS despite England holding 87% of the membership.

  If the sport has to accept this fudge then the least it can do is ensure that only the England Regions are able to vote for the four available positions. 

The President will no longer be a voting member of the Board but will be entitled to attend Board meetings and participate in discussions.  There is an on-going discussion about the term of office of the President.

The Chair will be an independent and appointed position – so as the Chair always has a casting vote the six “cycling” representatives on the Board could, in theory, be out-voted on a contentious issue.

The remaining Board members will be four independent/appointed plus the CEO.

All of the elected directors presently on the Board are due to stand down at this year’s National Council and only George Gilbert can stand for re-election.  This presupposes that Messrs Alasdair Maclennan and Nick Smith will stand down and be appointed by Scotland and Wales respectively.

My other source reiterated what is said above:  

He said the proposals do give cause for alarm and if Regions and Home Countries are to approve them they will need to be clear what they are voting for.  It is true that the balance of power will shift from National Council to the Board – with the members, clubs and Regions only able to elect four of the twelve members of the Board. 

The balance will be somewhat restored by giving Scotland and Wales the right to nominate one Board member each but this may not sit comfortably with the England Regions, given that Scotland accounts for only eight percent of the total BC membership and Wales accounts for just five percent. 

 As it stands, that leaves the England Regions, who together account for 87% of the membership, with no right to directly nominate Board members, while having to stand alongside Scotland and Wales in voting for the four elected members.  It has been suggested that, at the very least, only the England Regions should be entitled to vote in that election.

The CEO will automatically be a member of the Board and the remaining 5 (including the Chair) will all be independent appointments, no doubt all influenced to a greater or lesser degree by UK Sport and/or Sport England.  Given that the Chair will have a casting vote on any contentious issue the balance of power will sit with the independent appointed directors.

Sadly, our status with our funding partners seems to have fallen to the point where we cannot resist in whole or part the conditions they are imposing on us.  At the same time, Rowing have been allowed to re-appoint a Chair who comes from the sport and the Members Council of UK Athletics remains the senior body, to which the Board reports .

There are other things in the proposals to worry about but, at the end of the day, they are likely to be approved because of apathy among members, clubs and regions (only

six attendees at the South Region meeting out of a membership of over 11,000) and the pressure and speed with which this is all planned to be implemented.

Assuming the proposals are approved at the EGM all of the elected members currently on the Board will step down at National Council in November and only George Gilbert can put himself forward for re-election.  It is going to be vitally important that the members/clubs/regions identify and elect form among their number people who know the sport and are prepared to represent them actively and knowledgeably on the Board, even when those representing the cycling family are in a minority.

Cycling 'vision' remains distant dream as government fail to improve funding

The £1.2bn government funding announced last week for their Cycling and Walking Investment Strategy (CWIS) is all smoke and mirrors.

This is the sum offered a year ago when it  was widely criticised as being too little.
Yet this time the cycling campaigners have hardly raised their voices, seemingly resigned to battling on as before, hoping that one day they might at last get  ministers to make up the deficit.
In the meantime, they are praising the government's "vision".

 The £1.2bn is to be spread over five years and includes £800m contributed by Local Authorities - who may or may not pay up because they’ve always blown and hot and cold over cycling.  

This leaves us with the £316m spread over five years which the Department for Transport is putting in. Peanuts. It works out at £65m per annum.

Roger Geffen, Policy Director at Cycling UK, knows the funding is totally inadequate and hints at such on his blog.

https://www.cyclinguk.org/blog/roger-geffen/cycling-walking-investment-strategy-published-now-lets-get-putting-vision-practice.

Here it is in a nutshell.

Under the title: “Reasons to be positive (despite the funding deficit!)” Geffen admits that many will expect Cycling UK to be “sharply critical” of the government’s £1.2bn funding.

Amazingly, he says they’re not!  And this is why:

He says this is the first time the Government has legally committed to “any kind of multi-year” investment in cycling and walking.

He also lays great store by the government’s “vision” for cycling and walking.

I think he’s just being brave. 

Meanwhile, in Cycling UK’s magazine emailed to members, everything about the Cycling and Walk Strategy is wonderful, there are no negatives, it’s all a brilliant “vision”. Only Geffen gives a hint of the truth. It begs the question, was he being leaned on not to spell out the truth, that the money will simply not deliver the “vision”.  

British Cycling, too, are majoring on the fact that the cycling strategy itself is a very good one. Which it is on paper.  But like Cycling UK, British Cycling plays down the funding deficit which remains exactly as it was when announced a year ago for the Consultation period. Then BC called it “Laughingly low”.

If you expected their policy advisor Chris Boardman to scream blue murder, like he did when Cameron said he wouldn’t provide cabinet backing for cycling, you will be disappointed.

He’s almost mute, as though struck dumb by the utter stupidity of the government not to back a policy which is good for the health of the nation.

You might just catch a sense of disappointment if you read between the lines of what Roger Geffen, Policy Director at Cycling UK, says on the Cycling UK missive emailed members: 

"Cycling UK has spent years campaigning for a strong and well-funded Cycling and Walking Investment Strategy, so we’re pleased to see it finally published two years after it was initially announced.  A big ‘thank you’ is due to the DfT officials who have put a huge amount of effort into it.

“Now the hard work begins. With national as well as local elections now looming, Cycling UK will be doing all we can to build the cross-party support needed to strengthen this investment strategy over time, while supporting councils in making best use of the resources available, as they start bringing this vision to life.”

“Strengthen the investment…make best use of the resources available”!!!!

He was more forthright when I called him.

Geffen told me:    “The CWIS contains some really excellent ‘vision’ statements….it’s just a shame the Government’s funding allocations don’t remotely match the fine words.”

He also confirmed what has been known for a number of years, that funding for cycling is to get progressively lower, while funding for roads is to expand by many £billions.

And he reiterated what he told me last year:  “It’s pretty clear that at some stage Government funding for cycling and walking will drop below £1 (per head of population in England) – a tenth of what Goodwill and Cameron both publicly declared as the amount they wanted to make available for cycling alone. “

The desired figure is £10 per head. Anything less and the vision remains a dream.

 Here’s what Chris Boardman said on British Cycling’s website.

 “The first ever cycling and walking investment strategy for England should be a watershed moment for active travel in this country, giving the government a clear leadership role. Andrew Jones and Chris Grayling deserves praise for getting this published and I look forward to working with their Department to hit the targets that have been set,” said Boardman.

"It is not clear, however, how the target to double the number of journeys made by bike will be met with the funding levels set out in the strategy.

“We will be calling on the *chancellor to make the necessary funding, starting at 5% of transport spend, available to local government so that they can invest in truly ambitious plans to a develop world-class cycling infrastructure and networks to meet these targets.

"It is not solely about money, policy initiatives such as updating the Highway Code - as called for by our Turning the Corner campaign - will help to support local infrastructure plans by helping create better bike lanes and safer junctions. This can be started now.”

 www.britishcycling.org.uk/campaigning

*Chris, a word in your ear about the Chancellor, Phillip Hammond. He was the guy who, in the newly elected Cameron led government, killed off Cycling England.

Many will surely be puzzled as to why Cycling  UK and British Cycling have rolled over and accepted what was unacceptable to them a year ago.

Then they had urged ministers to reallocate to cycling some of the £15bn  earmarked for the Government's Roads Investment Strategy.  

They wanted £10 per head minimum called, as called for by the APPCG. That means £450m annually for England outside London, or £2.25bn over the five-year period.

However, it should be even more, at least £3bn, and preferably nearer £4bn.

That is the sum needed if investment levels are to rise from an initial starting point of £10 per person for cycling, with enough funding to cover walking as well. Below that level of funding nothing much happens to stimulate cycling.

The government ignored the call. They failed to come up with the cash then and they have failed to do so now.

Funding remains at just over a £1 per head of population, instead of the £10 called for. This is well below what we’ve been told is required to emulate the admired Dutch cycling infrastructure.

I’ll leave you with the government policy statement – their “vision”.

“We want to make cycling and walking the natural choices for shorter journeys, or as part of a longer journey.

 “The Government wants walking and cycling to be a normal part of everyday life, and the natural choices for shorter journeys such as going to school, college or work, travelling to the station, and for simple enjoyment. As part of our aim to build a society that works for all, we want more people to have access to safe, attractive routes for cycling and walking by 2040.”

The good thing here is that cycling strategy is now officially part of DfT policy, writ large in the annals of transport planning, whereas before it was not.

These are, I believe, important levers put in place before the upcoming election.

Cycling UK and British Cycling pay praise where it is due, thanking

the cycling team in the DfT who worked their magic on the politicians. 

But the spell they cast didn’t extend to squeezing any more money out of them.

The huge deficit which remains for the Cycling and Walking Strategy means it will struggle to get off the drawing board.

 “British Cycling is sexist” Cooke tells MPs

Former Olympic and World Road Champion  Nicole Cooke has told the Parliamentary inquiry  investigating  “possible wrong doing” in British Cycling that she is sceptical of Team Sky’s explanations for the contents of the Jiffy bag and Wiggins use of TUEs allowing him the use of an otherwise banned drug.

But what shocked MPs was her insistence that British Cycling is sexist, and has always provided a disproportionate amount of support to men than to women.

In so saying, she has re-ignited the embers of the fire British Cycling hoped they had doused last year, when an investigation found ex-British Cycling technical director Shane Sutton guilty of using sexist language towards Olympic team sprinter Jess Varnish.

And it begs the question, are the chickens at last coming home to roost?

For here is the great irony.   When Cooke fulfilled her dream and carried off that historic gold medal in the 2008 Olympic road race at Beijing she had done so in the absence of any cohesive plan for women’s road racing.

 And yet it was this performance which  launched British Cycling on its famous medal winning trajectory at that Olympic Games which has brought cycling £millions in Lottery funding and £millions in Sky  sponsorship. It led to the creation of Team Sky but the there was no such deal for the women, despite the explosion in talent here in the UK

Even BC acknowledged that Cook’s victory in Beijing was down to her own hard work,  enterprise and training perfected over the years, and had very little to do with British Cycling’s still evolving World Class Performance Plan which was designed for  and has underpinned the track team’s successes this Millennium.

For whatever the undoubted merits of the Plan - fashioned around the track because of the greater medal winning opportunities to be had there than on the road - it was nevertheless Cooke’s road victory at Beijing which provided the spark for the British track team’s unprecedented gold medal haul which elevated British Cycling to number 1 UK Olympic sport.

When Cooke gifted British Cycling with a unique double two months later by winning the world road title, the national body once again bathed in reflected glory. 

Now, here we are, more than eight years on, and still women’s road cycling is the poor relation to the men’s.

Cooke’s claims reinforce those already made by the current crop of British internationals - Olympic medallists Lizzie Deignan and Emma Pooley who say the problems go all the way up to the UCI.

Cooke has never been afraid of expressing an opinion, never afraid to mince words with the national body or fellow riders if something irked her.  She was dubbed  “ Her Majesty” by her compatriots!

I recall this self-assured immensely talented 15-year-old schools champion after her victory in Milton Keynes confidently   declare her aim was to win the Olympic title one day.  She knew what she wanted.

She will tell you - is reminding us now - she did it her way because the national body was always more concerned with the men.

British Cycling insists this has changed now. Now they have a strategy to encourage women in the sport.

And they report that in the past seven years 254,000 women have taken up cycling.

British Cycling now has 20,000 female members – up from 3000 in 2008.

They also have 1,100 female coaches.

This is all to the good. But for grass roots to develop they need something to inspire them, which was the story, fed Sky when they first backed British Cycling in 2008 and so Team Sky was born.

British Cycling should show some initiative and twist the arm of their new backers - the bank HSBC – UK - and get them to put in a few £m by sponsoring a British professional women’s road team the equal of the men’s outfit at Sky. 

Until then they do that, the Tour of Britain will remain the torch bearer in the struggle for equality in women’s road cycling.  They had the foresight to introduce a women’s professional Tour of Britain in 2014.

Just a jiffy

JUST A JIFFY…

While browsing in one of London’s temples to cycling excellence – Rapha’s cool cycling shop in the West End – I pondered is this as good it gets?  I don’t mean their coffee, which is excellent. Neither do I mean the smart range of clothing which is very expensive – imagine crashing and writing off such costly kit?

No, it’s the future of the sport I worry about.  More specifically it is the damage done and being done by the Team Sky TUEs and mystery package stories under scrutiny by government and UK anti-doping.

All those wonderful performances by British riders these past 16 years have attracted some two million newcomers to the sport. Now these allegations of “possible wrong doing” have put cycling’s reputation on the line.

On Monday, at the Parliamentary committee enquiry, there came a chance to clear the air.

But the explanations provided by our sport’s big wigs failed to satisfy and they found themselves sinking deeper into the mire.

After 10 weeks of prevarication and two hours of cross examination by the Parliament culture, media and sport select committee, they finally got the answer as to what precisely was in that jiffy bag.   

Suddenly, after a lot of stonewalling, Team Sky boss Sir David Brailsford spilt the beans.  It was revealed in a jiffy - if you like!

The contents of the infamous jiffy bag flown out to Team Sky with coach Simon Cope at the 2011 Criterium du Dauphine was apparently nothing more terrible than a legal medication called Fluimcil, which is used to rid the airways of mucus. It was for Sir Bradley Wiggins’ use.

And we are all asking ourselves, well, OK, why didn’t you say so before all this shit was kicked up?

They couldn’t, it was claimed, because of medical confidentiality. What?

Or, as the comedian Tony Hancock would be heard to cry when he couldn’t quite believe his ears, “Oh, dear, OH DEAR, oh dearie me.”

After several years of unprecedented success by British cyclists amassing those few dozen gleaming Olympic gold medals, plus the crème de la crème, that historic first Tour victory by a British rider courtesy of Wiggins in 2012, followed by three more Tour victories to revelation Chris Froome, cycling is in the spot light as distinct from the limelight. Cycling is in the dog house.

The Jiffy bag story came about following a Daily Mail allegation a few months ago revealing that a package was delivered to Team Sky in France in June, 2011 and it was claimed that the team official carrying it didn’t know what was in it.

That set tongues wagging. Would you or I accept being asked to carry something through customs if we didn’t know the contents?

That story poured fuel onto the fire already raging over earlier story of Sir Bradley Wiggins’ legal use of a banned steroid in 2011, 2012 and in 2013. 

Eyebrows at UK Anti-Doping were now raised and they launched their investigation into “an allegation of wrong doing in cycling.”

Eventually, Parliament decided to join the party.

This is the Team Sky TUES story, which came to light when confidential medical information was hacked and leaked to the world by the so-called Fancy Bears - thought to be Russian. They were reacting, it is presumed, in revenge for all the flak hitting Russia over WADA’s (World Anti-Doping Agency) accusations of state controlled doping which led to calls for Russians to be banned from the Olympics. Their message is take a look what’s going on in the rest of world, not just in Russia.

TUEs (Therapeutic Use Exemptions) permit an athlete to take, for medicinal purposes, a banned drug he would otherwise not be permitted to take.  

In my view, anyone who needs medicine to enable them to continue competing should not be competing, they should be resting.

In Wiggins case the drug was a powerful steroid known to enhance performance. Wiggins was permitted this drug to treat his breathing allergies, we are told.  So its use was legal. But was it ethical?

Immediately, the news provoked outcry because clearly Team Sky had moved from being whiter that white to being tinged with grey.

The question everyone has been asking is, was it ethical for a team fond of telling the world they ride clean, then to allow the use such a powerful steroid?  

When asked if by taking this drug for his breathing allergies could Wiggin’s performance also have been enhanced when he won the 2012 Tour.  Brailsford said he couldn’t know if it was or it wasn’t.   So that was the first great unknown. And with it came the doubt.

And then along came the second unknown, the Daily Mail story of a jiffy bag flown out to France for Team Sky. What did it contain? No one was saying.  So more suspicion. More doubt.

And then, under pressure from the MPs, Brailsford claims it contained a harmless medicine.

Understandably, he is now being called on to provide independent evidence in support of this claim.

Otherwise this story will run and run.

Especially as the Daily Hate Mail have now got their hooks into Brailsford.

They are alleging that he tried to persuade them not to run story in the first place by offering them another story instead.

Whatever the truth in this, it pains me that it is the Mail putting our sport on the rack. Very clever paper, the Mail, combining good informative features with malicious deceit, such as the grossly exaggerated stories of migrants flooding into Britain which influenced the Brexit vote!

But back to this public relations disaster facing Team Sky and British Cycling.

There can be no doubt that the biggest sports story of the New Millennium, British Cycling’s stupendous rise from nowhere to top UK Olympic sport. And then Team Sky gave us Tour de France champions, all this in one decade. Now it has been overshadowed by – by what exactly?

By allegations of wrong doing but with no actual proof of wrong doing. Certainly Team Sky have spoilt their copybook by allowing a rider legal use of an illegal (in sport) drug. And British Cycling and Team Sky between them have made a mess of their handling of the Jiffy Bag story, giving the impression that they had something to hide?

Yet neither Team Sky nor British Cycling has been found to have broken the rules, no one has failed a dope test.

Brailsford told the committee he is confident that when Ukad report on their findings, it will be clear there has been no wrong doing.

In the meantime, doubt remains.  And doubt – unless cleared up – can be poisonous.

The truth is out there

The only government money provided for cycling has gone to sport, commented Cycling UK’s website recently, but in the recent budget no direct money was announced to make the roads safer for cyclists.

They were referring to the £24m funding to  Yorkshire to host the 2019 World Championships. There is no suggestion that money should have gone instead to a cycling strategy. The sport is welcome to their £24m, which reflects Britain’s new standing in the world of international cycling.  It’s a tidy sum for the World’s organisation to play with, but the fact is,  you wouldn’t get much of a cycle lane out of it!

To fund a decent cycling policy for the UK  needs at least £500m per annum. That’s what is being asked for. It may sound a lot to you and me  but it is only fraction of the £multi Billion transport budget.

But the point Cycling UK were making was that once again, cycling gets no direct funding within the Chancellor’s pledge of £1.1bn to upgrade local roads. They sounded surprised!

Surely, they must know the government’s game by now.  They must know the TRUTH.

Transport is all about cars. Cars win every time. Trains have recently started to get a look-in with increased investment. But cycling has to fight for road space, and here and there is given a bit of cycle lane to go and ride in.

Instead, hard-working campaigners  win our admiration for continuing to build and reinforce the excellent economic case for investment in cycling. Sadly, they are going round and round in circles. They hope that common sense will one day prevail and Britain will get a cycling infrastructure to match the excellent Dutch system.

Pigs might also learn to ride bikes.

The campaigners surely know the bitter truth.  And yet they always feign surprise when cycling is almost completely ignored in each and every budget.

I don’t pretend to know how to change this. But I do feel  that a start could be made by coming clean and telling the growing cycling population  how the odds have always been stacked against a half-decent cycling policy ever getting off the ground in the UK.  

Everyone needs to brush up on their UK transport history.

The current campaign of urging MPs and councillors to back cycling is a waste of time. It will only ever go so far and nowhere near far enough in bringing about the integrated transport system this country lacks.

This is largely because Britain has adopted a car-based policy to allow people the freedom to drive everywhere at any time.  So the very idea of promoting cycling to reduce car dependency is alien to the ideology which under pins transport thinking.

To delve into the transport history you can do no better than read  Christian Wolmar’s recently published book “Are Trams Socialist…Why Britain has no transport policy” (reviewed in my blog May 26 this year).

In this he quotes Nicholas Ridley MP as saying:

“The private motorist wants the chance to live a life that gives him (sic)  a new dimension of freedom – freedom to go where he wants when he wants and for as long as he wants.”

This was the attitude, reinforced by a powerful motoring and roads construction lobby,  which underpinned transport ideology, and still does.

Wolmar tells how, only a few decades ago, in order that people should be able to drive everywhere they want to, there  were  plans to transform our cities with inner urban motorways until it was realised that by doing this, whole city centres would have to be destroyed and rebuilt.  Besides,  there could never be enough parking provided for those who wished to stop and view the desolation. The one city centre they managed to wreck was Plymouth.

So that idea was kicked to touch. And instead….they’ve come up with nothing, still holding to the dream that driving is king, and promising somehow to relieve traffic congestion with road “improvements”.

London alone is setting the benchmark for improvements in cycling infrastructure, but this is down to the Mayor, nothing to do with government policy.  Another mayor could easily rip them out!

Cycling campaigners need to find a new approach. They could start by telling it like it is, explaining what drives government thinking on transport.

They need to read Wolmar’s book. He’s got it nailed, and he’s positive, too. Me, I think it’s a hopeless situation whereas he thinks government can be made to change, as they have in their approach to rail travel.

But there is no sign of any positive thinking yet for cycling.

As if to illustrate this, Chancellor Phillip Hammond in his recent budget announced a £b1 upgrade for local roads.  Theoretically, this could lead to making those roads safer for cycling, too, but we can’t bank on it. In fact there no was direct money awarded cycling.   No surprise there.

Hammond was the man who killed off Cycling England when David Cameron was prime minister. Cycling England had pioneered over two dozen cycling demonstration towns which showed that small but effective schemes would encourage more people to cycle instead of drive. 

Clearly they were too successful for their own good and  I fancy that is why the government closed them down!

Meanwhile, the improvements promised for the road link between Oxford and Cambridge (Cambridge was one of Cycle England’s successful cycling demonstration towns)  might work against cycling. The university cities have done much to improve cycling conditions and reduce car dependency.  But now there is fear that the fine balance between car and cycle achieved will be upset as the improved road link pours more motor traffic into both cities.

Nothing changes.

But  to bolster our hopes, or  more likely torment us further with a vision of Utopia,  the cycling press runs yet  again another article  extolling the virtues of cycling conditions in the Netherlands, where 28 per cent of the population ride as against only 2 per cent in the UK. 

I refer to the inspirational piece in the December-January issue of Cycle, the magazine of Cycling UK, written by chief executive Paul Tuohy.  He gives  us hope!

Until  says he just wishes he’d had our Ministers of Transport or even the PM, Theresa May, with him to show what has been achieved for cycling in Holland. You’re wasting your time, Paul. They want out of Europe!

Surely it’s now obvious that no British government will ever create anything remotely like the Dutch have done, and put cycling at the centre of a nationwide integrated transport system – unless there is a massive change in thinking at the core of the establishment.

It can only happen here if cycling becomes an election issue. But given the current crisis caused by Brexit, the public may have more important things on their minds.

SHORTS? You must be joking!

What’s with the shorts in winter?  Shorts worn by men, walking around the shops, or out cycling, on a freezing cold day?

It’s a fashion thing, right?  Must be.

It irritates me, for some unfathomable reason.

Take the walkers.  The gentlemen I see wearing shorts in winter on the high street and in the shops are mostly over 30, some much older, old enough to know better.  

It begs the question, is the older man attempting to reclaim the ground from that equally annoying trend among the yoof, the wearing of trousers hanging off the arse?  Don’t see this so often nowadays.

They looked as if they had done a load.  It forces them to walk with a certain unnatural stride which requires each leg to move slightly outward, in an attempt to give the jeans purchase on the thighs.

They would frequently have to yank them up by the waistband to stop them slipping down completely.    

This was very cool, apparently.

The trousers around the arse thing came about, I believe, from America of old, when prison inmates were denied belts and braces in case they hung themselves. So they were forced to shuffle about with trousers slipping down their backsides.

But I wonder if perhaps this trend is dying out.  Is the slipping trouser trend on the wane to be replaced by the shorts in winter trend among the older population?

Even more intriguing is the theory (gaining ground) that those same yoof have morphed into the older people we see wearing shorts in winter today.   It’s the same lot out to regain attention with a new trend. And it has spread like wildfire, giving a new lease of life to those who catch the bug, including those nearing pensionable age. 

What does the shorts guy look like?

A typical shorts guy will walk about town wearing a hefty  lined coat or  jacket, a scarf wound around his neck to keep out the chill, wool hat to keep  his brains warm,  gloves to look after his digits, then to confound the wintry look,  he wears not full length kecks, but big shorts with, usually unattractive legs protruding. Not even socks. He may wear flip flops.

It’s as though he can’t make up his mind whether to go the ski-slopes or the beach.

Weird.

Are they being macho and showing off?  Is the message, look at me, a tough guy who doesn’t   feel the cold? In which case, why the heavy jacket, the wool hat and the gloves.  Why not just do the summer thing and wear a tee shirt?

It’s a mystery, this trend.

Which brings me to another mystery, concerning bike riders who wear shorts in the cold weather.

It’s a new thing among cyclists, this wearing shorts in the winter.   I don’t ever recall seeing any club rider in shorts in the winter.

I’m going back a few decades!

In the pre-thermal top days when you wore big sweaters and blanket lined army combat jackets, you would resort to stuffing newspaper up your jersey and tear strips of newspaper to line your shoes, which were nothing like the marvellous works of art which grace our feet today. And you wore full length plusses, warm diamond patterned stockings to the knee.

Quite simply, we took our cue from the more experienced club riders. We copied them. They dressed for the weather and the newcomers in the club did the same.

Would I be right in thinking that most of the shorts-wearing cyclists are new to the sport and have never been a club, never benefitted from the knowledge?

Many thousands were attracted to take up cycling following the 2012 Olympics in Britain, which resulted in a huge upsurge in the numbers taking to two wheels and racing off without any tuition or guidance whatsoever.

So are they simply copying their heroes of Le Tour and wearing shorts to show off their muscled legs, unaware that come winter, the top guys wouldn’t be seen dead in shorts, at the risk getting a slapping from their coach?

Take my experience last Sunday morning.

The day dawned bright and beautiful. The autumn colours were splendid.  There was a heavy frost and it was very cold. I felt it all the more cold because this was sudden change from mild weather earlier in the week.

The sky was deep blue, the air was clear and the sun was shining. Excellent conditions to be out, cycling, running, whatever took your fancy. Provided you were correctly dressed, which in my book is to wear warm kit top to bottom. And not shorts!

Now I can forgive runners in shorts because you generate so much more heat more quickly when running, and besides, there is not the same chill factor because you are going as fast as on a bike. But I never went out running in the winter wearing shorts.

The majority of riders I encountered  on this lovely, cold winters morning were kitted out in thermal tights and tops, gloves, while many wore overshoes, the better to block out the chill blast. There was a fairly strong wind blowing sending leaves tumbling along the roads.

But quite a number of riders were in shorts, including five who left me for dead on a climb.

I used to be known as a bit of mountain goat. Club hill champion, me, way back. Hope Mountain in North Wales, 1.75 miles of 1-in-6.

I’m not bothered about being dropped on climbs now. These guys are mostly half my age. 

Now most of the “shorts guys” I saw – like the walking bare leg brigade – were well wrapped up on top. Each wore a thermal jersey, some had a lining under the helmet and they wore gloves and overshoes. So clearly they were keen to keep those parts of the body warm.  So top heavy in clobber, but lightweight from the waist down. Thin shorts and bare legs!

I don’t get it.

I recall racing early season when it can still be quite cold to be wearing racing shorts. To counter this we would rub warming embrocation into our precious legs.  I don’t suppose the riders I see out have taken any such precautions and to my mind, if you are going to ride bald in this weather, you should.

No you shouldn’t!  Just cover up, for Christ’s sake.

One of the guys in shorts who shot past me at speed – very impressive - was only wearing a short-sleeved jersey. It was a faded emerald green. It bore the legend “Ireland” in big letters across the back.  They breed them tough in Ireland!

At the café at the top of the climb I spoke to a rider who, like me, was sensibly dressed up top to bottom with warming clothing. I pointed to the guys in shorts.

“This lot in shorts should be arrested and charged with abusing their own bodies,” I suggested. “They’re mental,” he said.

Unless perceived wisdom has changed, I always understood that muscles worked better when warm and would be prone to injury if you pushed too hard when it was too cold. So always to keep legs covered unless it was warm day.

Besides, when you become cold, your body must burn more energy to keep you warm which means that by the day’s end the shorts brigade will be lot more tired than they ought.  Or dead.

I once read of a guy – not a cyclist - who wore shorts on a very cold day and he collapsed. The autopsy revealed a heart condition he had been unaware of. The cold had put him under more stress than his ticker could cope with.

Meet Team Asthma

As the controversy lingers on over Bradley Wiggins legal use of the banned drug triamcinolone to treat his hay fever/allergies, let’s take a break from our British misery and take a look at Norway’s!  For they, too, are embroiled in doping stories.

In Norway, there has long been speculation that use of performance enhancing drugs for medicinal purposes is being abused in their national sport, cross-country skiing.

It is claimed that half of the large and dominant Norwegian national cross-country skiing team are asthmatic and are treated for such. It has earned them the moniker “Team Asthma”, according to a national television channel.

However, breathing problems aside, the Norwegians have been killing the opposition for years and so this has given rise to the oft asked question about asthma medication containing salbutamol, which is this. Could its use as a treatment for breathing difficulties also enhance performance beyond what would normally be expected?

That’s the conundrum with banned drugs athletes may be permitted to take for medicinal purposes during competition.

Why bother you with this story? Well, it so happens that in our house my wife and I are fans of the international cross-country skiing season. As soon as the cycling road season is over on Eurosport, we look forward to the contrast provided by this winter sport held under  blue skies against a backdrop of snow white forested slopes and mountains. So clean and refreshing….!

Cross-country skiing is huge in Norway and their massive team dominates the season.   They have far more athletes than Sweden, Finland, Poland, the USA, Canada, Russia, Italy and France, who also boast top names. Britain enjoys a small presence, too, albeit down the rankings.

It is interesting that cross country skiing has borrowed from cycling and since 2006-2007  the  annual Tour de Ski, one for men, one for women, is held over six to nine stages during December and January, in the Czech Republic, Germany, Italy and Switzerland.

There is also a series of city centre sprint races which makes good TV. They also appear to have been modelled on cycling and attract huge crowds.

Now two of the Norwegian stars, it has been revealed, have tarnished their image over the, allegedly, inappropriate use of medication.

Both are national heroes.  The first to be named was Martin Johnsrud Sundby who has been stripped of his titles and banned for two months for taking “excessive” does of asthma medication.

WADA, the World Anti-Doping Agency, has now sharpened the rules on how much salbutamol, a substance contained in the medicine Ventolin, one gets to inhale.

From January 1, 2017, an athlete may  take 800 micrograms and not more often than every 12 hours. That dosage is considerably less than Sundby took, according to a WADA director, quoted by Agence France Presse (AFP) covering the story on NRK, the Norwegian national broadcaster.  

The Wada director said Sundby took three doses totaling 15,000 micrograms over five hours before a competition. That amount is roughly 20 times as much as the newly set permissible dose of 800 micrograms every twelve hours.  

So that’s Sundby in the doghouse.

More recently,   Norway’s top woman cross-country skier Therese Johaug has joined him. Like Sundby, Johaug is a household name and she has tested positive for  the steroid clostebol .

Johaug is a seven-time world champion. She was Olympic gold medallist at the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics, and took silver and bronze medals at the 2014 Games in Sochi.

In her defence, the Norwegian ski federation said that the drug was in a cream for her badly sunburnt lips - and given to her by a team doctor. 

Apparently, neither he nor Johaug spotted that the package – bought at a pharmacy in Italy - was clearly labelled with the legend “Doping” - circled with a red line struck through it!

It is being claimed in both cycling and cross-country skiing circles that professional competition can be so brutal as to induce asthma. Skiing races are often held over several consecutive days in temperatures of  -15 to -20C. (Any lower than -20 is bad for health and the competition is called off).

However,  claims of induced asthma have drawn scathing comments from  coaches who say they don't believe it. And some asthma sufferers say that going for a blast on skis in the freezing cold has actually reduced their asthma symptoms.

The story gets darker. AFP referred to another “unpleasant   revelation” into a “now-stopped clandestine research project”. This project involved some 40 healthy skiers, swimmers and athletes being given asthma medication despite not obtaining permission from the authorities.