NED BOULTING FORCE OF NATURE
PERSONAL TRAGEDY HASN’T DAMPENED CHRIS BOARDMAN’S FIGHTING SPIRIT
Chris Boardman is mighty. Like an oak tree, he is a considerable chunk of nature, a thing that requires no further explanation. Two months had elapsed since I’d last seen him. Two months since the moment our director came through to our commentary position on the Tour de France to tell David Millar and myself of the terrible accident involving Chris’s mother Carol, and how he had run (literally) to a waiting car and left France. Now I was readying myself for a pre-arranged encounter, in front of a packed and expectant crowd at The Cycle Show in Birmingham. I was unsettled to be seeing him in these circumstances, so publicly, for the first time since he lost his dear mother.
The irony of his loss was breathtaking. Chris’s voice is the clearest, sanest, and most urgent of all when it comes to making cycling a safer, more pleasant, more everyday experience.
I don’t think he was certain what he was getting himself into when he first took up some ‘freelance’ advocacy work a few years ago. It seemed like the right thing to do, I guess. It probably wasn’t too dissimilar from his decision, in 2004, to join the ITV Tour de France team, a year or two after retirement as an athlete. I don’t think Chris expected to become so passionately immersed in broadcasting, something that’s now a source of great enjoyment to him.
So his subsequent engagement with the world of transport infrastructure, governmental departments, political ambition and lobbying was initially simply an interesting new avenue. What he couldn’t have known is how it would consume him. His ambition for this country’s (mostly) urban environment is boundless. His commitment, enthusiasm, knowledge and persuasive powers are exceptional. Have you heard him on the radio? He is a master of the calm, disarming, contextualising response. Very deftly, almost invisibly, he just obliterates the very foundations of his naysayers’ arguments. The helmet debate? Boardman wins. Cyclists jumping lights? Boardman wins. The cost? The practicality? The benefits? Boardman wins, wins and wins again.
He has become this good as an advocate because he is leading the debate, shifting the parameters, expanding the horizons of the issue and driving it forwards. Unlike many other retired athletes, who are simply hired to espouse causes, Boardman owns this issue.
Then, out of the blue, one July afternoon, his phone relayed the kind of sickening message that we all fear. He simply removed his earpiece, grabbed his bag from the TV truck and was gone. That journey home to his mother’s bedside must have been endless.
Weeks later, I feared Chris might never resume his role as cycling’s most articulate advocate. I wondered if his mother’s death, on the road, on her bike, in a collision with a vehicle, would take the wind out of his motivation. It would have been totally understandable if he had decided to leave his work at that. Knowing his love for pottering around the woodland by his house, I could see him retiring all over again, to spend more time with his tractor.
How wrong I was. He’s back, and angrier than ever. Perched on a stool, the Birmingham crowd hung on his words, and I noticed an unaccustomed resoluteness to his position.
“When they come at me now with the victim-blaming arguments, you know, ‘Cyclists need to wear helmets, hi-vis, lights’ it’s like asking someone you’re shooting at to wear another bulletproof vest,” he breathes deeply.
“I have to step away. I go into the woods and chop logs. I chop lots of logs. It’s given me sciatica.” He rather theatrically clutches his back.
I can imagine the scene. Boardman, with an axe, letting loose his frustration on an innocent log at the inability of some people to understand the simplicity of his argument, and the massive gains for such a small investment, in terms of health, the environment, and just the sheer livability of places!
But there is no wasted energy here. With each fall of the blade, another idea will be sharpened. He was a carpenter first, then a racer, then a researcher, broadcaster, businessman and campaigner. He doesn’t do unproductive. I’m glad he’s back in the saddle.
There is no wasted energy here. With each fall of the blade an idea will be sharpened