Jocelyn Lovell on Torchy

Jocelyn Lovell, Canada’s star of the track cycling during ’60s and ’70s, met Torchy Peden on a few occasions. Here are Lovell’s words on the six-day racer as told to CCM editor Matthew Pioro.

When you say Torchy Peden, I don’t think of him being tall, or think of his bushy eyebrows or his red hair that he still had back then in 1975. But I think of dancing with his daughter. Although Torchy was good looking, he wasn’t as good looking as his daughter.

I met Torchy for the first time in 1964 at Maple Leaf Gardens. When I met him, I shook his hand and stared at him. I didn’t say anything. I was too afraid. [Lovell was in his early teens at the time.] Then, I met him in 1974. He carried my bike to the start line at the world championships in Montreal.

In ’ 75, we were on our way to Alamosa, Colo. We’d come back from the world championships in Rocourt, Belgium. In order to maintain our fitness for the Juegos Panamericanos [the Pan American Games] that were being held in Mexico City that year, we were going to go to Colorado to acclimatize at high altitude. But we stopped in Chicago on the way and raced there. I think I got second, which is losing. There were a bunch of us on the Canadian cycling team, including me and Ron Hayman.

So up walks Torchy Peden. He lived and worked in Chi-Town at the time. He did work for ccm but then it was Schwinn. He introduced himself. I knew him, but I wasn’t too sure if he remembered me. But he said to all of us, “It would be my honour if I could have you boys around for dinner.” Remember, this is the guy in Canada’s Sports Hall of Fame, gold-plated ccm in a Plexiglas case, the whole thing. Well, I jumped at the chance. Torchy Peden! You know, everyone else had something else to do.

He came around later and picked me up. At his place, his wife made dinner and his daughter was visiting from Hawaii. They were fantastic people.

After dinner, we went downstairs and Torchy showed me some of the stuff ccm had made for him. They made triangular-shape crankarms. They made special pedals for him because of his wide feet. They were the first to make cotterless cranks. There was a rim that was shot off his bike by the Mafia. If you didn’t win or lose a race that you were told to, the rim or tire would get shot off your bike. This was in Madison Square Garden where the Mafia would meet. It was the place to make deals and bets at six- day bike races.

I did ask him if, back then, you know, if he had used any “go fast,” any “stuff.” He said, “Well, we don’t often talk about this. It was agreed amongst ourselves that we’d never talk to anybody about this. I’m telling you in that same vein, but sometimes we used to take just half an ounce of cognac with about three raw eggs. We’d have that sometimes. But you wouldn’t be doing that out in the open.”

And then I went out dancing with his daughter at some local outdoor place for a couple of hours. It was nice.

Torchy was a fine, fine fellow: a towering hulk of a man.