DOPE PEDALLERS

International cycling events are proving addictive to growing numbers of South Africans; risked saddle sores to find out why

Head down, pedalling furiously while squinting through the pouring rain to avoid obstacles in the road ahead, I could have been cycling anywhere. Visibility was atrocious.

But wait, what’s that old building emerging through the drizzle on my left? Isn’t it the Tower of London? A couple of minutes later, on the right, there’s St Paul’s Cathedral, followed by Trafalgar Square and the Houses of Parliament. This is no time to be staring at the tarmac.

It wasn’t supposed to be wet. It hadn’t rained in the British capital for eight weeks and weathermen had been predicting that cyclists taking part in last month’s 160km Ridelondon event would roast in temperatures of up to 38°C.

Doctors were warning of severe health risks for the 25,000 participants, some of whom would take more than eight hours to complete the course.

Actually, nearly 100,000 people took to the streets of

London on two wheels over the July 28-29 weekend for what is billed as the world’s biggest cycling festival. Most rode shorter distances. But the centrepiece was the Sunday 100-miler, starting at the Olympic Park in London’s East End and finishing outside Buckingham Palace, on Pall Mall. In between, most of the race is through the leafy lanes of the county of Surrey, southwest of London.

Organisers say 80,000 cyclists applied for the 25,000 Ridelondon spots. At prerace registration, it was clear that a healthy number were South Africans — their nationality given away by their accents or their cycling jerseys in the national colours.

A growing number of SA cyclists are riding overseas, and not just in the UK. Ridelondon is only one of five annual international mass-participation cycle events organised by the World Association of Cycling Events, or Wace.

Our own 109km Cape Town Cycle Tour, formerly the Argus, is one of them. With 35,000 riders taking part each March, it’s the biggest timed event in the world. New York’s TD Five Boro Bike Tour takes participants through 64km of the city on the first Sunday in May. It’s the only one of the Wace events in which riders are not timed. It’s also one of only two events each year (the other is the New York Marathon) for which the entire city, including its iconic bridges, is closed to motor vehicles.

The Granfondo Campagnolo Roma is a tour through 120km of history in and around Rome that takes place in October. It starts outside the Colosseum, where gladiators fought to the death 2,000 years ago.

The route, parts of which are cobbled, includes Lake Albano, where the pope has his summer residence.