Jan. 14, 2008. Visiting Eddy Merckx in Belgium

It was for a feature, and Graeme Freestone-King, one of the most generous men in cycling, drove me there. The pay-off was meeting the great man himself, easily the “winningest” cyclist of all time, to borrow a phrase from William Fotheringham. Whether he is the greatest remains a healthy debate, but I am not in doubt. Just check his palmares. Exceedingly unlikely to ever be matched by anyone ever. In person, I detected a kindness, and a shyness that belied the Cannibal reputation. But he oozed with native diffidence and that sort of oddly continental political air that is impenetrable to the Anglo-Saxon mind. The enigma tag works.

Sept. 23, 2006. London League Round 1, Cyclocross at Eastway

My first bike race, age 34. I did it on a stripped down Dawes audax bike with a steel frame and the wrong, single sided road pedals. I came 72nd out of 78. Three weeks later Eastway closed forever to make way for the 2012 Olympics. A very mixed outcome if you were aware of enormous enjoyment-to-cost ratio that this old bomb site had achieved since 1975.

Dec. 2007. Fausto Coppi fixie

I bought a scarlet red Fausto Coppi fixie frame from Brick Lane Bikes, built up to my own spec. It was a converted road frame made from Columbus Nivachrome. I then rode it daily to Shoreditch High Street, the length of Hackney, and played my own small role in bringing the track revolution to the street. Unlike any other bike I have owned, I cannot imagine selling it under any circumstance. Riding fixed is a parallel universe ruled by extraordinary purity. Gears seem dirty by comparison.