Our first planning meeting in Distrikt took place on 17th of January, an important date for another reason; something that had sounded completely crazy became concrete … or tarmac.
For a couple of years, Gary Verity and what some people thought of as his spectacularly deluded Welcome to Yorkshire team, campaigned to bring to the region not only the biggest annual sporting event in the world, but one so essentially of another nation. Shortly before Christmas we heard that the 2014 Tour de France would start in Leeds and spend two days looping around the region. On 17th of January they announced the route.
Shane and I stood in the driving snow with more serious cyclists than us, watching suits and gowns arrive past the fire eaters for a celebratory dinner. We strained to hear rent-a-celeb-ratories, on that little screen to the left, saying how wonderful all this was for Yorkshire. It was a naff event and we left before the fireworks.
But the Tour coming is wonderful. Last year’s TV Olympics were pretty amazing, but this is amazing on an entirely different scale. To experience the Tour I won’t have to enter a lottery open only to those with the sponsor’s plastic, I will simply walk down to the bottom of my street.
The Tour has had its effect on Le Jaunt too. An idle fancy, a bit of fun for mates, has become even more fun – though I expect a call soon from the Tour’s logo police. And for anyone who cycles round here, however occasionally, however much we rely on muscle memory, the Tour coming has reinforced, or reconnected us with something essentially of this region, from Lal White, through Beryl Burton to all the people on bikes who all-day-everyday, quietly populate the roads round where we live.
This makes us shy about the limited ambition of our jaunt, but a little more confident about sharing it.
Sounds like a great trip. Good luck, we will be keeping an eye on your blog.