Bikie

Bikie lays bare the true heart of cycling. Every grass-roots enthusiast, keen racing man and elite professional has one thing in common: he loves his bike and riding it. The author pinpoints the source of his love, tracing its development in the individual, how it draws people into a community and then a tradition creating a whole worldwide culture to celebrate that deep affection for what is a technological marvel and transcendent experience. Great champions, too, are inseparable from their bikes. They merge into them, becoming a composite image, figures of myth. As well as exerting an emotional hold, cycling, in its famous races, also mounts a living proof of exemplary virtues: courage, perseverance and self-sacrifice gives us, in fact, a glimpse of the higher reaches of the human spirit. There is a sense of this mythical realm in every pedal turn, for once astride a handbuilt lightweight we are put in touch with the greatest riders of all time.Bikie is the story of one man s passionate involvement, but in its forthright sincerity it goes to the roots of what we all share.