Roule Britannia

William Fotheringham. Yellow Jersey Press 2005. 290 pages paperback, £15.99. ISBN0-224-07425-3

When the English cycle-sport authorities decided back in 1894 to appease the police and the general public by voluntarily going underground, they dealt a blow to all aspects of cycling in Britain from which it never recovered. For 48 years Britain was deprived of the road racing which flourished all over the rest of Europe; we never developed a professional class, the classics, the big professional tour which everyone else had and has. Only when lack of cash or petrol rationing forced them did the British take up cycling en masse – and they came in their thousands even to local track meets, lined the roads four deep at road race finishes in the 1950s. When everyone rode a bike, they knew what it took to ride one fast. But greater prosperity and the advent of the Mini in 1959 finished utility cycling in Britain, and it's been downhill ever since. What kind of an idiot would choose to cycle when he might drive?

Without bloody-minded Percy Stallard and the BLRC there might never have been open-road racing in Britain, far less a British presence in foreign stage races. Sure, the valiant Charlie Holland, really an amateur, lasted 14 days in 1937, without support, before he was eliminated by punctures; but he was strictly a one-off, not the first of many. It would be 1955 before Britons tried again. The Hercules venture (only seven of the 10 riders were theirs) was premature – they should have waited another year. They stuck their transfers on French-built frames because their own were so poorly made. The manager was an ex-trackie, completely out of his depth, and Dunlop's tyres were unmatured rubbish. The great Ian Steel, on paper the strongest and most experienced stage-race rider in the squad, a Viking among Hercules, was conned out because his face didn't fit. All in all, despite what appeared in our press, it was a very British cock-up. But it launched Brian Robinson – the sage of Mirfield rightly gets a whole chapter to himself – and legitimised future British participation.

It was more than difficult: the Tour's post-war national team formula made life all but impossible for a nation with so few experienced professional roadmen. But the re-introduction of trade teams in 1961 made things worse: there would never be a GB trade team up to the job, and from here on it would be a story of individuals talented enough to hold down a place in a French or Belgian squad on their own merit – even as domestiques – and hard enough to live with the demands of the race. ‘I had no idea men could do this to each other,' said Robinson after his first Tour. They were either driven, heroic, or both. Only very determined men could leave home for a hard and unknown future, for uncertain rewards and probable disillusionment. Back home their achievements (and some of them achieved much) would be largely ignored by the media and the general public. It was, as Fotheringham says (he did it himself and came home), ‘a step in the dark, a leap of faith. You got the ferry; you hoped it would work out at the other end.'

Subtitled ‘a History of Britons in the Tour de France', the book is just what it says it is on the cover. It's not a history of all the Britons in the Tour, but every one of the 51 gets mentioned, and it does include Michael Wright, the non-English-speaking British Belgian who won three stages and got a best placing of 24 th in 1965. (He doesn't get a mention on Bromley's matching video, except in a list on the sleeve). The layout is generally chronological: 1955, the problem with national teams, Simpson, Hoban, the others (Sherwen, the very talented Graham Jones, Elliott, Brian Smith, Deno Davie et al), Yates, Millar I, the ANC squad, Yates, Boardman, Millar II. Apart from 1976, at least one Briton started in every Tour from 1955 to 2003.

As we've come to expect from Fotheringham, the research is thorough and the writing excellent. There are two swatches of very nice pictures in monochrome and colour. An appendix lists all the riders and their performances by years and there's a good index. It's a great read and an essential part of the historical record. A few minor errors: Ian Steel won the Peace Race in 1952, not 53; Indurain, we're told, ‘never tried' the Hour Record: in fact, he not only attempted it but held it for seven weeks in 1994, with 53.04 km.

Ramin Minovi