Re: [CR]Old vs New

(Example: Events:Eroica)

From: "flying_scot" <flying_scot@btopenworld.com>
To: <classicrendezvous@bikelist.org>
References: <c4.2068f96.2d1e05bd@aol.com> <009701c3cc00$f7eee240$22e0fea9@man> <008301c3cc10$3c6b16a0$f40d8751@oemcomputer> <00e501c3cc34$2991e9e0$22e0fea9@man> <001201c3cc5b$6896a820$d4d07ad5@oemcomputer> <004501c3cc8f$8b11e020$22e0fea9@man>
Subject: Re: [CR]Old vs New
Date: Sun, 28 Dec 2003 00:08:24 -0000


Peter Wrote ;
> I knew you'd pick Scotland as the venue.... I'll take any hill you throw at
> me, but wind... especially North of Scotland wind.... urrgghhh. Does this
> mean that you Scots eschewed Sturmey-Archer's products well in advance of
> those foreigners living in say Lincolnshire? I suspect you did. Then again
> it's not exactly flat around Nottingham... were Cyclo-Benelux gears
> reprobate in the staff cycle shed at the S-A works?
> Yep, that's us hard Scot's - Biting winds, pissing down with freezing rain... so bad, the Romans built a wall keeping the English safe from us, then gave up and returned to Rome and don't we love it ! - emm no not really, but remember I'm Scot's and unless anyone's going to pay for my ticket, the chances of racing in Washington are about as slim as me visiting my cousin whose lived and worked there for the past 18 years. Bruce and I could get free accommodation, but we'd have to sell his prize 1930s Elrick, my 1937 Flying Scot (and/or his kids and my mother-in-law) to afford the air fare... As far as south of the border is concerned in Ye Olde England, you'll have to ask Mick Butler to chime in here, about all those English hardmen....You know the ones that are good time trialists but show them a hill....and well enough said. (I'm sure Tom Simpson must have had a granny living in Scotland).

Slightly more on topic. Derailleurs first came to the Scottish club scene circa 1926/27 hot from the lands of our Auld Alliance partners. Racing with Sturmey's seem to have been popular in Scotland until about 1937ish. Post war "racing" clubmen used derailleurs emulating their French and Italian hero's (Anything Italian was particularly in-vogue in post-war Scotland through the 40s and 50s perhaps due in some small part to our large ex-pat Italian community) Sturmey's were the reserve of the CTC club tourist folk and the pre-war die-hard guys who could see no better. By the time I got my first 27" wheeled "racing" machine circa 1968, sturmey's were the reserve of butcher boy's, grannny's shopper, eupemistically entitled Raleigh "Sports Tourist" lightweights, and the horror of horrors, the Raleigh Chopper.

Bob Reid Stonehaven Scotland (slightly warmer here than in Iceland)