One More Kilometre and We're in the Showers

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A social and cultural history of cycling in post war Europe seen through the eyes of a veteran racing cyclist. Written with great literary and historical relish, One More Kilometre examines the spread of cycling's popularity, how it developed into a sport and how the bicycle has changed people's lives - all viewed through the eyes of a seasoned 56-year-old racing cyclist/art crtic who keeps 11 racing cycles in his garden shed and who never cycles less than 10,000 miles a year. The book starts with the 1950s, regarded as the golden age of cycling, and when the author, an unhappy communist child, first discovered cycling and its emancipating powers. Progressing through four decades of cycling social history, the author examines cycling as a Continental phenomenon; the rise and fall of the Tour de France; the lives of the great trackmen; cycling in its domestic form; and cycling for fun.