Except obviously he didn’t.

OK, there’s a very slim chance he did but he probably didn’t.

Anyway, what he definitely did do was to write a review of the Tesla Roadster in the Mail on Sunday’s LIVE magazine which included a lefty baiting rant about hating herbal tea drinking cyclists and an anecdote about parping his horn at a group of cyclists as he silently sped past in the electric sports car. The sheer shock of him tooting his tooter, according to his story at least, forced the unsuspecting riders off the road into the hedge.

Sadly his version of events have been deleted from the Mail’s Website so I stole them from elsewhere:

Twenty minutes into my test drive I pulled round a leafy bend, enjoying the birdsong – and spotted those Spider-Man cyclists. Knowing they wouldn’t hear me coming, I stepped on the gas, waited until the split second before I overtook them, then gave them an almighty blast on the horn at the exact same time I passed them at speed.

The look of sheer terror as they tottered into the hedge was the best thing I’ve ever seen in my rear-view mirror. I think this could be the car for me.

Brilliant, James. Just brilliant.

And his article has caused an ugly storm on the internet. Thanks to the wonder of Twitter and seemingly all the internet’s cycling Web sites every British cyclist has now read the article and become outraged by his now deleted words. In fact the shock of reading the article was so great I sprayed my Clippers Green Tea with Echinacea all over my keyboard!

Did it Really Happen? Did it?

Now, I realise this fact will amaze and shock you in equal measures: I’ve never met James Martin – but its hard to find anyone who’s not on HRT with anything nice to say about him.

Take the British Courts, for example. They ruled he was a liar. Back in 2008 his former stepmother sued him and won damages after extracts of his autobiography were published in a paper in which he labelled her the “ugliest women he had ever met” – oh, and he wrote some nastier stuff about her being a terrible witch of a stepmother that wasn’t as school boyishly funny so we’re under playing that.

However, what with this being the Daily Hate Mail I suspect that, as inappropriate as his comments were, James’ article was somewhat playing to the crowd. Was his encounter with the cyclists simply an exaggeration to add a touch of spice to his review? From my experience of Daily Mail readers, the tale of James’ Mr Toad antics could only have raised more self satisfied guffaws from the breakfast tables across the Home Counties if it had turned out the cyclists were, in fact, disabled, illegal immigrants.

Of course that doesn’t excuse him. His words were at best ill-judged and at worst an irresponsible admission of law breaking. Nor does his subsequent “sincere” apology – although apologies phrased as “Do you lot not have a sense of humour or what?” never seem particularly sincere to me – provide him with a get out of jail card.

But his claim that it was just a joke only leads me to believe that James either has a very strange sense of humour or he made the whole story up.

54,00 Complaints

What’s interesting about this affair is how similar it seems to – the lazily named – Sachs-gate scandal that quite literally rocked the Daily Mail’s readership to its very stone-hearted core last year and yet how different the response of the Mail is.

On that ocassion the Mail embarked on a moral crusade to defend public decency – sadly it was too late to defend the chastity of Manuel’s Satanic Slut granddaughter, Georgina – which resulted in 54,000 complaints – 53,999 of which came from readers who hadn’t even heard of Russell Brand let alone the broadcast itself before the crusade began. But it also resulted in Brand and the controller of Radio 2 resigning and meant that 100’s, if not 1000’s, of Bridge Clubs had to cancel matches as their memebers stayed at home to write “Outraged of Eastbourne” letters to the Beeb.

Fast forward 12 months and when the Daily Mail publish an article – written by a BBC employee – containing a remorseless admission of “driving like a nutsack” that could, without exaggeration, caused someone’s death, they’re keeping tight lipped.

Harassment of the not so vulnerable elderly – oh no, no, no. Harassment of vulnerable cyclists- oh yes, yes, yes.

Has the Mail started a crusade to sack James Martin from its paper? Has the Editor resigned? Have they even mustered an apology? Has a monkey flown out of my butt?

This hippocracy is undoubtedly down to the Mail not really giving a flying fuck about cyclists – although if the truth be told, they didn’t give a flying fuck about Andrew Sachs or his granddaughter either they simply had an axe to grind with the BBC and a paper to sell. And they seem not to give one about honesty, transparency nor the decency that they previous did so much to defend. By demonstrating a level of journalistic integrity that you’d wouldn’t expect from a shoddy blogger they surreptitiously removed the offending words from the online version without so much of a by your leave, and closed the comments section’s flood gates to stop the deluge of complaints.

So James Martin might not have fucked your granddaughter but he surely deserves the sack from the Mail just as much as Britain’s cyclists deserve an apology from the paper.

There’s something undeniable naff about folding bikes. Endearingly so, maybe, but naff none-the-less.

Naff. Naff. Naff.

I suppose, before I go any further, I should come clean here and confess that my feelings towards folding bikes are more than somewhat coloured by the fact my sister had one when we were children. It was truly a horrorshow of a bike – some sort of Raleigh, the cream finish offset delightfully by the white wall tyres on the tiny wheels. It had molded plastic grips that after ten minutes riding made your hands feel like you’d been holding on to a pair of curling irons. It was hard to make it “go” because the lever for the Sturmey Archer was stiffer than a teenager at a women’s beach volley ball tournament and even harder to make it “stop” thanks to a set of brakes that had so little power in them pulling the level felt like you were pressing a sponge against a jelly. It had also a basket.

And worst of all, my sister – being 2 years older than me – used to regularly kick my arse on it.

So, there, now you know. Phew, that feels better.

Anyway, despite this naffness – and my deep psychological scarring – the folding bike is now more popular than ever with quite literally 60 – if not 70 – percent of doorways on every train into London now made impassable by a folding bike. All of which might be a pain in the arse for commuters without their right trouser leg tucked into their socks, but is great news for the grandaddy of the folding bike - Brompton.

What’s not quite such good news for Brompton, is that the folding bike’s image problem is compounded by the fact that it’s also British built – a fact which essentially uses the unstylish, yet powerful, thumb of bad taste to shift the bike’s Sturmey Archer hub of naffness into third. Because, and I’m wildly generallising here, British manufacturing has struggled to do the whole “cool” thing, apart from a few exceptions, which means everything seems to be a little bit, well, naff.

Look! Alexei Sayle thinks so too:

“If the British had invented the Walkman, it would have been a teak box, covered in leatherette, with the headphones out of a Lancaster bomber”

Maybe it’s our pragmatism that makes us place function over form. Maybe we’re too rational and not emotional enough. Maybe we genuinely would rather be Richie than the Fonz. Whatever the reason, while we were out taking “country jaunts” on our drab Pashley’ Roadster Classic:

Our European neighbours, the Italians, were knocking out things of beauty like Coppi’s 1952 Bianchi:

What Are You Doing There?

But in the midst of all this naffness, almost behind our backs, something unusual happened. Something completely unexpected happened. Something involving Brompton turned out to be *cool* – the Brompton World Championships.

Obviously these *cool* Championships weren’t held in Britain. The first was held back in 2006 in Barcelona by the Spanish importer of Bropmton bikes. And despite not being able to find any reports or pictures, I like to think that each and everyone of those taking part were nonchalant chicos who whilst racing through the exotic streets of Barcelona each offer a casual “Hola, guapa!” to every girl they pass. Sounds like a reasonable, yet in no way over glamourised, and highly plausible description of events, doesn’t it?

Anyway, whatever actually took place in Barcelona Brompton liked what they saw enough to bring the event back home to the UK. And – would you believe? – in the process turned the World Championships from something that was exotic and cool into something slighly less so:

After You. No, After You. No, No…

With its strict dress code of shirt, tie, and jacket the Championship was moved to Blenheim Palace – the home of the most British of Brits: Winston “Bloody British” Churchill – making it a Spanish fantasy no more but a quintessential British affair. A celebration of British eccentricity and our spiffing sense of bally-well humour.

Of course, in reality, it’s also a cynical marketing event hosted by Brompton – preaching their “brand messages” to the converted. Quite literally peddling naffness to people who are quite literally peddaling naffness. But we’re all too terribly, terribly  British to mention that, aren’t we?

Maybe the quirky rules, the location, and the prospect of another day away from the family is a spot on recreation of your average Brompton rider’s experience of community by train/bike – but it’s not mine. So here are a few ideas I’ve had to make the event a little truer to the my train/bicycle commuter’s experience:

• Before the race, the competitors are held in a cramp, smelly, and searingly hot compartment with their face pressed into a stranger’s armpit for 45 minutes.
• Instead of clapping and cheering on the participants, the crowd geer and throw insults at the riders as they pass.
• Taxis pull out into the path of riders at various points around the course.
• The event is only held if it’s raining.
• To win the race, each competitor MUST hold open a door for someone – even though you’re the one with the bike – AND have shouted “Wanker!” at someone along the course regardless whether it was actually them in the wrong or not.

Let’s hope they bring these in for the 2010 event to make it proper British, innit?

Don’t I Know You From Somewhere?

Bringing a bit of the Spanish cool to last year’s Championships was ex-Pro Roberto Heras:

What was most startling about his participation in last year’s event is just how much of an improvement to your performance an effective doping programme can really make. With it, you can win a Grand Tour, with out it, you can only finish 2nd in a fold-up bike race.

And speaking of recovering drugs cheat not performing at their best, Floyd Landis finished 25th in the recent Tour of Utah:

After being beaten by Utah Jazz’s Deron Williams in a pre-race publicity time trail, Floyd Landis carried his form into the race proper, finally being beaten by 24 other riders. Jolly good show, Floyd.