A random selection of contemporary and classic cycling terms explained with varying degrees of lucidity. Some may give the impression of being entirely made up, which is probably because they are.
‘Pedalling in Circles.’
These days you seem to hear this expression quite frequently. A good cyclist should ‘pedal in circles’ ( if you have standard cranks, you may be thinking it’s pretty hard to cycle in other shape and you’re right)
When asked for advice about Cycling, Fausto Coppi replied ‘trying pedalling harder’. This is the essence of pedalling in circles – keep those pedals moving.
The actual idea of pedalling in circles, is that you don’t just push on the down stroke, but also pull on the way up. So your exercising pressure for the full 360 degrees of the pedal rotation, and not just the 180 degrees going down. An advantage of using clipless pedals and toeclips.
‘Hold your Line’
You’ll hear this in road races or very serious chain gangs. The idea is that when going round corners you need to hold a set distance from the edge of the road so you don’t force other people onto the other side of the road. Though people who shout ‘hold your line’ tend to have a very good capacity to sneak past you just after saying this.
To ‘Half Wheel’
If you’re in the opposite of a serious chain gang, you may hear stately club members ask you not to ‘half wheel’. This is when an overeager cyclists keeps trying to push the pace of the group higher by riding ahead and making people lift pace to keep up. Take it easy and keep to the groups pace even if it is 13mph downhill.
‘Good Cycling technique’
It may seem curious you can have a good cycling technique. If you watch a race, you may hear people say ‘he looks good’. I guess this is one of the advantages of cycling, you may be really rubbish, but as long as you ‘look good on the bike’ then it counts for something. No-one’s really sure what it means to look good on a bike, but a lack of swaying around all over the road helps.
Djamolidine Abdoujaparov is widely considered to have lacked good cycling technique for his propensity to frequently miss the finish line, but instead race into crash barriers at 50mph bring down the rest of the peleton. Not only that, but people couldn’t even spell his name. If you really want really good cycling technique try having an Italian name.
‘Shelled out the back’
When you can’t stay with the leading group and you get dropped, you are said to have gone out the back – dropped to the back of the peleton. Probably destined to ride with the gruppetto or if you’re really dropped you could end up in broomwagon.
‘Bonk‘
A real cyclist is one who doesn’t snigger when someone mentions the word ‘to bonk’. He knows it is that painful experience of running out of food whilst on a ride and collapsing on the ground.
Guttermeter
This is the distance of a cyclist from the side of the road that will cause a motorist to aggressively sound their horn. This can range from 15cm for Audi drivers to 30cm for sanctimonious Daily Mail readers who will also try telling you you should be paying road tax.
Carbonometer
The proportion of a bike and its components made of expensive carbon fibre. The higher the carbonometer, the more money you have spent and the less excuses you have for not being a good cyclist. A person with a carobonometer of over 95% has a high chance of being a ‘polisher’
A Polisher
A polisher is someone who buys the most beautiful bike and spends many hours stripping and polishing his bike. In fact the polisher will spend so long cleaning his bike, he never actually gets round to riding it, but it is very nice to look at.
The Beardometer
In the glory days of cycling, there was a theory that you could test the type of cyclist by the length of his beard. The longer his beard, the more slow miles the cyclist will have done. However, this was theory deemed to be no longer practical when in the 1980s, female Russian sprinters started developing beards, allegedly due to the use of certain drugs.
The Golden Age of Cycling
‘In those days you could race on the A1 and do a dead stop in the middle of the road.’
Cycling was always better in the past. This is an unalterable law of cycling. In the good old black and white days, there were no drug scandals, no cars on the road, just happy cyclists riding 150 miles a day, fuelled by nothing other than jam sandwiches, a pot of tea and good old British sunshine. In the mythical days past, the local club cyclist thought nothing of doing a 12 hour time trial for fun – nothing too competitive mind you - sill time for toast and teacakes at lunch time. Not only that, but even the tubular tyres were better in the old days.
I’m sure in 50 years time people will be saying – the 1990s were the golden age of cycling, so many scandals to make the racing more interesting.
A bicycling challenged person
A person who is bicycling challenged isn’t very good at cycling, but always has ready reasons as to why this is the case. This is rarely because he can’t pedal very fast, but often because he has a very low carbonometer.
The Red Light District
This is the time and place when you think it is OK to cycle through a red light. This can range from never – even in the middle of the night when no one is around - to those who will ride through a red light on the assumption that the articulated lorry will be able to do an emergency stop to let you through.
‘Vintage bike’
A vintage bike can mean one of two things. It can mean it is a classic Pashley made before the war, and lovingly maintained and upgraded. Also, a vintage bike can mean that old banger in the garage that is impossible to ride because it has all rusted away, but you can’t bring yourself to throw it away as it is well ‘vintage’.
The Wall.
In pro cycling the wall can refer to that point when you just reach your limit and you can’t go any further. For non-cyclists the wall also represents that point where you just can’t ever get round to repairing a puncture and so your bike sits unused in the garage for several years – until it becomes a ‘vintage bike’
A Head Turner
Some people ride bikes for speed, others for utilitarian devices. A head turner is one which is beautiful, aesthetically pleasing. It may not be fast, it may not be utilitarian, but it will encourage people to look round with either open or sneeking admiration.
Bagging a Road Sign
If you don’t quite make it as a pro tour rider, you can always comfort yourself with the prospect of beating a few club riders to local village signs. Not only do you gain temporary bragging rights, you can also gain points in an imaginary green jersey competition. The prospect of bagging a road sign also enables you to justify bringing out your state of the art carbon fibre bike on winter training runs when the road is full of salt water.
To Put the Hammer Down
Ride really fast and try and drop people. Make sure you don’t put the hammer down at the wrong time or to the wrong people. It can be embarrassing to put the hammer down when riding with your grandma only for her to catch up with you on the next hill.
Involuntary dismount
i.e. fall off. Involuntary dismounts frequently bring much mirth to those who witness your action. But, strangely, their mirth fails to lessen your pain of picking up road rash and sitting in a pile of horse manure on a country road.
Bagging Out.
Plan to go out on a ride with friends, only to see them drop out at last minute. Some of the best excuses for missing local training ride – fixing bike, watching tour to learn race tactics.
‘And Karpets is Curtains’
The best thing about the tour, is you get some memorable quotes. Vladimir Karpets is a a good cyclist, but one day he went ‘out the back’ and what better description than saying ‘Karpets is curtains’. This means whenever you get dropped, you also have to think of a witty repost to describe your demise. Like ‘well, Armstrong’s legs are not looking so powerful today‘
There was a rumour Vladamir Karpets was going to get signed by the Belgian outfit ‘QuickStep’ but there was concerns they would walk all over him (hat-tip Eurosport)
OK, I won’t inflict any more puns on you.
Though if you have your own cycling term, you’ve always wanted to explain feel free to leave comment.
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Very funny read