Originally Posted by
Mark Dominck
Late 60's for fun no pay or support I read that Tour De France book by Bill and Carol McGann and they showed these tough old guys battling it out with all the elements on gravel roads,snow, rain no rain gear or allowed any help from anyone or disqualified, strict rules
In other words, you have no experience as a professional bike racer.
Shall the TdF organizers start milling the mountain roads to recreate the conditions way back when before many of the mountain roads were actually paved? How about going back to the days before gears? You had a rear wheel with one cog on each side. One larger than the other. When you hit a mountain climb, you stopped and flipped the wheel around to the larger cog. Definitely force everyone to go back to racing in wool. What sort of rain gear do you think existed back then?
BTW...Ever see this image of Andy Hapmsten during a stage of the 1988 Giro that he won?:
