Aug 1, 2021Member-onlyTre CannoniIn the Ortler Alps in northern Italy is a minor summit called the Dreisprechenspitze: the ‘three-language peak’. For hundreds of years this tiny mountain was a tripoint — where Switzerland, Italy and the Austro-Hungarian empire met. (The languages then were German, Italian and Romansh, still an official language of that…Mountains6 min readMountains6 min read
Apr 21, 2020Member-onlyClearing the snow on the Col de la BonetteTaken from the first chapter of Higher Calling (published Yellow Jersey, UK, 2017 / Pegasus, US, 2018) — an exploration of road cycling in the mountains, and what pushes us to ride very slowly uphill . . . I am drinking a coffee made for me in a Ricard glass…Travel31 min readTravel31 min read
Nov 6, 2019Member-onlyBunker ResearchThe hidden history of modernism in the mountains Extract from the Isola Press book by Max Leonard, with photos by Camille McMillan, available here « Over the years I had puzzled out a good deal in my mind, but in spite of that, far from becoming clearer, things now appeared to me more incomprehensible than ever. The more…Alps3 min readAlps3 min read
Aug 20, 2019Member-onlyArthur Beale: Supplier to the StarsThere was a time when if you wanted rope — rope to moor a ship with, rope to tie supplies down, rope to save a man’s life — there was only one place to go… The rope-maker now known as Arthur Beale has existed in London’s West End since the…History4 min readHistory4 min read
Jan 7, 2019Member-onlyDoing that Riviera HustleShe wore a tux and I put on my favourite green dress. Then we left the hotel and went out for some of that Riviera hustle. At least that’s how I think it happened, I forget. I asked myself if I was feeling lucky. Most of us spend our lives…Cycling11 min readCycling11 min read
Jun 29, 2018Member-onlyA conversation with Paul FournelI talked to the writer Paul Fournel in Paris in 2017, just after that year’s Tour de France. Some parts of this were published in Mondial magazine issue 6. — Your book — ANQUETIL, ALONE — I get the sense that it’s been a life’s work, in the same way that cycling is a whole life’s work. Yes, this is exactly that. I have nothing to add! You’ve been thinking about Jacques since you were very little…Cycling17 min readCycling17 min read
Jan 7, 2016The Map Is Not The TerritoryOn the occasion of the British Library’s Magnificent Maps exhibition in 2010. ‘I am told there are people who do not care for maps, and I find it hard to believe,’ wrote Robert Louis Stephenson, recalling the moment he began to conjure his most famous story. ‘As I pored upon…Maps5 min readMaps5 min read
Jan 6, 2016Member-onlyRené Vietto and the Missing ToeOriginally published at rouleur.cc. October 1988. A crowd of 500 people waits on the 1,002m Col de Braus as Jean Vietto, only son of one of the best grimpeurs of all time, rides a yellow René Vietto-branded bike to the top. This remote col outside Nice was where René sealed…Cycling20 min readCycling20 min read
Jan 6, 2016The Gaul, Pierre KraemerOriginally published at www.stinnerframeworks.com. A friend messaged me from France last week: “The memorial on Mont Ventoux has fallen on its face,” he said. “I thought you’d want to know.” This was news but only, really, to me. Because he wasn’t talking about Simpson. If it had been the memorial…Cycling5 min readCycling5 min read
Jan 6, 2016On Stopping and GoingOriginally published at www.stinnerframeworks.com. There has been much standing around and scratching of heads in the ski resorts of the Alps and Dolomites this winter, a lot of heads upturned to azure blue skies, too much wondering where the snow has gone. As their year begins, however falteringly, our time…Travel3 min readTravel3 min read
