Courage on a bicycle

Anyone who’s ever learned how to ride a bicycle has fallen off.

You know what that feels like: the hard, hard asphalt as gravity brings you down, the inevitable scrapes and bleeding, a dazed sense as your body reacts to what feels like a punch from Mohammed Ali. For most of us, it’s a rare occurrence, with minimal consequences. Sometimes, it happens miles away from where you need to be, so you have to climb back on and ride through some discomfort until you get to where you can rest and heal.

For professional cyclists, falls are part of the game. Taking risks is in their blood, and it’s rare to get through an entire career without breaking something, having surgery, rehabbing, and often, astonishingly, getting back on the bike within weeks, to the rough-and-tumble: the hair-raising 80-kph descents, the agonizing 20% climbs, the uncertain and sketchy road conditions; in the wet, in the dry, in the cold, in the heat, in the rain, in the snow, in the wind (tail-, head-, and cross-); on granite cobblestones, on the strada bianca, on the one-lane mountain tracks of Italy, France, and Spain with their 180-degree hairpins, on flat roads, on off-camber curves; amongst the road furniture of islands, medians, raised tram tracks, slick painted lines, tight-radiused roundabouts; avoiding unleashed dogs, unattended children, drunks running alongside, and idiots taking selfies in the middle of the road; avoiding, too, the caravan of cars and motorcycles that surround the riders like a movable feast, or is it a hell on wheels?

I fell in love with cycling because of a fall. I’d followed casually in the Armstrong years (although I do remember seeing Greg Lemond’s astonishing time trial into Paris in the 80s), but I didn’t love it, truly, until some anonymous rider in the Paris-Roubaix race in about 2006 fell hard on the granite cobblestones after taking a ludicrous 90-degree bend, bounced a few times, and then immediately remounted and took off down the road. No leisurely rest on his back like in a football game (American or soccer), no time to waste. Just right back up and go, go, go.

In cycling there is lots of talk about suffering: the sensations in the legs, a good day, a bad day, bonking, cycling squares, on the rivet, in the tank. We talk about the domestiques who protect their leader from the wind, from the vagaries of the road, from their own stupidity and that of those around them. They drive hard so their leader can emerge from the chrysalis on the last climb of a 5-climb day fresh and ready to attack. They fall back, and like the lanterne rouge (the last rider on overall time, currently Ji Cheng, the first Chinese rider ever in the Tour) make their way to the finish line minutes behind on a stage, hours behind in the overall race.

And then we have a day like today, the 11th stage of the 101st Tour de France.

It’s already been a chaotic race, with lots of crashes causing top favorites to abandon, including defending champion Chris Froome and past champion Alberto Contador. Seasoned veterans like Fabian Cancellera threw in the towel, getting ready for other races more suited to their abilities. Hanging in there is the uncharismatic but amazing Italian, Vincenzo Nibali, who boldly took the yellow jersey in Sheffield on stage 2 and then motored his way across the cobblestones on stage 5, channeling the Flemish greats as though to the manor born.

On that day, the young American rider Andrew Talansky, nicknamed Pit Bull for his tenacity, fell on a 90-degree turn in the cobblestones. Not a big deal, but every fall accumulates on the 3-week odyssey that is the Tour de France, and he lost time. Talansky was the leader of his team for the yellow jersey, and had great hopes for this year’s Tour after finishing 10th last year.

The next day, he fell again, 200 meters from the finish in a sprint where he lost his concentration and drifted into the line of another rider, Australian Simon Gerrans; or did Gerrans ride into his line? In any case Talansky took a very hard fall, as he did on the next day on a wet descent.

He held in there on the next two days, not comfortable, losing time to Nibali (who lost the yellow jersey to Tony Gallopin of France on Sunday and won it back Tuesday with a decisive stage win).

And on the 11th day, they rested.

The odd part about rest days in the Grand Tours is that sometimes riders come out of them with more pain and less power than they had before. Or the body, no longer flush with adrenaline, signals defeat.

And so it was today with Andrew Talansky, on a moderately strenuous climbing day. His back was in pain, and he quickly fell behind the peloton, first by 5 minutes, then 10. At that point, he gets off his bike, and talks to his Director Sportif, Robbie Hunter, a recently retired rider. We don’t know the exact details of the conversation, but basically Hunter told Talansky that as long as he came in within the time cutoff of about 35 minutes after the stage winner, he would still be in the race. No chance at yellow in Paris, but maybe he could make it to Paris. Or maybe just to Oyonnax, the finish of today’s stage.

He got back on, tears in his eyes.

His domestiques had been released to try for a stage win, so he was alone for the last 50 km of the race. He persevered, finishing 32 minutes after the stage win by Gallopin, within the time cut.

The fans were waiting, and cheered him home as though he were today’s winner.

And then, the astonishing thing happened: Talansky spoke briefly to the press. When asked why he persevered, he said, “Just for my teammates.” When asked how much pain he was in, he said, “A lot.” Tears in his eyes. More, perhaps, like a boy than a man, but a man in spirit.

It’s not often that a team leader suffers for his domestiques, instead of the other way around. Today, at the Tour de France, Talansky did.