CYCLING.

Auckland Star, Volume XXX, Issue 160, 8 July 1899, Page 4 (Supplement)

CYCLING.

Mr W. G. Atack has been elected chairman of the executive of the Leajgue.of'New Zealand Wheelmen, vice !Mr W. E. J. Thompson, who resigned I recently.

A. A. Chase, the English professional, on May 9, at the Crystal Palace j made an attempt to lower the mile standing start paced record of lmin !43sec, held by J. W. Stocks. He i failed by 1 3-ssec, but succeeded in equalling the world's half-mile record 'of 54 2-ssee, and was l-ssec better than the three-quarter mile record, his time being lmin 18 l-ssec. On the I following day Chase lowered the halfmile record to 54sec.

j During last season the sum of £6427 5/9 was given away in prizes in Victoria in races decided under League rules, £1745 19/2 being allotted to scratch races. The principal winners were: R. H. Walne, £331; Don Walker, £281; W. Mathews, £278; T. S. Finnigan, £240; S. GorI don, £224; W. C„ Jackson, £211. Nine others gained £120 and over. It is noticeable that not one of the big I prizes went to the back-markers, and that in handicap;;! they won the following sums: —Walne, £10; Walker, £2; Jackson, £19 2/3; Forbes, £32; Beauehamp, £81 6/8; Barker, £21 10/. Thus these riders secured the greater portion of their winnings in j the scratch races,, most of the £4681 i 6/7 given for handicap events goingto the second and third-class riders.

By a recent edict San Francisco cyclists are compelled to carry continuous alarms. They, however, outHeroded Herod, and provided themselves with fearful cowbells, with the consequence that life in the town

"Was rendered well-nigh insupportable by the awful din. The order was withdrawn. In Auckland cyclists are supposed to carry continuous alarmbells, but the bye-law happily is not enforced.

The "Happy Land" for cyclists has been discovered. According to the Albany correspondent of a New York journal the Judiciary Committee of the Assembly have introduced a Bill to provide for the appointment of Side-Path Commissioners and to define their duties and authorise the construction of side paths for bicycles and to license bicycles. The board is to have power to repair, maintain, and construct new paths along any road outside the limits of cities and in villages with the consent of the authorities. No side path is to be constructed on or along any sidewalks without the -consent of the owners of at least one-half of the abutting lauds. The license fee paid by the cyclist is to be not less than 50 cents, nor more than Idol., and the license is to be good for a year. Every license issued by the commissioners of any county shall be good upon the side paths of any other county of. the State. The license fees are to be deposited as a "sidepath fund" with the County Treasurer, and drawn upon for work on the side paths by the Side-Path Commissioners for planting shade trees. No person is to drive cattle, sheep, or swine on any side path or in any way destroy or injure it. Pedestrians when meeting or overtaken by a wheelman are to vyal). on the righthand outer side of the path, and are to • give way to cyclists.

An amusing phase of Parisian life, writes the corespondent of the "Pall Mall Gazette," is exciting attention just now owing to the advent of better weather. For some little time the Mont-de-Piete, or State pawnshop, has received the visits of a stream of bicyclists come to redeem the machines which they pledged at the beginning of the winter. To house a bicycle during the inclement season is comparatively costly in Paris. A machine when not needed is a cumber-' some object in the flats in which Parisians live, and a considerable sum is charged by the establishments that make a business of storing bicycles. As the result of this state of things the ingenious native has found tha,t the cheapest way out of the difficulty is to confide his bicycle to the pawnshop. Al he has to pay is the triflibg interest on the money advanced to him. The expedient, moreover, is .as excellent as it is cheap. The Mont-dc-Piete is never sure that it will not have to sell the machine in order to recover the loan. In consequence, it takes the utmost care of the bicycles entrusted to it. They are carefully housed in dry rooms and kept well oiled and attended to. When claimed they are in the pink of condition, and all for the most insignificant outlay. ~. Mr John. Foster FVasei\ writing lately on the "Sorrows of a Cyclist •' remarks; "The extraordinary assortment of food I've consumed these last two years would be enough to stock an entire section of a dietetic museum. One can put. up with a bad road, or no road at all, in unbounded thirst for adventure; but it's a negative so^ of heroism going without a decent meal for six weeks ,at a stretch." Eggs became the chief stand-by; and he calculates that 3019 were disposed of during the 772 days he occupied in riding round the world. "True, there are periods that stand out scarlet in my life when I never saw or tasted an egg. But then I recall times when I've eaten six for breakfast, four for lunch, five for tea, and a round ten for dinner, until at last I used to turn aside with a blush whenever I met a hen \y the wayside." Six sets of tyres were used up in this little, tour of about twenty thousand miles, and while Mr Fraser sees nothing very wonderful in the mere fact of making the world's circuit on wheels, he does think his enthusiastic friends might exclaim over him, "Here's the man who holds the record" for punctures—he's had 415 in two years; in accumulated time he's had to sit on damp grass sixteen days, seven hours, and ten minutes, patching up burst tyres; he's carried his bicycle 309 miles because there was no riding; on three occasions he wept salt tears because his fore-fork had broken a couple of hundred miles from anywhere; he's spent days lifting handfuls of mud from his clogged chain; and he's had to ease his soul 11,093 times by .swearing." Eleven punctures in two minutes was one of his Southern Russian experiences. ■■£

The value of perfect ankling in pedalhng is only to be estimated when it is understood that the ankle works in conjunction with the calf of the leg, wherein is situated the strongest muscle in the whole body,l a muscle capable of supporting seven times the weight of the body. It is thus apparent that the more perfect and studied the ankling the more is this powerful muscle brought into play, and a consequent increase in power brought to bear upon the pedals.