’CYCLING.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XXI, Issue XVII, 22 October 1898, Page 531

’CYCLING.

Entries for the Thames Cycling Club's meeting on November 9th close next Saturday at the Metropolitan Hotel, Auckland, and Pacific Hotel, Thames. An excursion steamer will leave town on the 9th to give Aucklanders an Fred Murray, of football fame, has turned his attention to the wheel, and is training for the cycle events at the Amateur Athletic Club’s sports on November 19th.

Two or three visits we have paid to the Row this season have convinced us (writes the social correspondent of an English paper) that the horse is no longer eclipsed by the bicycle. Whereas last year the road patronised by cyclists was inconveniently crowded and the Ride almost empty, the exact reverse is now the case. The cycling craze is over in smart circles. There is plenty of cycling still going on, but it is no longer done ‘because it is the thing, you know.’ Women of means and leisure ride in town, and keep their cycles for country use. Women who have neither means nor leisure ride the steel and iron horse, and find that it brings them both health and pleasure. The Row is again the magnet that attracts society in the mornings, and fashion’s votaries, who last season declared that there could be nothing more resting to jaded limbs after a night’s dancing than a cycle ride are now equally certain that a ride on horseback is ever so much more restful. Girls who are in shops or telegraph offices all day, or who earn their living by teaching are those who benefit by cycling. They can get out into the fresh country air and profit by change of scene as they never could without the useful wheel. It is, however, dropping completely out of smart town life, as it soon will out of smart country life. The bicycle has its own special niche in the eceonomy of things. As a whim its day is almost over. As a utilitarian means of locomotion it will last a very long time. opportunity of attending the sports. Good riding should be the order of the day at the Auckland Cycling Club’s Carnival, which takes place on the Exhibition track on Saturday, October 29. Among the entries already received are those of J. W. Jones, exAlliance champion; Geo. Sutherland, the one, five and ten mile champion of the colony; Alfred Maxwell, three mile champion; A. R. Barker, Andrew Ralston (champion of Otago), Neil Ralston, A. C. Middleton, who won the 1896 Austral, R. Hendry, and W. Tierney. The Manawatu, Wanganui. New Plymouth, Hawera, Rangitikei, Roxburgh, Oxford, Thames, Huntly, and Waihi Clubs will also be represented. With such a representative number of riders the racing should be keen.

Whenever the question of registering cyclists crops up, says Charles Sisley, the well-known cycling writer, there, is always a terrific howl from the cycling public as to the injustice of it. As to taxation, however slight, that to the average cyclist is the thing too terrible to contemplate. Personally, I never could see how the terrors of registration or nominal taxation eame in, and would like to see both measures adopted. The eyelist who can afford from £lO to £2O for a machine is not so |KKir that he cannot afford an extra shilling or two as a registration fee. So far as I can see

it would only be the scorcher and the cycling rough who would suffer. At any rate, whether the idea finds favour with the cycling public generally or not, 1 have good reason to believe that the Home Secretary is contemplating some scheme of registration.

Messrs Dexter, Reynolds, and Colwell have each nad a trial spin round the new Exhibition track, ami express themselves as delighted with its construction. They say that it will be a splendid sight to witness the competitors negotiating the 12 feet banked corners, and that, provided the fields are not too big, the chances of any accidents occurring are remote. Mr W. R. H. Stewart, surgeon to the ear, throat and nose department, Great Northern Central Hospital, London, writes as follows in the ‘British Medical Journal’:—‘As a considerable majority of the patients who have lately consulted me for nasal trouble have complained that the sensation of obstruction has either commenced or considerably increased since they have taken to the bicycle, the question arises, Are we to place this otherwise healthy and almost necessary mode of locomotion among the causes of nasal mischief? It is to me quite conceivable that the quick rush through the air, inhaling large quantities of dust on the country roads, and all sorts and conditions of dirt on the London ones, might cause considerable irritation to the nasal mucous membrane.’ Cycle-racing in this colony is in a very unsettled state at present. The question of the control of the sport will evidently have to be faced very soon, and some definite settlement arrived at, for the present unsatisfactory state of affairs cannot continue. The League of Wheelmen, the ‘cash’ governing body, have done their, best to crush the Alliance, or amateur body, out of existence, and have very nearly succeeded. Nearly all the large amateur cycle clubs have gone over to the League, and Auckland and Timaru are now practically the only places where amateur cycling has any strength. Several amateur athletic clubs have now come to the conclusion that to make their meetings a success they must have cycle events on the programme, and as amateur cycling under Alliance rules is practically ‘non est’ in their towns, they applied to the N.Z.A.A.A. for permission to place events for League riders on their programme. The matter was discussed at great length at the last meeting of the Association, and much was said on either side. Auckland amateurs were pleased to see the stand taken by Dr. Jennings, one of the delegates, against* what he considered was practically an attempt to cater only for professional cycling. The League, he said, had two classes, but it was evident that it had not the slightest intention of catering for the amateur class. They had been told some time ago that the League was going to take up legitimate amateur sport, and foster it, but nothing had been done in this directio. The prospect of League action in Timaru, whither the head-quarters of the Alliance had been shifted, showed the determination of the League to exterminate amateur sport so far as cycling was concerned, and if the Association threw in its lot with the League then amateur sport, so far as athletics were concerned, would be exterminated in the same way. If amateur athletic sport was not strong enough to be carried on without so sordid a thing as the ‘gate’ being the pre-eminent factor, then it was time they gave it up. An effort should be made to train up the rising generation to take part in athletics for the sake of sport, not for the sake of cash. These remarks by Dr. Jennings state the position very clearly, although the ‘N.Z. Cyclist’ is pleased to call them ‘some of the choicest selections of illogical rhodomontade (dictated apparently by the ultra-con-servatism so prominent in his past efforts) ever launched in a sports association meeting.’ The N.Z.A.A.A. decided to allow the inclusion of amateur cycle races run ‘by amateurs ns defined by the Cyclists’ Alliance and the League of New Zealand Wheelmen.’ In view of the fact that the League has distinctly refused to grant permits for any meetings where Alliance events appear on the programme, the above resolution really effects nothing. Why have the League refused to grant permits where Alliance events are on the programme? Or how, in view of this refusal, cnn they complain if cash events are excluded from amateur programmes? If the League really wished to foster an amateur branch they

would take advantage of the opportunity given in the above resolution of the N.Z.A.A.A. I understand that the Auckland A:A. and C.C. are sending circulars to the various amateur athletic clubs throughout the colony suggesting that each should take amateur

cycling under its wing bv forming a cycling branch in connection with the club, on the same lines as the Auckland Club. This plan has been a success in Auckland, and the suggestion seems a good one in the present unsatisfactory state of the cycling sport. The English mail brings some particulars of a splendid ride by A. A. Chase. At the Crystal Palace track, in Sydney. The second best effort in from five miles to one hour, inclusive, covering 33 miles 712 yards, as against Stock’s 32 miles 1,086 yards. Chase's times were: One mile, 1 min 52 2-5 sec; five miles, 8 min 47 1-5 see; ten miles, 17 min 36 sec; 15 miles 26 min 33 3-5 sec; 20 miles, 35 min 44 sec; 25 miles, 44 min 46 4-5 sec; 30 miles, 53 min 52 2-5 sec; 33 miles, 59 min 17 4-5 sec. Elkes, the American rider, is reported to have ridden over 34 miles in one hour; but this record is not recognised in England. Now that so much is being written about brakeless bicycles and their dangers, it would be well to impress on cycling novices that if they would only cultivate back-pedalling and rely less on their brakes, there would be fewer accidents —fatal and otherwise —to record. So far as I am able to judge, it is not so much the riders without brakes who come to grief, as the riders who have them and rely implicitly on them, finding at the critical moment that for some reason or other they refuse to act. Novices generally seem to think that provided their machines have a brake of some kind fitted they can descend with safety any hill in the kingdom. This is a great fallacy, and it ought to be a general rule with cyclists that if they find they cannot keep their machines in control by the mere act of backpedalling they should immediately dismount. Thus would scores of bad accidents be avoided. A local Bret Harte sends me a metrical version of a collision which took place this week in Newmarket between two cyclists. As he himself modestly puts it, he ‘wields a graphic pen,’ and no doubt the two unfortunate cyclists will recognise their adventure in this ‘pome.’ Here it is, by ‘J.A.,’ Carlton Gore Road: — THE COLLISION OF THE SEASON. It happened in Newmarket upon last Tuesday night. That two bicyclists were meeting, and neither had a light. One of them was coming slowly like a gentle summer breeze. But the other was *a scorching,’ witn his head between his knees. Then the one who did the zephyr to the other fellow said: ‘Where in thunder are you coming? Lift up your blooming head.’ There were twenty sober people there all standing looking on. Who will tell in twenty different ways just how the thing was done; But I will give my version as I wield a graphic pen. And explain things as they happened to these two misguided men. The scorcher he came whizzing down upon his track red hot. Like the laws of Medes and Persians, whose course does alter not; The other fellow shouted and then made a sudden luff — The street is thirty yards across, but it wasn’t wide enough—it seemed as though a thunderbolt had fallen then and there. And two bikes were cutting ‘monkey shines’ some six feet in the air. Then a cloud of dust was rising, as to the earth they fell. And which were men and which were bikes 'twas difficult to tell. Then up they rose, a-glowering at each other tiger-like, While each upon his arm supported remnants of a bike; And I felt a thrill of pity—just allow me here to say— As I gazed upon that scorcher, who so late was blithe and gay. Each party then meandered upon his homeward track. A wiser man and sadder, with his bike upon his back. It is gratifying to me as a persistent opponent of long distance racing, says a writer in the London ‘Daily Mail,’ to find that the final stopper is being placed on this form of so-called ‘sport.’ By the same ]x>st 1 have received two notifications which are very instructive under the circumstances. The first of these relates to the abandonment of the Catford Gold Vase race, and the second states that the historic Cuca (’up will no longer be competed for in a twenty-four hours' race, but it is to be put up for a twenty

mile event on September 3 at the Crystal Palace. These two anouneements coming on top of the scandalous scenes enacted at the recent sev-enty-two hours’ race in Paris, surely sound the death-knell of long-distance racing.

Since January 1, 1898, Mr E. S. Edwards, a young New Yorker, has ridden more than 23,000 miles on his bicycle. He rides a hundred miles every day, rain or shine, blizzard or sirocco, and intends to keep it up until the year is out. Moreover, he weighs five pounds more than he did on the day he started his heart breaking, nerve racking ride, and says he never felt better in his life.