CYCLING.

New Zealand Illustrated Sporting & Dramatic Review, Volume XII, Issue 746, 23 June 1904, Page 13

CYCLING.

Arrangements in connection with the Dunlop Test Races in the various centres are well in hand. The Auckland race will be over a course of 136 miles, the Manawatu race is some seventy-six miles, the Otago race 56 miles, the Southland test sixty miles, and advice from the other centres is still to come in.

It is estimated that the total value of the prize lists for the various Dunlop Road Races throughout Australia and New Zealand will amount to £7OO, and that all ; to,ld there will riot be less than four hundred cyclists competing. Road racing as a sport is decidedly on the up grade, and it is without exception one of the finest forms of athletics that is represented in this country.

The first of the Dunlop interstate eliminating road races —the Goulburn to Sydney test —is announced to take place on Saturday, August 6. The course is about 130 miles in length, and is the hilliest of any route adopted for the test races in any State. The prize-list is, as usual, a very liberal one, the big tyre company heading it with a cheque for £3O and a £5 gold medal. There are seven other valuable prizes, including two bicycles. The fastest New South Wales competitor will be selected as that State’s representative in the Warrnambool to Melbourne event, on August 20, and will receive £lO from the Dunlop Company towards his expenses. The company will also undertake to feed the competitors en route and arrange for cheap railroad rates and hotel tariffs. The race will be run under the rules and handicapping of the New South Wales League.

France, seemingly, is a cyclist’s paradise. There is no speed limit, no bringing of one before the magistrate because the lamp has flickered out, or for riding upon the footpath ; the latter, being allowed, is not an offence. Several towns have special tracks for cyclists along the boulevards, while the general condition of the roads is excellent. The hills, also are well engineered, the grades beingeasy, because the fact is recognised that it is easier to climb an incline of 1 in 20 for, say, half a mile, than to labour up 1 in 10 for half a mile to reach a desired altitude. The French roads have, in addition, plenty of notice-boards warning the travellers of dangerous descents and level crossings, besides finger-posts at all junctions.