Who is going to take the trike to Tuscany ?

Most people like a challenge and Brendan Hennessy is one of those people, in fact I have heard the word ‘challenged’ used when describing the illustrious ‘OldVelo’!

His latest adventure was in fact two challenges, how to get a tricycle from Co. Cork to a village in Tuscany and then how to navigate a 135 kms route incorporating ‘Strade Bianca’ (unpaved farm roads) with 3,000 cyclists without causing serious injuries to himself others.

Ciclo Turisti (bicycle tourists) are welcomed in Italy but normally they are expected to have two wheels and to not choose a mount that might cause a life threatening injury to other road users.

We are all aware of Michael O’Leary’s rules about cabin baggage but a trike certainly would tax even his concepts of what you can bring on holidays. In case you are not familiar with what a ‘modern for Brendan’ racing trike is: if you can imagine a cross between a bicycle and a Husqvarna lawnmower with the handling characteristics of a fully laden wheelbarrow you are getting close.

After a perusal of what you can bring on a Ryanair flight Bren noticed they were prepared to transport hang gliders. With a bit of creative thinking on Bren’s part and to be honest considering some of the descents in L’Eroica he thought it was not deceitful to describe his chosen mount as a hang glider. We all hoped that he would remain on ‘terra firma’ but to be honest in the back of minds there was a vague recollection of feats of ‘Eddie the Eagle’.

Here is what Brendan has to say about the adventure:-

The schemes I had considered to get the trike to Italy were as follows:-

• Sending out the trike in a van in advance, this was quickly dismissed as the trike is not safe travelling on its own.
• Shipping the trike via Sardinia, the trike is not buoyant so this method was quickly ruled out
• Taking the ferry to France with the trike, the prospect of trying to convince the customs in France of the sanity of the owner could have proved difficult
• ferry to Spain, driving through the night, (tolls funded by the children’s trust fund) and a nocturnal cycle through the Mont Blanc tunnel, fun but fraught with danger.

The solution required a bit of lateral thinking, when you pilot a trike you quickly learn to think laterally (or sideways!)

My soon to be travelling companion, Ger, announced two days before departure (just as I was running out of cunning schemes) that some friends of his had just left  for a car rally in Italy with their trucks and trailers. It was quite possible that they would have had room for the trike.  “Why Ger did you not tell me before? Please, please, ring them to see if they have any friends who haven’t already left Ireland.”  He did. They didn’t.  Ger said, “maybe you could get it on the plane?”  I think he would have said anything to placate me, but it was the first time I really, seriously, considered it.

When you think about it, all manner of things are carried on planes. There’s an option for pets, and they do not discriminate against tripedalism…  So why not a trike? 

With thoughts of the feats of Houdini, I soon had the trike bound up in a Tifosi bike bag and looking remarkably like a hang glider at rest.

Fantastic ! I was heading to Italy to spend some quality time with the trike. 

Then we discovered a problem. When organising the rental car Ger had been misled.  It was not his fault, but when we arrived in Pisa Airport there was no one at the car rental company’s desk. This was a bit disappointing but we were in Italy and the staff possibly had a more pressing commitment, maybe ‘cenare’ with their mothers? We were ‘lucky’ to locate the last available room in Pisa but it had a double bed. The last time I shared a bed with a man was in 1976, I was 2 and my father was already asleep. This was a different matter entirely, and with typical Irish decorum we hung on to our separate sides of the bed and dreamt about the Grand Canyon. What happens in Pisa stays in Pisa!

The following day after a competitively uneventful journey we arrived in Gaiole. Ger had done a wonderful job of procuring accommodation this time.  He had found an affordable villa just a short ten miles (16 kms for non-trike readers) from the start point. The only downside of the villa was the upside of its location. The ten miles were ‘short’ in the way the hills up to it were ‘small’.  They’d be a good test for the legs, and multiple wheels.

We awoke next morning to beautiful Tuscan early Autumn sunshine. I suggested that we cycle (or in my case tricycle) down to Gaiole even though it was on our rest day before the event. Neither of our colleagues, Anthony nor Dave, were overly eager but to my surprise Ger was. It took me a few minutes to realise that Ger wanted to look like a lean Velocista while he was swanning around the town and this could only be accomplished by depositing all his accoutrements in my cavernous Carridice saddlebag   

Anyone contemplating l’Eroica should know that the evening prior to the event is spent planning and preparing.  Luckily Ger was a veteran of the event and knew the pack drill.  He instructed us to have our numbers on jerseys, water in bidons, cold weather gear for the morning, warm gear for coming home and a change of clothes in case we were stopping for a beer.  No sooner were we in bed (solo this time) than Ger was getting us up again. It was 5am and time for road.

The 85 mile l’Eroica route, with 8,000 feet of climbing is not for the faint hearted. It is definitely for those imbued with limitless optimism, endless bonhomie and possibly a third wheel.  In short, I spent the day trying to gain traction and deal with trike threatening cambers. My descents defied the Laws of Physics and possibly threw in to question some of the theories of Isaac Newton. While careering down the gravel strewn ‘strada’, I enjoyed the shouts of “complimenti” and “grandé” from the Italian’s that were brave enough to attempt passing. I offered turns on my trike to anyone who had acquired sufficient ‘Dutch Courage’ at the wine tasting cum food stops.

Now, you may want more detail of the ride. You might like me to describe the way the early morning chill froze my fingers to the bars, or how the mist remained in the valleys as we climbed above them. Indeed, it would be a pleasure to wax lyrical about sun soaked rest stops and sunset amongst the beautiful vineyards, but you’re not getting it here.

All you need to know is the reality that to finish the ride I had saved a can of coke for the very last climb, and just as the last bit of energy departed via my little toe, we were joined in our sunset ride home by a man who goes by Davelo Retro.  He needed company and we needed a light.  We were able to meet each other’s needs, and whether it was the Coke or hearing how he had, on his 1926 machine, ridden 500 miles from France to arrive at midnight the night before and depart at 4am in the morning, the last 10 miles in the dark were more than bearable, in fact they are now, fondly, memorable.  Then once the achievement had been toasted, and bikes disassembled this strange feeling came over me. A weakness so to speak.

I survey now the trike in its body bag at home.  It has an awful pallor, a white sickly dusting from the gravel Strade Bianchi.  It’s wheels remain unattached, the frame unencumbered of bars and seat, chainset and derailleur discarded, cables at odd angles like drips that normally would be attached to beeping machines.  And I feel similarly oddly discombobulated.  And now it strikes me, like the boy Elliott in the film ET, or maybe Flann O’Brien’s Third Policeman, my trike and I have shared so many molecules on our sojurn in Italy we have somehow become one.  I’m sure I’ll feel fine once its reassembled.

A footnote: the day after L’Eroica, as the riders of the shorter events passed us by:

The deafening silence from my 3 companions which greeted my question “could we turn around…please?” was followed by a deliberate slowing of the car, the pulse of the indicator, the selection of reverse gear, and a 3 point turn.  Still no words. Just silence.

Our once free-flowing fun-filled vehicle now joined the traffic jam caused by thousands of multi coloured cyclists toiling upward in their heroic enterprise.  I was one of these cyclists yesterday: motivated, eager, geared up and geared down.  We had finished our race in the dark, exhausted, empty, tired of our ancient bikes and clothes.  Yet, on a whim it seemed, I determined to rejoin the peleton today. Unlike my three solemn companions I had particular reason to want to return. Getting the trike to Tuscany had been an achievement in itself.  I had had severe doubts if my steed would make it to Italy. I had doubts if it would weather the terrain, and the same could have been said about me.  It had and I did.  This meant I could approach a shorter ride with confidence and care free.  What a pleasure. I tackled the climbs with more vigour, and the descents with more bravado. I stopped at the rest stops, and could savour the victuals and chianti.  I talked, chatted, waxed lyrical and learnt the lesson; if you’re going to Gaiole, give yourself over to the full l’Eroica experience.