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i like alf - 14 lessons from the life of alf engers. paul jones mousehold press paperback. 155pp illus. £13.95
imagine, if you can, a different world infiltrating the great britain of the 1950s and 60s. rather than football being the working man's sport, let's pretend, for a moment, that cycling had imitated the state of affairs prevalent in italy, where a professional life on two wheels was seen as the ideal get out clause from a life of potential drudgery, tilling soil and working on the land. instead of roy race's exploits with melchester rovers, readers of the 'tiger' weekly comic might have been regaled with deeds of derring do in the quest for best british all rounder time-trialling.
in which case, it would scarcely have been a fictitious chap by the name of roy; more likely a real fellow by the name of alf.
born in southgate on the 1st of june 1940, alf engers grew up to be a pastry cook, working nights while pursuing a career as a cyclist, having acquired his first bicycle at the age of ten. though sharing a christian name with his father, the two weren't exactly close. "He was very keen on fishing. Didn't have any time for me. Worked my mother to death. That's it."
this state of affairs contrasted sharply with memories of his mother: "(She) was very hard-working and brought up in the Depression. In other words, she knew what poverty was. [...] Mother helped me in any way she could; she had a will of iron."
engers pursued both swimming and running while at school and occasionally accompanied his father when he went fishing. however, after the blitz and its destruction of large areas of london, engers joined in the cycle speedway craze of the time 'amongst the brick and cinders', indulging in lethal laps of tiny oval circuits on beat-up bicyles largely devoid of brakes. "I was 14. Cycle Speedway (was) good for girls and I went out with one of the other bloke's sisters. [...] There were loads of these bomb-sites." According to sports historian, Simon Inglis, one of the driving reasons behind this wholesale adoption of a hitherto unrecognised sport was "...the birth of a youth culture that hadn't existed before, which enabled kids to have a completely separate identity to their parents for the first time - cycle speedway was something that no adult did."
with an honours degree in hindsight, it's easily possible to view this early adoption of teenage culture as one which may have shaped engers' subsequent brushes with the authorities that constrained british cycling practice. he was not one to subsume his aspirations to the whims of authority for which he often held little respect.
Lesson three from jones' superb narrative (all 14 chapters, perhaps obviously, given the book's subtitle, are prefaced with the word 'lesson') introduces the reader to the formative and formal steps in the teenage engers' cycling career when he joined barnet cc and was inducted into the mores of club cycling. membership of the barnet introduced him to club runs along with evening ten and 25 mile time-trials. oddly, considering his later prowess as one of britain's premier tt riders, the discipline against the clock was not one of his initial interests, holding riders such as fausto coppi in high esteem and cycling to leicester square to purchase copies of 'le miroir des sports', contributing to his collection of cycling magazines.
"Time-trialling didn't interest me, I wanted to be a road man, or a track man."
despite this alleged preference, engers began competing in 25 mile time-trials, inspired by the higginson twins. "...they used to ride in a dead straight line, no messing, straight corners. They became my heroes. [...] They used to take the ball bearings out of their wheels and bottom brackets and polish them." but, though from a different sporting discipline, throughout the 1950s, alf's true hero was sir roger bannister, the first man to run the four minute mile, though he gained more specific time-trialling inspiration from the performances of the inestimable ray booty as he edged ever closer to riding 100 miles in under four hours in the mid 1950s.
in 1954, however, alf's promising career was rudely interrupted by a crash while returning from an evening ten. the accident totally shattered his kneecap, enforcing six weeks in hospital and ultimately a year out of competition. returning from this mishap, engers was aided and abetted by alan shorter, one of the senior members of the barnet club. engers attributes much of his future success to the guidance proffered by shorter. "I remember somebody saying to him 'You're a has been'. Old Al replied, 'Better to be a has-been than a never-was or never-going-to-be."
though engers still had his sights set on becoming a professional cyclist on the continent, a rider who one day might win the tour de france, it was a career that was simply not to be. having been brought up during the second world war and its immediate aftermath, he was conditioned to be a provider, hence his continued employment as a baker, sometimes for as many as three different bakeries at the one time. with british cycling authoritarianism enforcing strict delineation between the beloved 'amateur' and the questionable 'professional' class, alf saw the only way forward being to adopt the intermediate 'independent' status. this allowed the intrepid cyclist to 'try' riding outside the restrictions of the amateur, to test the waters, so to speak, of a possible professional career. riding as an independent technically allowed the incumbent to re-apply for amateur status should things not work out as planned.
however, having discovered that racing as an independent did not bring the fame and fortune tentatively promised, engers applied to return as an amateur, providing a lengthy period in no-man's land, unable to compete for several years up until 1968, despite the independent category being abandoned in 1966. it was to be the first of many of engers' brushes with the blazers who controlled the lives of britain's cyclists. in the meantime, alf went fishing.
engers went on to win the national 25 mile time-trial six times and to become one of the foremost exponents of drillium, the practice of drilling holes in any and every component that would survive the process, all done to remove as much weight from the bike as possible.
"If I had gone on to do what I wanted to do, I would have won the Tour de France, but that's how the dice were rolled."
paul jones, author of the previously reviewed mousehold press publication 'a corinthian endeavour' proved with that particular book that, beyond any doubt, he is possessed of inherent skills as a wordsmith. i like alf (the title is derived from frame stickers attesting support of engers in his battle with the authorities) ranks alongside many of the other superb publications to come from adrian bell's mousehold press. the latter has proved to possess an uncanny knack of publishing cycling books that have changed the face of the genre. classics such as herbie sykes 'the eagle of the canavese', jean bobet's 'tomorrow we ride' and graeme fife's exemplary biography of brian robinson, have now been joined by this essential publication.
the prose is intelligent, the narrative addictive and the author's prescience in framing the life of one of british cycling's great characters commends it to every individual who considers themselves a connoisseur or apprentice connoisseur of the sport. time-trialling and, indeed, pretty much all forms of road and track racing, have substantially changed since the time of alf engers. whether this is seen as a good thing or otherwise, probably depends a great deal on your age and nostalgic reverence, but as someone far wiser than yours truly once said, 'in order to comprehend the present, one must first understand the past.' buy one for yourself and a second copy as a christmas present for your best pal in the peloton.
lessons learned.
sunday 14 october 2018
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