Tour de force
After a career with rock band The Clash, writer Johnny Green now indulges his biggest passion, The Tour De France, and finds that life on the road is still as rock ‘n’ roll as ever
Tour de Force
THIS YEAR THE TOUR DE FRANCE IS 93 YEARS OLD. AS WE GEAR UP FOR THE SPECTACLE, MATTHEW BARKER TALKS TO EX ‘CLASH’ TOUR MANAGER TURNED AUTHOR JOHNNY GREEN ABOUT THE BIG EVENT AND LIFE ON THE ROAD
WHEN IT COMES to iconic images of British sport, this one is up there with Bobby Moore lifting the Jules Rimet trophy and Ian Botham’s mullet glinting in the Lord’s sunshine as he hooks the Aussies for another six. Tom Simpson, the first Englishman to wear the Tour de France yellow jersey (albeit for just the one day) riding up the punishing Monte Ventoux in 55ºC heat, his dark eyes fixed directly at the camera lens in deep concentration. Moments later he was dead.
It’s a harrowing photograph, a devastating eulogy to one of the best-loved sportsmen of the 1960s. For Johnny Green however, it’s the very thing that kick-started his passion for the greatest cycle race on Earth. “I was always aware of the Tour, always sort of knew what it was. I always had in mind that picture of Tommy Simpson wobbling on his bike and dying. I’m aware of death on the job from rock ‘n’ roll and it doesn’t shock and horror me. In fact. I find it quite attractive and endearing.”
Simpson literally pedalled until he dropped (his last words were said to be: “get me back on my bike”). During investigations into his death amphetamines and methylamphetamines were found lying in his luggage. Performance-enhancing drugs had been an open secret in the sport for decades and Simpson’s untimely death (he was just 29) opened the floodgates of criticism of the practice. It changed the race forever.
Or at least for a little while, anyway. Doping scandals have surfaced intermittently since Simpson rode his last ride way back in 1969. Green, who used to be the road manager for punk band The Clash, and is author of the excellent book Push Yourself Just a Little Bit More – a sparklingly roguish account of a summer following the Tour – argues that, for seasoned Tour watchers at least, any drug-taking that may still occur rarely intrudes on the magic of what makes the race such a special event: “The organisers are all shock and horror, promising to weed drugs out of the sport, but the people happy with myself for making it to the front, when I looked out across the road and noticed the liggers’ enclosure. All the fur coats and nice polished shoes. And I thought ‘I should be there’. And that’s kind of what set the whole process in motion.”
A lifetime of laminated access-all-areas passes and backstage parties had left Green with a taste for life on the other side of the velvet rope. What better way to get to the vol-au-vants and chilled drinks than by writing a book? “I wanted a more intimate approach, but slightly elitist. I wanted the best seats. But then there was more as well.”
Having initially popped over the Channel to catch the odd stage, Green gradually found himself sucked in by the ongoing sight of the show rolling into town, taking in all the little nuances of the race, the details, from colour-coded jerseys and races within races to the importance of team-work. “I needed the buzz.”
And, as Green points out, the idea of the Tour being a race but actually also a team sport is something that often gets lost in translation when who turn up and watch and follow it around everywhere, don’t actually care about that.”
There’s no doubt that Green’s book would have been a two-wheeled Gallic version of Hunter S Thompson’s infamous Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas if he hadn’t long since knocked the drugs on the head himself. Sitting in a Whitstable beachfront café, resplendent all in black bar some shocking pink socks and a Gillingham FC badge, he sips at a Diet Coke and muses on the parallels between life on the road with one of the most influential bands of the past 30 years and life on Le Tour.
“As a road man, I wanted to get the sheer size of it all across to people. The moment I set eyes on the actual live event, I realised that this is 10 times bigger than a concert by U2 or the Rolling Stones. It’s a massive logistical event that goes to the most unlikely of places, to these little medieval hilltop towns. And it’s still there, despite everything the modern world has tried to throw at it.
“I hadn’t realised quite how huge it all was. I thought it was a niche sport, like here in the UK. But I was staggered by the sheer volume of people that turned out to watch the event. I read somewhere that one in four French people will watch the Tour live at some time. I pushed my way to the front of this block of people, feeling very you’re watching it from a different aspect. “I liked that team aspect that a lot of English people miss when they think of the race. Other European countries understand that inherently. We don’t, we’re all too hyped up on celebrity culture. All that back-up that goes on. It’s exactly like rock ‘n’ roll. Pedalling away for six hours a day, you have to be surrounded by eight other blokes, which is why the overall winner always gives his prize money to the team. You can see the gang spirit in the Tour. All those foulmouthed roadies hanging around. When things are stacked up against you, you all pull together, all looking out for each other. It’s paranoia as a creative force.”
This year’s race will be the first since Lance Armstrong – the very embodiment of an individual battling against the odds – finally called it quits. Perhaps it’s just coincidence, but race organisers have been building up this year’s Tour as a return to tradition, an old school slog and celebration of the event being so much more than the sum of its parts. Green readily raises a glass to Armstrong as a great champion, but doubts whether the American will truly be missed. “Armstrong was always too American for the French. He didn’t mix or mingle. He was always surrounded by minders. All very Bono, very rock ‘n’ roll. He wasn’t giving, just taking. He was just there to win. The French didn’t understand that mentality.”
One man who does get the full Green seal of approval is Jean-Louis Paget, described in his book as the perfect roadie, a kindred spirit, the Don of the packing cases. The director of the course, Paget has been in the job for 20 years, keeping the show on the road, with an intimate knowledge of every twist and turn. Green gets as close as he can to hushed tones: “He’s the man who shakes the hand of the chief gendarme in each town. He’s the man you have to |get to if you’re the mayor and you want your town to be on the Tour. He will walk around, looking at everything, and he’ll say ‘well, that bollard’s got to go… that corner’s far too tight.’ He’s on top of everything. He picks up all the ice cream wrappers to clear the road. He makes everything happen, he’s the heart and soul.
“The whole town gets clogged up, and there’s Paget, running down the road clearing bodies, with the race going ahead by the skin of its teeth.
If it wasn’t for him there would be the mother of all traffic jams, with the pack of cyclists running straight into this mass of people. It went very close once or twice last year. It will happen one day. And I want to be there.”
Man of the moment
Australian Stuart O’Grady is training in Spain for July’s race. A world-renowned sprinter and a member of the CSC team (number one in the world in 2005), he’s been cycling professionally since 1995 and is a six-Tour veteran who twice just missed out on the Green Jersey which is awarded to the best sprinter.
Does the Tour get any easier? “It doesn’t with age. Experience counts though.”
Are you in a confident mood? “I’ve just got over the biggest accident of my career [he suffered broken ribs during Italy’s Tirreno-Adriatico race in March], but I’m feeling very confident. Things are going well with the team, morale is high.”
How important is team spirit? “Hugely. It’s like a game of chess – each rider with their talents. Without back-up, other riders would gang up on you.”
What happens afterwards – is it tins on the beach? “Nah, I’ll get a couple of days’ rest, then it’s back on the bike for the World Cup race the following weekend.”
