John has been writing about bikes and cycling for over 30 years since discovering that people were mug enough to pay him for it rather than expecting him to do an honest day's work.
He was heavily involved in the mountain bike boom of the late 1980s as a racer, team manager and race promoter, and that led to writing for Mountain Biking UK magazine shortly after its inception. He got the gig by phoning up the editor and telling him the magazine was rubbish and he could do better. Rather than telling him to get lost, MBUK editor Tym Manley called John’s bluff and the rest is history.
Since then he has worked on MTB Pro magazine and was editor of Maximum Mountain Bike and Australian Mountain Bike magazines, before switching to the web in 2000 to work for CyclingNews.com. Along with road.cc founder Tony Farrelly, John was on the launch team for BikeRadar.com and subsequently became editor in chief of Future Publishing’s group of cycling magazines and websites, including Cycling Plus, MBUK, What Mountain Bike and Procycling.
John has also written for Cyclist magazine, edited the BikeMagic website and was founding editor of TotalWomensCycling.com before handing over to someone far more representative of the site's main audience.
He joined road.cc in 2013. He lives in Cambridge where the lack of hills is more than made up for by the headwinds.
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5 comments
Except for the headline writers.
No it wasn't doing 120 - but the speed of the train wasn't the point.
It's a daft situation that could have been avoided. If the UCI make it very, very clear that the head of the race will, without fail, be neutralised until the rest catch up then riders wouldn't be so desperate to jump the barriers. In the past the marshals have given into rider pressure and not slowed the breakaway which is why riders take risks to be on the right side of the barrier when it closes.
It's one thing to argue against slowing groups like a few years back when Schleck took a tumble in an early stage of the TDF and Cancellara bossed everyone into waiting: that was keeping a commercial and viable rider in the race after bad luck and bad luck is part of sport. However, jumping in front of trains shouldn't happen and the UCI and marshals are to blame.
Beyond a certain speed I imagine the outcome of being hit by a train differs only in the area of spread.
They don't want a report on the Flanders Shimano incidents?
Whilst not in any way condoning the Paris - Roubaix riders crossing the railway lines as the train was approaching, the train was NOT travelling at 120 mph or anything near that speed. The 'anti cycling' lobby will jump on any adverse publicity, don't let us give them anymore ammunition.