Downhills Are Your Friends, Stuart Pickering (2012)

An aspirant MAMIL’s guide to lycra, lactic acid and everything

Flowerdew 9780620522212 142pp paperback R169.95

It is a brave man who, in advanced middle age, illustrates the front of his own book with a picture of himself in lycra. In Stuart Pickering’s case, it gives a strong sense of an author who is not much troubled by self-doubt.

His story is simple. After a career in the RAF and participation in any number of glamorous adrenaline sports, he took to cycling at the age of 51. In no time he was hooked, and has since then lost himself in the world of sportives, mountain bike races, and recreational riding – mainly in South Africa, where he now lives.

In his book he sets our everything that he has learned in his few years of immersion, from how to choose your bike, what clothes to wear, what to eat and what type of rides to join. For the most part it sound stuff, delivered in a tangible gush of enthusiasm. For anyone who finds themselves on the lower foothills of such an enthusiasm this would be a very useful book indeed – albeit one whose orientation is clearly South African.

Some may prefer to learn the ropes from friends, or by trial and error. Others may favour a book that wraps its advice around the experience of an old pro, or someone who has been involved in cycling their entire life. For those who would wish to learn the craft from one for whom all this information is relatively fresh, then Pickering is your man.

And should he inspire them to follow in his wheeltracks with half his gusto, they too may end up feeling at ease being pictured in skin-hugging garb in the sixth and seventh decades.

PS Apr 12