Paul Sherwen lays down The V in the late Seventies

Paul Sherwen is generally seen as Phil Liggett’s counter-point, dutifully keeping the iconic duo’s race commentary on course, helping to convey to the English-speaking world the sport of Professional Cycling. Liggett, of course, has undeniably helped shape this great sport  for Anglophones across the globe, having been the English voice of this sport since before I was born – and for that I’m eternally grateful to him; merely the sound of his voice warms the cockles of my cold, black heart. But as much as he is inextricably bound to the sport, the last time he got a fact right must have also been before I was born, if he ever has.

The balance Liggett’s special breed of factual rigor is Paul Sherwen. Not only does he have the insight of an ex-pro with which to season his commentary, he has several other highly technical analytical tools at his disposal, such as actually watching the race. Furthermore, Paul is able to counter Uncle Phil’s constitution under pressure – which resembles that of a knock-kneed Rhode Island Red in a washing machine on a delicates/knits cycle – with his Sprinter’s Cool. Whereas Phil can be heard squawking and clucking incomprehensibly with excitement as a race unfolds, Paul peppers the commentary with self-deprecating jokes about his own career and adds a Swahili proverb or two that might be helpful for the riders, were they only able to hear him.

In this current role of his, as the commentary equivalent of Autocorrect on Liggett’s iPhone, it is easy to forget that Paul was among the most respected riders of his day. Seen here stringing out a bunch (in complete Rule Compliance, I might add) reminds me of the various tales of tenacity that earned him the respect not only of his fellow riders, but of race organizers.

One such example is of the 1985 Tour de France when Sherwen, a domestique with no chance at the overall, crashed in the opening kilometers of a Pyrenean stage and was left to fend for himself while Bernard Hinault raced for the win at the front, making small children of grown men. Refusing to give up, Sherwen limped through the stage alone, accompanied only by a single Gendarme’s motorcycle. More than an hour after the stage winner and well outside the time limit, he finished the stage. The race jury, moved by his resolve to finish the stage, reinstated him and allowed him to continue on in the Tour. In a word, respect.

I think of all the people in the cycling world I most admire, it has to be Paul Sherwen.

frank

The founder of Velominati and curator of The Rules, Frank was born in the Dutch colonies of Minnesota. His boundless physical talents are carefully canceled out by his equally boundless enthusiasm for drinking. Coffee, beer, wine, if it’s in a container, he will enjoy it, a lot of it. He currently lives in Seattle. He loves riding in the rain and scheduling visits with the Man with the Hammer just to be reminded of the privilege it is to feel completely depleted. He holds down a technology job the description of which no-one really understands and his interests outside of Cycling and drinking are Cycling and drinking. As devoted aesthete, the only thing more important to him than riding a bike well is looking good doing it. Frank is co-author along with the other Keepers of the Cog of the popular book, The Rules, The Way of the Cycling Disciple and also writes a monthly column for the magazine, Cyclist. He is also currently working on the first follow-up to The Rules, tentatively entitled The Hardmen. Email him directly at rouleur@velominati.com.

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  • @G'phant

    @scaler911
    Rather taking money for product brands to lurk here, why not recognise the strength of The V-Brand by selling the right to use it on products (of endorsable quality)? Plenty of good brands not as well-known as Velominati - Campagnolo, Cervelo, Look, etc - would benefit enormously from a tastefully executed association with The V-Cog. Provided we stopped calling it a sea urchin.

    We tried that with the Rule 31 sack and Lezyne. The prez was all for it, but one of his minions decided it would cost too much to put a V cog on the other side of the sack...

  • @Oli
    Futher to Jim and Oli's posts,this pic was taken on stage 3 of the 78 tour. Sherwen was the only non-French rider on the Fiat-La France team directed by the wily, colorful, voluble and general hard man of the 50s Raphael Geminiani. (Jacques Anquetil's old boss). The 78 tour was notable for thee major things: Raleigh won 10 of 22 stages - incredible dominance and a real take-no-prisoners attitude that makes HTC look like amateurs; Michel Pollentier got kicked off the tour at Alpe d'Huez after cheating the dope test. In what seems an almost laughable, Chaplinesque move by today's standards, he concealed a rubber bulb of someone else's urine under his armpit with a tube going across his back, down his crack and out under his dick. Needless to say he was busted. The rumor was that if he had been French and a stylish rider, he would have been penalized and allowed to stay in the race; as he was small, Belgian, ungainly on the bike and had a comb-over, Felix Levitan (the race director) didn't want him on "his" podium in Paris. He packed his bags in shame. A young team-mate of Pollentier was Sean Kelly. Other riders on the Velda-Lano-Frandria team were Freddy Maertens, Joaquim Agostino, Marc De Meyer and Marcel Tinazzi.

    Another striking feature of the 78 tour (and pardon the pun) was the riders' strike at Agen on Stage 12a. Yup, 12a. There were to be two stages that day - 148km in the morning, 96 in the afternoon. Pissed off at this and the fact that it came after a really hard day in the mountains and a need to get up at 5am, the riders, in protest, dawdled on the stage and dismounted and walked across the line - led by the French champion, a certain M. Bernard Hinault. The people of Agen, expecting a fine finish to their stage, were equally pissed. Prize monies were given to local social service agencies.

    Anyhoo, back to Mr Sherwen's display of the V. Stage 3was 243.5kms from Saint Amand Les Eaux-St. Germain En Laye. The weather was wet and crappy with a head wind most of the way. At 185 kms, the big break of the day got away: Danguillaume and Ovion (Peugeot), Thaler and Knetemann (Raleigh), Bossis (Renault), Le Guilloux (Mercier), Bittinger (Flandria), Friou (Lejeune), Bruyere (C&A) and Sherwen (Fiat). Sherwen gave it his all on the front, but alas laid a little too muh V down on the road (it was his first tour) and he fell off the back near the end. The stage was won by Thaler and Bossis won the yellow jersey, after Danguillaume skidded on a wet pedestrian crossing near the finishing straight taking out Bittinger and Ovion.

    Only 110 riders began the tour in 78. Coincidentally, 78 riders finished with Sherwen in 70th spot. Throughout the rest of his career as a rider, he was noted for his hard grafting and courage in finishing several stages despite injuries that would have seen many abandon. A real "Tour man."

  • @Mikael Liddy
    Heard about it but didn't know if it had come out yet.
    I can understand needing sponsors but naming the jerseys, and each little on screen stat gets more than a bit annoying.

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