Vol 3, No 12
Articles in this issue
- The Annual Race Meeting is fixed for Saturday 19th June, racing at 3 p.m. punctually, with the One Mile Handicap (prizes given by Mr. J. B. Holdsworth), the Two Miles Scratch Race for the Ladies' Challenge Prize, an open Two Miles Amateur Handicap and the Ten Miles District Challenge Race. Entrance is 2s. 6d. for the first three events, forms from the Secretary; members are asked to sell the four plain tickets sent out with the Gazette of 28th May at eighteenpence, and competitors may train on the course on 17th June except between five and seven.
- Captain Theo. Godlee corrects last week's paragraph, it was the printer, not he, who put Oxford in the North-East; he said, as geography will show, "the West", and adds that men with a regular residence near London do not change district merely by being up at Cambridge or Oxford.
- Theo. Godlee, writing for A. Fowler and himself, sets out the joint run of June 12th: the N.E. will meet as usual and ride to Purfleet, leave their machines there and take the boat across the river to meet the S.E., returning by the same route. The S.E. brought sixteen members over on their own invasion, so at least twelve N.E. men are wanted, "it is an experiment…let us prove it is a wise one."
- The Editor, wanting the Gazette in members' hands by Friday evening, asks for copy at the office early in the week, before five p.m. on Mondays if possible, and never later than noon on Wednesday, and pleads with correspondents over illegible proper names of men and places, which puzzle even Mr. Maclean, "the best reader of MS. on record."
- With the District Captain at Cambridge, only four N.E. men met at Syborn's Corner for Havering; the elected substitute refused to act out of modesty, Ernest Barrett ran through his men on a 58-in. Bill Keen, a wrong turning brought shingle and a spill, and five sat down to a shilling tea at the "Orange Tree." The N.W. rode 33½ miles to Essendon by the old North Road, drinking Potter's Bar pump water and Gubbins' spring dry; the West made 36 miles to Rickmansworth; the S.W. took 27 miles to Dorking, paying 3s. for cold meat and one egg at the "White Horse"; and the S.E. Croydon and Blackheath divisions converged on the "Leicester Arms," Penshurst, amid the village feast and kiss-in-the-ring, where Wyndham's telegram brought the Inter-Club result.
- The Wednesday evening runs to Keston to bathe begin on the 9th, weather permitting. The District Captain wants members' views on starting times, destinations and another paper-chase for the next meet card, and, since next Saturday's run is only twelve miles, is trying to get a musical member to play the piano after tea, several members having promised songs.
- "L'homme qui rit" thought the Cambridge fifteen miles worth going fifty miles to see, a very modest table-cloth would have covered the first four at the finish, and heard the Captain sighing for Cleaver. He protests at the printer making S. P. Smith resign, reports a member paying two guineas in advance with no discount allowed, a moralising S.E. man's fall near Liss, Dan Young's safe arrival at Bombay, an empty loose box at the Trainer's stables at Surbiton for anyone wanting to get fit for next Whit Monday, and the Daily News's stray full stop describing "Ainslie, the amateur-professional."
- Eight advertisements, including H. Sharpe of Well Walk, Hampstead, offering a 48-in. "Stassen" "one of the good old sort," 4½ years old, "just suitable for a tour in the Pyrenees or Norway," which has been safely down Muswell Hill and which he would prefer to sell by weight at 1s. 6d. a pound; plus Stephen P. Smith's want of a braked roadster, M. H. Dicker's 49-in. "Stassen" at £7, R. G. Trollope's 58-in. John Keen racer at £10, Cyril J. Turner's 52-in. "Racer" at £5, W. W. Northcott's 52-in. "Timberlake" at £7, and a 52-in. "Stassen" roadster "comfortable as an armchair" at £10.
- Corrections to the Committee notice in the Gazette of 28th May: for Kewley read "Kearley," for Starndale Road read "Stavordale Road," and for S. P. Smith read "S. B. Smith."
- The meet table for the next two Saturdays: N.E. from Lea Bridge Road and Syborn's Corner for Harlow and then Erith to meet the S.E.; N.W. from "Jack Straw's Castle" for St. Alban's and then Uxbridge; West from Addison Road Station for Sanderstead and from Acton Church for Uxbridge; S.W. from the "Griffin," Kingston, for Betchworth and from the "Clarence," Teddington, for Uxbridge; and the S.E. Croydon and Blackheath divisions for Betchworth, Shoreham via Farnborough and Chelsfield, and Erith.
- A full account of the C.U.Bi.C. meeting, closing with Saturday's victory over the L.B.C. Record time was beaten from six to fifteen miles and for one mile; Cooper beat Keith-Falconer at one and ten miles, taking the Amateur-Professional mile in 2 min. 46¾ sec., and in the ten miles, paced by Cortis, beat the professional records from four to ten miles while Keith-Falconer, who stopped with stitch at 7½ miles, secured the amateur six and seven. In the match Wyndham beat Pollock by a foot in the mile but Cambridge took all three events; in the fifteen, Bailey won by a yard from Thorn and Day in a dead heat in 46 min. 34¾ sec., Thorn shut in on the last lap, the London and Cambridge views of which are both given for readers to judge.
- The card from June 5th (Pickwick B.C. at Stamford Bridge, Dewsbury B.C., and Croydon B.C. at the Crystal Palace) to the L.A.C. Winter Meeting on November 6th, taking in the three Bicycle Union Championship meetings at Surbiton, one and five miles on June 16th, twenty-five on June 23rd, fifty on June 30th, and the London B.C. Annual Race Meeting on June 19th.
- Five letters debate the Bath Trial: Alfred Henry opposes re-running it this year, while "Another Competitor" argues the decision rests with the twenty-four original entrants. H. C. Freeth attacks the ten-hour time limit as unfair to older or slower riders and proposes extending it to twelve or fourteen hours, and Theo. Godlee explains that Freeth's times were given only as a historical note, not part of the official record.
- The standing notice on contributions to the Editor, L.B.C. Gazette, 35, Eastcheap, E.C., author's name required, one side of the paper only, in by Wednesday morning, with Messrs. Darling's Club-badged portfolios at 2s.; "Borgas" is unavoidably crowded out.