Cobbles, coal and Yorkshire grit: Barry Hoban, a legend of British cycling | Cycling Weekly

Ask Barry Hoban what the best ride of his 18-year career was and he doesn’t hesitate long before answering. This is perhaps surprising considering how many rides he has to choose from, of which dozens ended in victory, and on the biggest stages. Until Mark Cavendish came along, he was Britain’s most prolific Tour de France stage winner, with eight.

Barry’s tenacious attitude and prolific success have made him a true cycling legend and a deserving winner of Cycling Weekly’s Lifetime Achievement Award in association with Specialized.

Specialized: https://www.specialized.com/gb/en

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[Applause] [Music] [Music] friends we are almost at an end of this rather unusual cycling weekly awards this year and it’s time to take the the hats off because we’re going to honour the lifetime achievement award winner in association with specialized and what a life what achievements he had what a simply incredible career racing on the bike [Music] my name is barry hoban if you want peter barry hogan i was a professional racing cyclist and i say professional because two years i was independent which was like semi-pro but i was earning my living 18 years so a pretty good career and i rode the two or twelve times when i was a kid at school and my dad uh blessing me was working all hours got sent to uh to bring up five kids but there was always bits of bike in the out in the shed and i put one together and went to school on it and i got the greatest amount of street cred by following the school bus into wakefield about four miles and actually touching the back of the bus which was a trick i could do so anyhow that’s i started off like that i’m basically getting from a to b on a bike yorkshire especially west yorkshire where i came from was a really working class area people worked people were hard and riding a bike around yorkshire you could be in the countryside in a flash if you want into into the pennines into the dales you’re into the walls it was ideal a perfect perfect place for a bike rider to be produced the toughest race of course is the tour de france but i soon found out that i had an attribute which was paramount for a tour de france rider my recuperation was amazing i could ride a stage get smashed to smithereens sleep the night following days brand new again a lot of riders just deteriorated by the time they got to the finish of the tour if they finished the tour they were dead i was wanting the tour to go on for another week the cobble classics i was living in belgium and so a train on a lot of the roads that the flanders went on a wave of gun went on i i knew them all inside out and i always knew that if i could pick a good day for me and some good luck then i could do a good ride in any of the big classics handwritten gum is always the same the riders who can’t sprint are going to take flyers and they did do don gion went month i’d got pulidor with me and alan santi but they were riding for themselves i did scream at pooridor raymond close the gap close the gap and he did do fortunately for me so and so we came into the last k and then oh i was beautifully placed and suddenly we’re 400 meters 300 meters and the sprint is really taking off and i’m there ideally spaced and a place i should say and i’m just hoping because i was behind max delaming the eric le man and i say open open open and they opened up well i didn’t need to be talked twice i went through that like a like a dose of salts and i i just got the overdrive and when you’ve got that overdrive that time i’d i put a good length into them all now none of these guys have beaten me in the sprint but this time nothing went wrong everything went right and it was a sprint to perfection in 69 i was the first briton ever to win back-to-back stages in the tour and i won in bordeaux on the following day in brief and these are the pennants which are nicely embroidered ones so they’re quite good many enthusiasts in britain will recognize that and say wow the gun jersey and it was when you see the jerseys now these are iconic so i’m keeping this one it’s it’s not going to anyone last stage of the four days in kirk in 71 i think my friend robert minkovic in second place but hey deflamic where are you hey i’ll just say didn’t need to lead out man i led i led my i led my teammate out actually 1967 the day after tom died there’s always been a lot of not controversy about discussion about that stage big mates of toms were all there saying okay day yesterday and all that so yeah that’s how it was and and that was it there was a very somber atmosphere we i said to people before i said it almost like we set off and it was like a funeral courtesy we were already you could see there wasn’t going to be much of a race and after a while stablinski came up to me he said barry he said the lads have been talking i said yeah he said one of you guys one of the british team riders have got to win this is going to win the stage today i said well who he said oh you decide amongst yourself i was riding in the front my head full of my own thoughts and suddenly i just realized there’s no one near me i look behind and i’ve got about 15 20 meter lead when i thought oh what do i do now and the french guys who were at the front of the group just waved and said go on so i continued uh a couple of kilometers further on i then got i was out of sight then and the motorbike rider came up a motorbike came up with the journalist on the back and he said barry stab stablinski he says continue like that to the finish full stop that is what happened i’d no one said barry you’re going to win no one said anyone’s going to win it just happened like that on the road now we are 75 barry and bordeaux again that was my last stage win on the bordeaux track and it was the last event to ever finish on the beautiful pink velodrome in bordeaux shortly afterwards and demolished it it’s no longer there well it’s an honor and i i know a lot of cyclists who because cycling in britain is an enthusiastic sport uh even guys like brad wiggins deep down their amateurs at heart like i am you know we love the sport that we’ve been in and i’ve been fortunate to be quite successful in it and it’s great thank you cycling weekly that was 52 years ago i won that [Applause] you