Martin Curtis

A labour of love for me. No-one seems to remember the short but spectacular career of cyclist, Russell Mockridge, but I do. He was my cycling hero when I was a junior cyclist in the 1960s, though already dead and gone. I read his autobiography, published postumously in 1960, and identified with him in so many ways. He was more introverted than I, but we shared the sheer joy of cycling more than the world of competition. In some ways he was a reluctant champion. Two Gold medals at the 1952 Olympics and the second Australian to complete a Tour de France. I, of course, was a kid riding club races in Brisbane - never more. Perhaps he would have won the Tour except he died in a collision with a Ventura bus during a road race in 1958.
Curtis comes at the story 50 years later and assembles a broad collection of views of Mockridge. It's a work of sports journalism that treats its subject with sympathy and honesty. We do not have hagiography, but a touching story of a complex man whose potential was never fully realised.… (altro)