EVERYTHING TURNS YELLOW

After weeks of endless rain the sun is at last coming out and the forecast is for summer to at last arrive.

And tomorrow there will be a Brit standing on the top of the podium in the Champs Elysees.

Britain is slowly waking up to cycling. It has not historically played a large part in our sporting culture, but a combination of British cycling success at the Olympics, the ‘Lance Armstrong effect’, and an increase in people cycling to work in order to beat traffic and high transport costs means that cycling is cool in a way it has never been before. But probably a majority of Brits still do not get the scale of what is going to happen tomorrow.

For Bradley Wiggins to win the Tour (which he will, barring some extraordinary accident) is a much bigger deal than it would have been for Andy Murray to win Wimbledon. It is a bigger deal than it would have been for England to win the Euros. For non-cycling Brits the scale of the Tour simply isn’t understood. A million people will line the Champs Elysees tomorrow, and millions more have stood at the side of Belgian, Swiss and French roads these past three weeks waiting for the blur of colour as the peleton screams past. The Tour is the largest annual sporting event in the world. It is carnival and national icon and physical test sans parallel. And I love it.

The bike is a very simple machine. A small child often gets their first real sense of freedom wobbling along on a bike. A rusty old jalopy can be a helpful way of nipping to the shops. Or thousands of pounds can be spent on a race ready carbon beauty. But it is all basically two wheels suspended from a frame of two triangles. I think it is this very simplicity that makes competitive cycling what it is – that something so basic can create (in David Millar’s words), “beauty, suffering, grandeur and panache.”

When Wiggins wins the Tour it will be a moment of incredible individual achievement. It will also be a result of phenomenal teamwork. This is perhaps the least understood aspect of cycling by non-cyclists – that it is teams that compete in the Tour, and an individual can no more win the race that a lone footballer can win a game. This means that there is a psychological appeal about cycling which other sports often lack – and perhaps that is why the French are so drawn to it, whereas we more black and white Anglo-Saxons prefer more straightforward games. The politics of the peloton, with deals struck, friends and enemies made; the significance of aerodynamics; the different specialisations of domestique and climber and sprinter – all spread out over three weeks of torture and beauty make the Tour uniquely compelling.

It is because of this psychological depth that cycling has generated a rich seem of profound and painful and beautiful writing. The peculiarities of cycling seem to lend themselves to an artistry of description. (Try The Escape Artist by Matt Seaton or The Death of Marco Pantani by Matt Rendell.)

And then there is France. Probably the most beautiful country in the world – an unfolding tapestry of mountain and coastline and vineyard and sunflowers. It’s the sunflowers of course. That defining image of the Tour de France, as the peleton pours through field after field of sun-turned yellow.

Everything is turning yellow.

GLAD TO BE HUMAN

I've already tweeted a link to this, but it's so uplifting I wouldn't want anyone to miss the joy!

THE RIGHTS & WRONGS OF REPRODUCTIVE ETHICS

Two articles in yesterdays Daily Telegraph caught my eye for what they reveal about rapidly shifting assumptions regarding reproductive ethics.

The first described how, worldwide, five million babies have now been born thanks to IVF.  The article quotes Dr Simon Fishel, a fertility expert, as saying: “The five million milestone not only justifies all the legal and moral battles, the ethical debates and hard-fought social approval, it is also a testament to the great scientists and doctors who have worked so hard to improve treatment.”

That is interesting. How, I wonder, does a particular number “justify” IVF? A large number of births as a result of IVF might demonstrate its success, but whether it justifies anything, especially the “moral battles” is suspect. That sounds rather like a restating of “might is right” to me. As the article also reveals, 68 per cent of IVF treatment cycles are unsuccessful, so the technology is by no means fool proof. And while the delight that those five million babies have no doubt given their parents is in no way to be denied or begrudged there is also the reality of the huge amount of pain (physical and emotional) involved in the IVF process. The prevalence of multiple conceptions and associated premature births, still births and health issues that result from IVF are well documented, and the ethical issues that arise when donor eggs or sperm are used should not be discounted.

Over the page was the second article – this one describing how St Thomas’ Hospital, London, is now screening embryos from parents whose families have a history of breast cancer. What the article does not mention is that inherent to the screening and “selection” process is the discarding of any embryos displaying the wrong genetics. This article does not contain even a hint of any moral issue about the selection and discarding of embryos. The ethic is entirely utilitarian.

As evidence that our society is terribly confused about sex, marriage, family, and human dignity and value these two articles are stark. They are not merely reporting science, but telling a story of remarkable, and disturbing, moral shift.