Seemingly every UK venue is/was sold-out apart from Taunton. The audience was, agewise, not unlike a jazz audience - to qualify as a youngster you had to be under 50!
Indeed cycling and jazz have much in common. Both require intense training/practice as well as the ability to improvise to extricate yourself from difficult situations such as cycling up an Alpine pass faster than your competitors or negotiating a new and complex set of chord changes.
Kirby proved to be a natural raconteur as he spoke of his fellow broadcasters' idiosyncrasies. Sean Kelly in particular was the butt of his urinal humour. Kirby's sidekick, Duncan Steer, fed the questions which, after the interval, had been submitted by members of the audience.
Kirby's replies were witty and the questions themselves suggested that a large percentage of the audience were Eurosport viewers - particularly in July.
Kirby is also the author of a couple of cycling books that seemed to be selling well during the interval.
The rapturous applause at the end was well-earned. Lance
2 comments :
Did Kirby or anyone else arrive at GCT by bike?
Kirby would have required a trailer to carry his merchandise (books) and, had they been cash sales, a Brinks truck to take the proceeds home. There may have been someone who arrived by bike - there were plenty of geezers in shorts - but most were probably, like myself, recalling days gone by. I don't think Kirby was ever a serious cyclist and, like music and other sports, you don't have to have gigged at Ronnie's or scored a century at Lords to talk about the drama or the artistry evolving before your very eyes and Kirby did that brilliantly drawing many chuckles and guffaws from what seemed to be a knowledgeable audience.
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