As a culture that now celebrates all things quantifiable — a fitbit to track your steps, an app to count how far you’ve run — fitness is at the epicentre of our tech-focussed lives. From the calories you’ve consumed to the weights you’re lifting, there’s a number that makes it all worthwhile. If you didn’t Instagram a screenshot of your Runtastic app, have you even really worked out?
You’d assume then that this cycling fad that seems to be sweeping the city is just that — a fitness phase. Is cycling the new running? The new boot camp? Surprisingly enough, for all the avid bikers we spoke to, fitness came at the very end of their list of priorities. Whether it’s waking up at 5 a.m. to cycle, or spending the weekend on long rides, many of them may have started cycling to get fit, but they all agree it is way more than exercise that they are out to get now.
Creating culture
“Please don’t call it a themed restaurant,” Ashish Thadani clarifies at the very beginning of our conversation. Too many people have misunderstood what Ciclo (pronounced chee-klo), India’s first bicycle cafe, is attempting to do, and Ashish is eager to explain. As someone who cycles every day, Ashish admits that Ciclo was not conceived as a revenue spinner, but is more passion than business, as he’s excited to promote a lifestyle that he has grown to love. The cafe is a place where Ashish is hoping to build a common platform for the various cycling clubs in Chennai — there’s an entire wall where the jerseys of six reputed clubs are framed and proudly displayed.
The cafe’s other speciality is the cleaning and repair services it offers bikers, who can have a snack while getting their rides fixed. And it’s not just pro-bikers — the cafe offers all customers a chance to rent cycles at the nominal rate of Rs. 200 a day to try their hand at cycling. With other Ciclos set to open in Gurgaon and Hyderabad, this time with shower and locker facilities, Ashish is hoping the bicycle cafe culture catches on all over.
Suresh Kumar likes to believe he called the cycling craze way back in 2006. Having grown up watching his father run Balaji Cycles, a 100-sq-foot shop, which launched in 1975, Suresh and his brother expanded the business. In 2012, they opened Pro-Bikers, one of the first high-end stores to sell professional bikes in Chennai. From five bikes a month to about a 100 now, Suresh says sales have peaked in the last four years, which is also why he set up a tech workshop with mechanics trained in Taiwan to service these high-end bikes. Suresh is also one of the founders of the Tamil Nadu Cycling Club (TCC), which began in 2010. They organise about 40 events a year, like endurance races, timed trials and workshops, where all the cycling clubs in the city participate. According to Suresh’s estimate, the cycling community in Chennai is about 10,000 people strong, and growing.
“When I started Chennai’s first biking club in 2009,” says Suhail Ahmed, “there were just 10 of us riding on the ECR.” Called ReaXion Cycling back then, their most popular event used to be a ride from Chennai to Mahabalipuram and back. This casual club soon grew to become an information portal called choosemybike.com that helped people find information about bikes in the market. Suhail now works for TI Cycles, where, he admits, he doesn’t get enough time to ride.
Another big draw for cycling is that, like running, this too is a social experience. It is easier to stay motivated when you’re in a group, and while you may start off concerned about fitness, what you’ll get hooked to is the company. Just ask Divagaran Thiagarajan, who started WCCG (We are Chennai Cycling Group) in 2012, as a neighbourhood cycling group. Today, WCCG has different chapters in different areas in the city, where people in the same neighbourhood ride together. Unlike a racing group or randonneurs, WCCG focusses on getting people together and creating themed rides to keep the regulars excited.
For the love of the race
For Aarthi Srinath, the party starts at 5 a.m. All days, except Mondays, you’ll find her at Madhya Kailash at the crack of dawn, geared up and waiting for her team — the MadRascals — Tamil Nadu’s first amateur cycle racing team. They ride for an hour and a half every day and three hours on weekends. Being the only woman on the team doesn’t deter her. “When people ask me why I do it, I tell them cycling is more than an activity — it’s a lifestyle choice,” says Aarthi. It’s a tough choice, considering the commitment one needs to keep up with the team. While there is only one winner at the end of the race, cycle racing is a team effort. There are positions like sprinter (who keeps up the speed), the climber (who takes care of the elevated bits) and even domestic (teammates who get in formation to protect the finishers from wind resistance). “When you’re in a team, you need to trust each other because often, when you’re riding at high speeds, all you can see of each other are the wheels,” she adds. The rest is intuition.
There’s also a need to be entirely self-sufficient when riding long distances. “You need to learn to fix a flat tyre, a fallen chain — when you’re riding alone, you’ve got to help yourself,” explains Aarthi.
On the fitness front, cycling is a great idea, since you tend to burn close to 850-900 calories on a 50-60 km ride. Also, it’s low-impact with no stress on the knees. For Aarthi though, it’s much more than fitness. It’s the love of the race and the adrenalin rush that keeps her — and many like her — going.
It’s the journey that matters
To win the title of Super Randonneur, as defined by the Audax Club Parisien, Partha Datta had to complete a series of brevets (rides that were 200, 300, 400, and 600 km long, in a fixed time limit) in one single year. He has won that title a number of times — and so have more than 100 others from Chennai as of last year, according to Partha. If cycle racing is a test of speed, then randonneuring is the ultimate test of endurance.
A fixed route, control points at regular intervals and a time limit is all you get when you attempt this sport; you need to have the discipline, stamina and time management to make it to the end point in time. With a minimum of 200 km, and a maximum of 1,000 km (in Chennai) brevets, this is no joyride, and yet more than 153 people completed the ECR Classic brevet held by the Madras Randonneurs on June 28.
What kept Partha going when he started off in 2011, is the fact that every ride he organised and took part in, was making history for randonneuring in India. Then, of course, there was that amazing feeling of completing each brevet. He recalls one brevet where it rained for eight hours straight and he even had to deal with a puncture, but managed to make it in time. Of course, there’s also the fact that he enjoys riding. “I enjoy explaining the concept of randonneuring to the strangers I meet on the road, and they never fail to ask me why I don’t just buy a motorbike,” he laughs.
At 65, Sundar Rajan holds the title of Grand Super Randonneur with great pride — but congratulate him on it, and he’s quick to tell you that it isn’t amazing, and anyone can do it. After a childhood of cycling every day to school and college, Sundar says he got back to it only in 2008, when he moved back to Chennai and decided to adopt a healthier lifestyle. Regular cycling soon became a habit, and he was looking for a challenge when randonneuring came into the picture in 2011. “I am not a speed guy. I can’t race, but I can manage long distances thanks to my stamina.”
“The best part is that randonneuring demands nothing extraordinary of you — if you put your mind to it, and focus, it’s easily done,” explains Sundar, whose daily routine is now cycling to Mahabalipuram and back in five hours every evening.
A century of cycling
Probably the only city to have documented its connection with cycling over a period of 100 years, Chennai seems to have started its affair with the two-wheel ride right after it was invented.
The effort of a cycling club that calls themselves Cycling Yogis, led by Ramanujar Moulana, Cycling in Madras — from 1877 to 1977 documents every possible connection between cycles and the city. “I was always inquisitive about how the cycle, invented in far off Western countries, came to Chennai, and how it ended up in this form,” says Ramanujar. For him, the booklet symbolises the culmination of his two loves — history and cycling. In fact, the Cycling Yogis came together mainly out of Ramanujar’s love for sharing Chennai’s history as he rode along with friends.
Filled with little gems like the fact that the first bicycle in India was assembled in Madras, the booklet is the Yogis’ way of documenting how the city embraced the humble bicycle.
From indispensible when invented, to relegated to secondary status around the time motorbikes were invented, and now, back in vogue again, the bicycle seems to have come a full circle (pun intended) in Chennai.
Popular cycling clubs in Chennai
ReaXion Cycling - Chennai’s first cycle club, started in 2009
Madras Randonneurs - Pioneers of randonneuring in Chennai
MadRascals - Chennai’s only amateur cycle racing team
WCCG - Chennai’s neighbourhood-based cycling group with five chapters
Cycling Yogis - They enjoy cycling to heritage sites and historic locations
G3 - Chennai’s first all-woman cycling club
