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Graeme Obree

Obree on "Old Faithful"
Personal information
Full name	Graeme Obree
Nickname	Flying Scotsman
Born	(1965-09-11) 11 September 1965 (age 46) Nuneaton, Warwickshire, England
Team information
Current team	Fullarton Wheelers
Discipline	Road and track
Role	Rider
Rider type	Time Trial Specialist
Major wins
World Hour Record 1993 (51.596km), 1994 (52.713km) World Champion (4000m Pursuit) 1993, 1995
Medal record Competitor for  Great Britain Track cycling World Championships Gold 1993 Hamar 4000m Pursuit Gold 1995 Bogota 4000m Pursuit
Infobox last updated on 27 June 2007

Graeme Obree (born 11 September 1965,^[1] nicknamed "The Flying Scotsman") is a Scottish racing cyclist who twice broke the world hour record, in July 1993 and April 1994, and was the individual pursuit world champion in 1993 and 1995. He was known for his unusual riding positions and for the "Old Faithful" bicycle he built which included parts from a washing machine. He joined a professional team in France but was fired before his first race. He suffers from bipolar disorder and has attempted suicide three times.^[2] His life and exploits have been dramatised in the film The Flying Scotsman. Obree created some of the most radical innovations in the history of bicycle design.

Obree was inducted into the Scottish Sports Hall of Fame in March 2010.^[3]

Biography[link]

Origins[link]

Obree was born in Nuneaton but has lived almost all his life in Scotland^[specify] and considers himself Scottish.^{[citation needed]} An individual time triallist, his first race was a 10-mile time trial to which he turned up wearing shorts, anorak and Doc Marten boots.^[4] He thought the start and finish were at the same place and stopped where he had started, 100 metres short of the end. He had started to change his clothes when officials told him to continue. He still finished in "about 30 minutes."^[4]

Obree suffers from bipolar disorder.^[5][6][7] He attempted suicide in his teens by gassing himself. He was saved by his father, who had returned early from work.^[2] In the 1990s he took an overdose of aspirin washed down by water from a puddle.^[2][8] He had personality problems,^[8][9] sniffed the gas he used to weld bicycles, and was being chased for £492 owed in college fees.^[2]

The bike shop that he ran failed and he decided the way out of his problems was to attack the world hour velodrome record.^[2] It had been held for nine years by Francesco Moser, at 51.151 kilometres. Obree said:

The record had fascinated me since Moser broke it. It was the ultimate test - no traffic,^{[n 1]} one man in a velodrome against the clock. I didn't tell myself that I will attempt the record, I said I would break it. When your back is against the wall, you can say it's bad or you can say: 'I'll go for it.' I decided, that's it, I've as good as broken the record.^[2]

The bike[link]

Obree had built frames for his bike shop and made another for his record attempt. Instead of traditional dropped handlebars it had straight bars like those of a mountain bike. He placed them closer to the saddle than usual and rode with the bars under his chest, his elbows bent and tucked into his sides like those of a skier. Watching a washing machine spin at 1,200rpm led him to take the bearings, which he assumed must be of superior quality, and fit them to his bike.^{[2][10][11][12]} Obree later regretted admitting to the bearings experiment, because journalists referred to that before his achievements and other innovations.^[13]

Obree called his bike "Old Faithful". It has a narrow bottom bracket, around which the cranks revolve, to bring his legs closer together, as he thought this is the "natural" position. As shown in the film, he thought a tread of "one banana" would be ideal. The bike has no top tube, so that his knees did not hit the frame. The chainstays are not horizontal so that the cranks can pass with a narrow bottom bracket. The fork had only one blade, carefully shaped to be as narrow as possible. A French writer who tried it said the narrow handlebars made it hard to accelerate the machine in a straight line but, once it was at speed, he could hold the bars and get into Obree's tucked style.

At a high enough speed, [I could] tuck in my arms. And, above all, get in a very forward position on the bike, on the peak of the saddle. The Obree position isn't advantageous simply aerodynamically, it also allows, by pushing the point of pedalling towards the rear, to benefit from greater pressure while remaining in the saddle. You soon get an impression of speed, all the greater because you've got practically nothing [deux fois rien] between your hands. Two other things I noticed after a few hundred metres: I certainly didn't have the impression of turning 53 × 13, and the Obree position is no obstruction to breathing. But I wasn't pedalling at 55kmh, 100 turns of the pedals a minute, yet my arms already hurt.^[10]

Taking the record[link]

Obree attacked Moser's record, on 16 July 1993, at the Vikingskipet velodrome in Norway.^{[n 2]} He failed by nearly a kilometre.^[14] He had booked the track for 24 hours and decided to come back the next day.^[2] The writer Nicholas Roe said:

To stop his aching body seizing up, Obree then took the unusual measure of drinking pint upon pint of water so that he had to wake up to go to the lavatory every couple of hours through the night. Each time he got up, he stretched his muscles. On the next weary day, he was up and out with minutes, at the deserted velodrome by 7:55 am and on the track ready to start just five minutes after that. He had barely slept. He had punished his body hugely the previous day. Surely this was a waste of time?^[2]

Obree said:

I was Butch Cassidy in terms of swagger. I didn't want any negativity. This was blitzkrieg. I'm going in there. Let me do it. I'm not going to be the timorous guy from Scotland. That's what the difference was. Purely mental state. The day before, I had been a mouse. Now I was a lion.^[2]

Obree set a new record of 51.596 kilometres, beating Moser's record of 51.151 kilometres by 445 metres.^[8]

Losing the record[link]

Obree's triumph lasted less than a week. On 23 July, the British Olympic champion, Chris Boardman broke Obree's record by 674 metres, riding 52.270 km at Bordeaux during the rest day of the Tour de France. His bike had a carbon monocoque frame, carbon wheels, and a triathlon handlebar. Their rivalry grew: a few months later Obree knocked Boardman out of the world championship pursuit to take the title himself.^[15]

Regaining the record[link]

Francesco Moser, whose record Obree had beaten, adopted Obree's riding position—adding a chest pad—and established not an outright world record but a veterans' record of 51.84 kilometres. He did it on 15 January 1994, riding in the thin air of Mexico City as he had for his outright record, whereas Obree and Boardman had ridden at close to sea level.

Obree retook the record on 19 April 1994, using the track that Boardman had used at Bordeaux. He had bolted his shoes to his pedals, to avoid what had happened in the final of the national pursuit championship, when he pulled his foot off the pedal during his starting effort.^{[n 3]}

He rode 52.713 kilometres, a distance beaten on 2 September 1994 by the Spanish Tour de France winner, Miguel Indurain.

Old Faithful banned[link]

The world governing body, the Union Cycliste Internationale grew concerned that changes to bicycles were making a disproportionate improvement to track records. Among other measures, it banned his riding position: he did not find out until one hour before he began the world championship pursuit in Italy.^[16] Judges disqualified him when he refused to comply.^[17] The magazine Cycling Weekly blamed "petty-minded officialdom."^[18]

Obree developed another riding position, the Superman style, his arms fully extended in front, and he won the individual pursuit at the world championships with this and Old Faithful in 1995.^[18] That position was also banned.^[19] The bike is on display at the new Riverside Transport Museum in Glasgow.

Other achievements[link]

Obree was individual pursuit world champion in 1993 and 1995. He broke the British 10-mile individual time trial record in 1993, won the RTTC 50-mile championship the same year (a record 1h 39m 1s), and won the 25-mile championship in 1996. In 1997 he timed 18m 36s in a 10-mile time trial and next day won the British Cycling Federation 25-mile championship. The writer Peter Bryan, of The Times, said:

To see Obree in full flight, shoulders hunched and elbows tucked into his ribs, is a memorable sight. His face contorted with pain illustrates the effort he is putting in. And yet, not too many minutes after he has finished a ride the champion is sufficiently relaxed to talk with a queue of pressmen.^[4]

Professional career[link]

Obree rode his hour records as an amateur. He took a professional licence after winning his first world championship, telling Bryan: "I reckon I can make more money on the bike than I get from unemployment benefit."^[4]

He joined Le Groupement, a French team but did not attend a meeting in Les Carroz d'Arraches^[17] and was fired for "lack of professionalism."^[20] Obree had been racing in Florida when the team first met. But he was on holiday there when the team met again for publicity photographs. He got to the next get-together but flew to Paris instead of Lille, where the meeting was held.^[20]

The team manager, Patrick Valcke, said:

"If a rider has that attitude, it's best to stop working together as soon as possible. We paid for his tickets [to fly from Glasgow to Geneva] and he didn't even turn up, didn't even phone to explain why he was not coming. He said that he did not want to leave his family so soon after the death of his brother (see below) but he could have phoned to tell us that. I don't want any more to do with him."^[20]

Obree said: "I was too ill to attend the get-together and had no success when I attempted to contact team officials on 1 January. My wife, Anne, who is a nurse, insisted I was not well enough to travel to France."^[17][20]

The Le Groupement team fell apart after a short time, when the sponsoring company was involved in scandal, with accusations that it was nothing but a pyramid selling scheme. Some of the team members claimed that they were owed money, and their wages had not been paid.

Attitude to doping[link]

Obree said of his short professional career:

"I still feel I was robbed of part of my career. I was signed up to ride in the prologue of the Tour back in 1995, but it was made very obvious to me I would have to take drugs. I said no, no way, and I was sacked by my team. So there I was, 11 years later, sitting there waiting for the Tour cyclists to come by, and something welled up in me. I feel I was robbed by a lot of these bastards taking drugs. I also hate the way that people think anyone who has ever achieved anything on a bike must have been taking drugs. I was surprised how resentful I felt when I was in Paris. It had obviously been simmering away in there for years. That's something new I'll have to talk to my therapist about."^[8]

He said in L'Équipe:

"In my opinion, 99 percent of riders at élite level take EPO or a similar drug, not particularly to dope themselves but to be at the same level as the others. And I find that rather sad."^{[21][n 4]}

His web site says:

"AND by the way, I never took drugs to improve my performance at any time as has been happening in the sport for a long time. I will be willing to stick my finger into a polygraph test if anyone with big media pull wants to take issue. In other words, if you buy a signed poster now it will not be tarnished later."^[22]

Further suicide attempt[link]

Obree's brother, Gordon, died in a car crash in October 1994,^[11] and Graeme Obree again slid in and out of depression. In 2001 he was found unconscious at Bellsland Farm in Kilmaurs, 12 km from his Ayrshire home. The Obree family horse was stabled there,^[9] and he was discovered by a woman checking a barn.^[11] He had tried to hang himself.^[2] His wife, Anne, said he had been diagnosed as having severe bipolar disorder three years earlier.^[9]

Present day[link]

Obree is divorced from his wife, and the couple have two children.^[6] He continues to race occasionally in individual time trials for Ayrshire-based Fullarton Wheelers cycling club. In May 2005, he crashed in the rain in the national 10-mile time trial championship near Nantwich in Cheshire. He was a member of the winning three-man club squad that took the team title in the Scottish 10-mile championship in May 2006.^[23] In December 2006, he competed in the track event, Revolution 15, in a four kilometre pursuit challenge.^[24]

In January 2011, Obree disclosed in an interview with the Scottish Sun that he is gay and that his difficulty with coming to terms with his sexual orientation contributed to his earlier suicide attempts. "I was brought up by a war generation; they grew up when gay people were put in jail. Being homosexual was so unthinkable that you just wouldn't be gay. I'd no inkling about anything, I just closed down." He came out to his family in 2005.^[6]

New Hour record attempt[link]

In May 2009, Obree announced that he would make an attempt at the "Athlete's Hour" record on a bike he had built himself during 2009. Obree said in October 2009 that the attempt had been cancelled as the bike he'd built himself was not suitable for the conditions. He will not be attempting this again.^[25]

In December 2009, he was inducted into the British Cycling Hall of Fame.^[26]

HPV land speed record[link]

In December 2011, Obree announced that he would make an attempt at the human-powered vehicle land speed record, hoping to hit 100 mph.^[27]

Book and film[link]

He published his autobiography in 2003 titled The Flying Scotsman.^{[n 5]} He said: "It started with the psychologist saying it would do me good and ended up as my life story."^[28] A film based on the book premiered at the Edinburgh International Film Festival in 2006, starring Jonny Lee Miller and Billy Boyd.^[29] In November 2006 Metro-Goldwyn Mayer bought world distribution rights and the film was released in the US on 29 December 2006;^[30] it was given a UK release on 29 June 2007. The DVD was released in the UK on 5 November 2007.^[31]

Notes[link]

References[link]

Related media[link]

• Flying Scotsman: Cycling to Triumph Through My Darkest Hours Graeme Obree VeloPress 2005 ISBN 1-931382-72-7
• Flying Scotsman Graeme Obree Birlinn Books 2003 ISBN 1-84158-335-9
• Graeme Obree at the Internet Movie Database
• The Flying Scotsman speaks: Graeme Obree interview stv website
• Graeme Obree interview: Velo Club Don Logan Podcast (Feb 2011)

External links[link]

• Official website
• Graeme Obree - Biography at CyclingInfo.co.uk
• Graeme Obree's home made bike photograph

This section needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (July 2011)

Chris Boardman

Boardman in 2010
Personal information
Full name	Christopher Miles Boardman
Nickname	The Professor[citation needed]
Born	(1968-08-26) 26 August 1968 (age 43) Hoylake, United Kingdom
Team information
Discipline	Road
Role	Retired (currently appears on ITV4's coverage of the Tour de France as a commentator)
Rider type	Time Trialist
Amateur team(s)
Birkenhead Victoria CC Manchester Wheelers' Club GS Strada North Wirral Velo Club - Kodak
Professional team(s)
1993–1998 1999–2000	Gan Crédit Agricole
Major wins
World Time Trial champion 1994 Tour de France 3 stages
Medal record Competitor for  England Commonwealth Games Bronze Edinburgh 1986 4000m Team Pursuit Bronze Auckland 1990 4000m Team Pursuit Bronze Auckland 1990 Team Time Trial (100km) Competitor for  Great Britain Olympic Games Track cycling Gold 1992 Barcelona 4000m Individual Pursuit Road bicycle racing Bronze 1996 Atlanta Individual Time Trial World Championships Track cycling Gold 1994 Palermo 4km Individual Pursuit Gold 1996 Manchester 4km Individual Pursuit Road bicycle racing Gold 1994 Salzburg Individual Time trial Silver 1996 Salzburg Individual Time trial Bronze 1997 Salzburg Individual Time trial Bronze 1999 Treviso Individual Time trial
Infobox last updated on 18 May 2008

Christopher "Chris" Boardman, MBE, (born 26 August 1968 in Hoylake) is a former English racing cyclist who won an individual pursuit gold medal at the 1992 Summer Olympics and broke the world hour record three times, as well as winning three stages and wearing the yellow jersey on three separate occasions at the Tour de France. In 1992, he was awarded an MBE for services to British cycling.^[1]

He was educated in Wirral at Hilbre High School and rode in his first bike race at the age of 13. He was on the national cycling team by the age of 16.^[2]

Boardman's nickname is the Professor, for his meticulous attention to detail in preparation and training, and his technical know-how.^{[citation needed]} He had an altitude tent built in his house to help him prepare for the Hour record attempt (see below), although in an interview he claimed that all it did was help him focus. Boardman focused on interval training. He was a keen user of power measuring devices.^{[citation needed]}

For his winning ways in time trials and prologues of stage races, he was nicknamed Mr. Prologue. He has been criticized for being a time-trialist who can't climb for his lacklustre performance in the mountains of the Tour de France.^{[citation needed]} He denied this in an interview with CycleSport, citing examples in the 1995 edition of the Critérium du Dauphiné Libéré stage race where he performed well in the mountains. He explained that his disappointing performances in the Tour de France were due to insufficient powers of recovery, which left him drained after a few days of racing.^{[citation needed]}

Boardman is also famous for having used the carbon-fibre Lotus 108 time trial bicycle designed by Mike Burrows and made by the sports car manufacturer Lotus. Later he worked with the UK carbon fibre bike specialist Hotta, to produce other time-trial frame designs, which he raced in various events including world championships, and Olympic games. He is now involved in producing commercial and competition bikes with the Boardman Bikes and Boardman Elite ventures.

UK time trial exploits[link]

Boardman won his first national RTTC time trial title in the 1984 "GHS" schoolboy 10-mile championship and subsequently won the 1986 junior 25-mile championship. He also broke the junior 25-mile national record in 1984.

As a senior he won four consecutive hill climb championships (from 1988 to 1991), five consecutive 25-mile championships (from 1989 to 1993), the 50-mile championship in 1991 and 1992, and the men's British time trial championship in 2000. He broke the record for 25 miles in 1992 and 1993 with 45 minutes 57 seconds (which he held until 2009)^[3] on a course based on the A34 near Oxford. He was also a member of the winning North Wirral Velo team in the 1993 100 km team time trial championship (won in a championship record time of 2:00:07), having previously won the event three times with Manchester Wheelers' Club, in 1988, 1989 and 1991.

Professional career and Tour de France[link]

Having started his cycling career as a time trial specialist, he turned professional with the GAN team, later renamed the Crédit Agricole team, of manager Roger Legeay of France.

His first race as a professional was the 1993 Grand Prix Eddy Merckx, a 66 km time trial which he won. He further won several stages of the Midi Libre and Critérium du Dauphiné Libéré stage races, including the final road stage.

He won fame by winning the prologue of the 1994 Tour de France with the fastest time ever recorded,^[4] but lost the Yellow jersey in a team time trial. He was hailed as the UK's future Tour de France winner, despite his own insistence that it was a long shot. After retirement he said he was not able to recover from the rigours of stage racing due to a low hormone profile. "I've always had it, it's probably been that way since I was born, but because of the type of racing that I did in the past, it was not a problem."

In the 1995 Tour de France, he crashed at the prologue and was forced to quit.

The 1996 Tour de France saw him make a timid return in the wet and rainy prologue where he was beaten by Alex Zülle into second place.

However, he made a comeback in the 1997 Tour de France by winning the prologue of the Tour again, although a crash forced him to quit in the 13th stage.

In 1998 Tour de France, when the Tour began in Dublin, Ireland, he won the prologue but crashed on stage 2 while wearing the yellow jersey.

In 1998 he was diagnosed with an illness like Osteoporosis. Treatment for this condition meant that Boardman needed hormone replacement therapy, necessitating that Boardman take Testosterone. As a professional cyclist, it was against the sport's doping rules for Boardman to take testosterone. Boardman chose to continue in cycling for a further two years and hoped to finish his career on a high note at the 2000 Summer Olympics.

His preparation was affected by missing the 1999 Tour de France due to sinus problems.^[5] Boardman came eleventh in the time trial at the Olympics.^[6]

The Hour Record[link]

Boardman is famous for his hour record. The 1990s saw him compete with Graeme Obree using radically modified time-trial bikes, beating each others' record. The Union Cycliste Internationale finally modified the regulations, making use of a traditional racing bicycle, similar to the one used by Eddy Merckx to establish the Hour Record in the 1970s, compulsory. Chris Boardman made his attempt at the Hour Record using this new ruling and succeeded in 2000 riding just 10m further than Merckx's 28 year-old record.

Olympics[link]

At the 1992 Barcelona Olympic Games, Boardman rode a new "super bike" in the 4 km pursuit, the Lotus 108. This incorporated several new features. It was made by Lotus Engineering and called 'the uni-axle'. In the final, he caught his German opponent Jens Lehmann, World Champion from the previous year.

He chose not to defend his title at the 1996 Atlanta Olympic Games, but did win bronze in the Men's 52 km time trial.

Retirement[link]

In an interview Boardman admitted that the last two years of his professional career were the most difficult, especially because of his debilitating condition and marital issues. Boardman was diagnosed with osteoporosis by the time he was 30, a condition which is uncommon for someone as young as he was. He was criticized for not realizing his potential, but in response he said that, "I never considered myself particularly gifted, but I managed to stretch and mould the ability that I have, and found a niche for myself."

Boardman lives with his wife and six children in his native Wirral. Since retirement from professional cycling he has presented for ITV's cycling coverage and currently has a brand of cycles and accessories under the name Boardman bikes.^[7][8] He is also involved in producing competition cycles through Boardman Elite.^[9]

Boardman was appointed a technical adviser to the British road and track cycling team in 2004, and was equipment and technical manager to the TeamGB cyclists at the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games ^[10][11][12]

In 2009 Boardman returned to competition. In the Flora London Marathon, he clocked a very creditable 3hrs 19min 27sec. He was also inducted into the British Cycling Hall of Fame.^[13]

Palmarès[link]

British Records[link]

25 Miles road time-trial (Junior), 1984

25 Miles road time-trial (Senior), 1992

25 Miles road time-trial (Senior), 1993, 45:57, min/sec

100 Km road time-trial (Team), 1993, 2:00:07, hr/min/sec (North Wirral Velo team)

World records[link]

1 Hour track time-trial, 23 July 1993, Bordeaux, 52.270 Km

1 Hour track time-trial, 7 Sept 1996, Manchester, 56.375 Km

1 Hour track time-trial, 27 Oct 2000, Manchester, 49.441 Km ("Athlete" rules)

References[link]

Further reading[link]

• Liggett, Phil (1994), The Fastest Man on Two Wheels — In Pursuit of Chris Boardman, London: Boxtree .
• O'Connor, Phil; Watson, Graham (2000), Boardman — A Cycling Career in Pictures, O'Connor and Watson .

External links[link]

• Chris Boardman's official home page
• Chris Boardman on Twitter
• Boardman Bikes official site
• Boardman Elite official site
• fansite
• International Olympic Committee - history page with video
• Chris Boardman
• Manchester Wheelers' Club
• LotusSport Pursuit Bicycle – used to win 1992 Olympic Gold.
• Chris Boardman profile at Cycling Archives
• Official Tour de France results for Chris Boardman
• Official Boardman bikes information page and Nicole Cooke video

Gary Fisher at Interbike 2007

Gary Christopher Fisher (born 1950) is considered one of the inventors of the modern mountain bike.^{[citation needed]}

Fisher started competing in road and track races at age 12. He was suspended in 1968 because race organizers cited a rule that his hair was too long.^[1] By 1972 this rule had been repealed and Fisher's career continued. He won the TransAlp race in Europe and a Masters XC national title.

Fisher went to work in 1975 on his 1930s Schwinn Excelsior X bicycle. His innovations to the model included drum brakes, motorcycle brake levers and cables, and triple chainrings, all taken from "junkers" Fisher found at bike shops. The next year, Fisher participated in the Repack downhill race, promoted by his roommate Charlie Kelly. This used a tortuous downhill route on Pine Mountain near Fairfax, California, just north of San Francisco, that riders used their coaster brakes so much that they had to repack the smoking hubs with grease after every run. Fisher holds the record time on the Repack course at 4:22.^[2]

Gary Fisher speaks about his role as a pioneer in the sport of Mountain Biking in two video documentaries: Full Cycle: A World Odyssey produced by New & Unique Videos (1994) ^[3] and "Klunkerz" produced by Billy Savage (2007)^[4]. Original clips of Fisher on his mountain bike appear in both documentaries.

Company[link]

Charlie Kelly coined the term mountain bike in 1979, after a phrase used by a mechanic. That year, Fisher and Kelly founded MountainBikes,^[5] the first company to specialize in the manufacture of this type of bicycle. Frames were built by Tom Ritchey, who later founded his own company. The first model sold for $US1300; 160 were manufactured in the first year.

1979 saw the introduction of Shimano components and an ill-fated attempt to trademark Mountain Bike. The company dissolved in 1983; Fisher founded Gary Fisher Mountain Bikes the same year. Fisher sold his company in 1991 to Taiwan's Anlen company, remaining on as President. In 1992, Howie Cohen, who had previously imported Nishiki, Azuki and Kuwahara bicycles, assisted Gary Fisher with his brand.^[6] 18 months later brokering the acquisition of Fisher by Trek Bicycle Corporation.^[6]

On June 16, 2010, Trek Bicycle Corporation announced "the Gary Fisher Collection, a line of Trek bikes that will replace the standalone Gary Fisher brand".^[7]

After company sale[link]

Fisher remains involved with design and marketing, along with being scout and mentor to racers sponsored by the team. The best known was the gold-medal winner in the 1996 and 2000 Olympics women's mountain biking: Paola Pezzo.^{[citation needed]}

Awards[link]

Gary Fisher in the Go-Kart portion of the 2005 SSWC

Fisher was inducted into the Mountain Bike Hall of Fame in 1988. Outside magazine named him one of the "50 who left their mark" in the sport in 2000, and Smithsonian magazine honored him in 1994 as the "Founding Father of Mountain Bikes." In 1998, Fisher was recognized by Popular Mechanics for his innovations in sports.

See also[link]

• Joe Breeze
• Klunkerz: A Film About Mountain Bikes
• Single Speed World Championship

References[link]

1. ^ http://fisherbikes.com/gary/story/
2. ^ "Klunking". Evening Magazine. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SVWP6VaLtvw. 
3. ^ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Gary_Fisher_Charlie_Kelly_Jacquie_Phelan_1994.jpg
4. ^ http://www.klunkerz.com/castcrew-fisher-1.html/
5. ^ Charlie Kelly. "MountainBikes History and Advertising". http://sonic.net/~ckelly/Seekay/mtbikes_company.htm. Retrieved 14 October 2011. 
6. ^ ^{a b} "Early BMX Pioneers". American Bicycle Association BMX. http://www.ababmx.com/index.php?page=halloffame1. 
7. ^ "Trek Press Release 16 June 2010". Trek Bicycle Corporation. http://www.trekbikes.com/uk/en/trek_life/news/article/2183/2010/06/16/trek_introduces_the_gary_fisher_collection/. 

External links[link]

• Fisher Bikes website
• Charlie Kelly Website
• Proceedings of MTB seminar by Gary Fisher at N.Y.intl. bicycle show 1983
• Klunkerz: A Film About Mountain Bikes Gary Fisher Bio

Jonny Lee Miller
Miller at a presentation for Peace One Day in 2005 along with ex-wife Angelina Jolie
Born	Jonathan Lee Miller (1972-11-15) 15 November 1972 (age 39) Kingston upon Thames, Greater London, England
Occupation	Actor
Years active	1983–present
Spouse	Angelina Jolie (1996–1999) Michele Hicks (2008–present)

Jonathan "Jonny" Lee Miller (born 15 November 1972) is an English actor. During the initial days he was best known for his roles in the 1996 films Trainspotting and Hackers. Miller worked steadily in film and theatre with less public notice until 2008, when he starred in two seasons of American TV series Eli Stone followed by lead roles in the Broadway play After Miss Julie and the BBC production of Emma. In 2010 he had a featured role on the Showtime series Dexter as the fifth season's chief antagonist Jordan Chase. In 2011 he starred, along with Benedict Cumberbatch, in the play Frankenstein at the National Theatre. Miller played Roger Collins in Tim Burton's film Dark Shadows, which opened 11 May 2012.

Early life[link]

Miller was born in Kingston upon Thames, London, England, the son of Anne Lee, who worked in theatre production and starred in many films (including Lost & Found), and Alan Miller, a stage actor and later a stage manager at the BBC.^[1] Miller's maternal grandfather was Bernard Lee, famous for playing the character M in the first eleven James Bond films. Miller has stated that he has fond memories of being at the Television Centre with his sister and watching Top of the Pops and Blue Peter being made.^[2] He made an uncredited appearance in the BBC TV series Doctor Who as a child in the 1982 story Kinda. Miller was educated at Tiffin School in Kingston upon Thames where he gained his first acting experience (notably in the musical October's Children) and played in the Tiffin Swing Band.^[3] Miller left school at age 17 to pursue his acting career.^[4]

Career[link]

After a stint in EastEnders as Jonathan Hewitt, Miller got his big break in the film Hackers (1995), co-starring Angelina Jolie, whom he married in 1996. In 1997, Miller was involved with the creation and operation of Natural Nylon along with friends Jude Law (whom he met in the National Youth Music Theatre), Sadie Frost, Ewan McGregor, Sean Pertwee, Damon Bryant and Bradley Adams. Natural Nylon folded in 2003.

Aside from EastEnders, he has appeared on television in the BBC's modernization of The Canterbury Tales, as Artie in The Pardoner's Tale and as Lord Byron in a BBC production about the life of the poet. He worked on the US television series Smith (CBS, Fall 2006). His first appearance on US Television was the 1996 miniseries Dead Man's Walk.

Shortly after Hackers, Miller was cast in Trainspotting (1996) as Sick Boy, a role which gained him recognition. He was suggested for that role by Ewan McGregor. The accent he used in the film was so convincing that it led many people^{[citation needed]} to erroneously believe he was from Scotland. It states on Miller's website, "As the only non-Scot in the cast Jonny has had to master the accent. "I had to do a lot of work," he confesses, " I read and re- read the book and I pretended to be Scottish all the time I was in Glasgow, hanging around with Scots, picking up bits and pieces on the street and in bars. Everyone's been very encouraging and Danny thinks that I've got it about right. Of course, the others are from all over Scotland and have different accents themselves, so I've tried to just pick up a general, composite accent."^[5]

In 1997, he played Billy Prior in the film adaptation of Pat Barker's World War I novel, Regeneration, in 2000 he played the role of Cameron Colley in Complicity (video title Retribution), based on the book by Iain Banks. He costarred alongside Jude Law and Ray Winstone in the film "Love, Honor, And Obey" as Johnny, a London street kid getting mixed-up with a notorious Brit gangster. Also in 2000, he appeared as Simon Sheppard in Wes Craven's Dracula 2000.

In 2005, he was considered for the role of James Bond, to replace Pierce Brosnan. The role went to Daniel Craig. The following year, Miller portrayed cyclist Graeme Obree in The Flying Scotsman. In 2007, Miller was selected to play the lead role in the series for ABC, called Eli Stone; the series was cancelled after two seasons. The first season had been interrupted by a lengthy writers' strike.

He was considered as the third team-mate to join Ben Fogle and James Cracknell in Team QinetiQ for the Amundsen Omega 3 South Pole Race (January 2009). He participated in training for the event in Norway which was televised for a BBC2 documentary series On Thin Ice.^[6] He was not able to attend the race due to filming commitments of Eli Stone being extended for a second season.

In 2009 he played Mr. Knightley in a BBC adaptation of Jane Austen's Emma.^[7] He also appeared on Broadway with Sienna Miller in a production of "After Miss Julie", his performance receiving generally excellent reviews.

In early 2010, a rumour was floated that Miller was in talks to portray Rick Grimes in the Frank Darabont film adaptation of the comic The Walking Dead^[8] but the part went to Andrew Lincoln. He has also starred in the fifth season of Dexter^[9] as Jordan Chase, a highly popular motivational speaker who is suspected of leading a gang of serial rapists/murderers.

In March, 2011, at the National Theatre, he played, on alternate nights, both Victor Frankenstein and his Creature, opposite Benedict Cumberbatch, in a stage adaptation of Frankenstein.^[10] Frankenstein, directed by Danny Boyle, was broadcast to cinemas worldwide as part of National Theatre Live on 17 March 2011 and additional dates throughout March and April.^[11]

In May 2011, it was announced that he would have a role in Tim Burton's film Dark Shadows (2012).

In February 2012 it was confirmed Miller had been cast as Sherlock Holmes in the CBS drama Elementary. Lucy Liu was later cast as Watson.^[12]

Personal life[link]

Miller married actress Angelina Jolie on 28 March 1996. They separated eighteen months later^[13] and were divorced on 9 February 1999. He began dating actress/model Michele Hicks in 2006.^[14] Miller and Hicks married in Malibu in July 2008. Their son, Buster Timothy Miller, was born December 3, 2008 in Los Angeles.

Miller is a supporter of Chelsea FC.^[15] He is a marathon runner, often supporting the charity Mencap. He ran the 2008 London Marathon in 3:01:40. Miller was signed up to run the 2006 Marathon des Sables but had to drop out due to contractual obligation to Smith, which was cancelled after three episodes. In 2010 he ran the New York Marathon with his Dexter co-star Jennifer Carpenter.

Selected works[link]

References[link]

External links[link]

• Jonny Lee Miller at the Internet Movie Database

Elizabeth 'Lee' Miller, Lady Penrose (April 23, 1907 – July 21, 1977) was an American photographer. Born in Poughkeepsie, New York in 1907, she was a successful fashion model in New York City in the 1920s before going to Paris where she became an established fashion and fine art photographer. During the Second World War, she became an acclaimed war correspondent for Vogue covering events such as the London Blitz, the liberation of Paris, and the concentration camps at Buchenwald and Dachau.

Early life[link]

Lee Miller was born on April 23, 1907 in Poughkeepsie, New York. Her parents were Theodore and Florence Miller (née MacDonald). Her father was of German descent, and her mother a Canadian of Scottish and Irish descent. She had a younger brother named Erik, and older brother named John. Theodore always favored Lee, and he often used her as a model for his amateur photography. When she was eight years old, she was raped while staying with a family friend in Brooklyn. Soon after, it was realized that Lee had contracted gonorrhea.^{[1][page needed]} The rape (which she almost never discussed), had a life-long traumatizing effect upon her.

Career[link]

Modeling[link]

Her father, Theodore Miller, an engineer, inventor and businessman, introduced Lee and her brothers John and Erik to photography from an early age. She was his model — with many stereoscopic photographs taken of a teenage Lee in the nude — and he also showed her technical aspects of the art.^[2] At age 19, she was stopped from walking in front of a car on a Manhattan street by the founder of Vogue, Condé Nast, thus launching her modeling career when she appeared on the cover of the March 15, 1927 edition in an illustration by George Lepape. For the next two years, she was one of the most sought after models in New York, photographed by the likes of Edward Steichen, Arnold Genthe, and Nickolas Murray. A photograph of Lee by Steichen was used to advertise Kotex, a female hygienic product, causing a scandal^[3] and effectively ending her career as a fashion model.

Photography[link]

In 1929, Lee Miller traveled to Paris with the intention of apprenticing herself to the surrealist artist and photographer Man Ray. Although, at first, he insisted that he did not take students, Miller soon became his photographic assistant, as well as his lover and muse. While she was in Paris, she began her own photographic studio, often taking over Man Ray's fashion assignments to enable him to concentrate on his painting. In fact, many of the photographs taken during this period and credited to Man Ray were actually taken by Lee. Together with Man Ray, she rediscovered the photographic technique of solarisation. She was an active participant in the surrealist movement, with her witty and humorous images. Amongst her circle of friends were Pablo Picasso, Paul Éluard, and Jean Cocteau. She even appeared as a statue that comes to life in Cocteau's The Blood of a Poet (1930).

After leaving Man Ray and Paris in 1932, she returned to New York and established a portrait and commercial photography studio with her brother Erik as her darkroom assistant. During this year she was included in the Modern European Photography exhibition at the Julien Levy Gallery in New York. In 1933 Levy gave Miller the only solo exhibition of her life.^[4] Among her portrait clients were the surrealist artist Joseph Cornell, actresses Lilian Harvey and Gertrude Lawrence, and the African-American cast of the Virgil Thomson–Gertrude Stein opera Four Saints in Three Acts (1934).

In 1934, she abandoned her studio to marry Egyptian businessman, Aziz Eloui Bey, who had come to New York to buy equipment for the Egyptian Railways. Although she did not work as a professional photographer during this period, the photographs she took while living in Egypt with Eloui, including Portrait of Space, are regarded as some of her most striking surrealist images. By 1937, Lee had grown bored with her life in Cairo and she returned to Paris, where she met the British surrealist painter and curator Roland Penrose, who she would later marry. Her photographs were not included in another exhibition until 1955, when her work was displayed with The Family of Man exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art in New York City.^[5]

World War II[link]

At the outbreak of the Second World War, Miller was living in Hampstead, London with Roland Penrose when the bombing of the city began. Ignoring pleas from friends and family to return to the US, Miller embarked on a new career in photojournalism as the official war photographer for Vogue documenting the Blitz. Lee was accredited into the U.S. Army as a war correspondent for Condé Nast Publications from December 1942. She teamed up with the American photographer David E. Scherman, a LIFE correspondent on many assignments. Miller traveled to France less than a month after D-Day and recorded the first use of napalm at the siege of St. Malo, the liberation of Paris, the battle for Alsace, and the horror of the Nazi concentration camps at Buchenwald and Dachau. One photograph by Scherman of Miller in the bathtub of Adolf Hitler's apartment in Munich is one of the most iconic images from the Miller-Scherman partnership.

During this time, Miller photographed dying children in a Vienna Hospital, peasant life in post-war Hungary and finally the execution of Prime Minister László Bárdossy. After the war she continued to work for Vogue for a further two years, covering fashion and celebrities.

England[link]

After returning to Britain from eastern Europe, Lee started to suffer from severe episodes of clinical depression and what later became known as post-traumatic stress syndrome. She began to drink heavily, and became uncertain about her future. In 1946, she traveled with Roland to the United States where she visited Man Ray in California. After she discovered she was pregnant with her only son, Antony, she divorced Bey and, on May 3, 1947 married Roland. Antony was born in September 1947. In 1949, they bought Farley Farm House in Sussex. During the 1950s and 1960s, Farley Farm became a sort of artistic Mecca for visiting artists such as Picasso, Man Ray, Henry Moore, Eileen Agar, Jean Dubuffet, Dorothea Tanning, and Max Ernst. While Miller continued to do the occasional photo shoot for Vogue, she soon discarded the darkroom for the kitchen becoming a successful gourmet cook. She also photographed for biographies Roland wrote about Picasso and Antoni Tàpies. However, images from the war, especially the concentration camps, continued to haunt her and she started on what Antony describes as a "downward spiral". Her depression may have been accelerated by her husband's long affair with the trapeze artist Diane Deriaz.^[2] Lee rarely talked about her war experiences but it inevitably had harsh effects on her health and her relationship with her family.

Miller died from cancer at Farley Farm House in Chiddingly, East Sussex in 1977, aged 70. She was cremated, and her ashes spread through her herb garden at Farley Farm House. Her son Antony Penrose, known as Tony, owns the house and offers tours of the work of Miller and of Roland Penrose. The garden exhibits art items such as Fallen Giant, Sea Creature, and Kneeling Woman, and the house is home to the private collections of Miller-Penrose, their own work and some of their favourite pieces of art. In the dining room, the fireplace was decorated in vivid colours by Roland Penrose.

Legacy[link]

Throughout her life, Miller did very little to promote her own photographic work. That Miller's work is known today is mainly due to the efforts of her son, Antony Penrose, who has been studying, conserving, and promoting his mother's work since the early 1980s. Her pictures are accessible at the Lee Miller Archive.^[6]

In 1985, the first biography of Miller entitled The Lives of Lee Miller was written by Antony Penrose. Since then, a number of books, mostly accompanying exhibitions of Miller's photographs, have been written by art historians and writers such as Jane Livingstone, Richard Calvocoressi, and Mark Haworth-Booth. In 2005 her life story was turned into a musical Six Pictures Of Lee Miller with music and lyrics by British composer Jason Carr. It premiered at The Chichester Festival Theatre (also in Sussex). Also in 2005 Carolyn Burke's substantial biography, Lee Miller, A Life, was published in the U.S. by Alfred A. Knopf and in the U.K. by Bloomsbury. In 2007, Traces of Lee Miller: Echoes from St Malo, an interactive CD and DVD about Miller's war photography in St Malo was released with the support of Hand Productions and Sussex University. A 1946 radio interview with Lee Miller can also be heard on the audiobook Surrealism Reviewed, published in 2002.

References[link]

External links[link]

• Lee Miller Archive official site
• Farley Farm House official site
• News story about how she was put under surveillance by MI5, BBC, 2009
• News story about a 2002 Lee Miller exhibition, BBC
• Composer-lyricist Jason Carr's website's section about the musical Six Pictures Of Lee Miller
• Borzoi Reader on Carolyn Burke's Lee Miller, A Life
• Bloomsbury on Carolyn Burke's Lee Miller
• Looking Down on Lee Miller: Carolyn Burke’s Lee Miller: A Life by Henry Edward Hardy on Scanlyze
• Smith, Ali (2007-09-08). "The look of the moment". The Guardian. http://books.guardian.co.uk/departments/artsandentertainment/story/0,,2164491,00.html. Retrieved 2007-09-08. 
• "The Art of Lee Miller". Victoria and Albert Museum. http://www.vam.ac.uk/vastatic/microsites/1631_lee_miller//introduction.php. Retrieved 2007-09-13. 
• Model Focus - Remembering Lee Miller by Emma Juhasz for bmi Voyager, October 2007
• Lee Miller at Find a Grave
• Surrealism Reviewed audiobook featuring Lee Miller