News: Vin Denson Signs The Golden Book

Vin Denson’s career peak was more than half a century ago when he was a ‘super’ domestique riding for Van Looy and Anquetil and Late March 2023 and Vin Denson has just signed his Pedal Club Golden Book citation

News: Vin Denson Signs The Golden Book

by Chris Lovibond,

Late March 2023 and Vin Denson has just signed his Pedal Club Golden Book citation. How did it take so long you will ask? Vin’s career peak was more than half a century ago when he was a ‘super’ domestique riding for Van Looy and Anquetil, but he loved bike racing so much that after retiring as a pro he came home and went back to his first love – time trialling (where he started in 1953). In fact his last significant achievement did not come until 2000 when he took the bronze medal in the UCI over 65 world pursuit championship. So perhaps the problem was that he just hadn’t gone away as an active competitor at the natural time for end of career honours. It would be hard to overstate the magnitude of his achievements, these at a time when there was little official support, and when many English people would have regarded any overseas travel as a major life event.

This oversight was picked up by Geoff Wiles (Nat.Pro. Road Champ 1976, among many successes) when he happened to meet Vin at a cycling event recently. It was through Geoff’s good work that this honour came to pass, and we should all be aware that there was quite a lot of effort here – not just preparing the page, but just bringing all the necessary people together for the signing ceremony took some doing.

Although now in his eighty eighth year and somewhat lacking in youthful sprightliness, once comfortably installed at a pub table, Vin is still an entertaining raconteur with an apparently bottomless fund of anecdotes from the golden age of sixties continental pro cycling. I hope readers here can take just one – an example of the quality of a rider who was almost always working for someone else.

In early 1964 Vin was in the Solo Superia team, which meant his sole purpose was to support ‘Emperor’ Rik Van Looy. In the Belgian classic Brussels – Verviers a thunderstorm broke, Rik decided he couldn’t be bothered and retired to the team car, the rest of the team following suit, except for Vin who was in the break. His D.S. gave two wheels and his bag to another team, hoping for the best, but no help came from that quarter.

Near Liege, he asked Ferdi Bracke, whose family were out supporting him, for a drink. Bracke got hold of a bidon and pretended he was about to hand it over, but at the last moment tipped the contents out over our man’s front wheel. Vin was so angry he immediately attacked. The rest of the break assumed he wouldn’t last to the finish on his own – they were wrong – he was three minutes clear at the finish.

A final comment from Mr. Wiles: ‘Fifty years ago I gave him a wheel at a Criterium, now it’s hearing aid batteries.’

March 2023.