This is quite probably a true story. If there can be any doubt it is because, like all good stories, it begins in a pub, some years past. So, picture if you will two cycling friends propping up the bar of their local hostelry. By pure coincidence it happens to be during the winter season. Anyway, we find these two at a point in the evening when, having exhausted the usual subjects of the birds, the bees, training and the economy, they now arrive at a hiatus.
Standing nearby, the landlady is surveying two empty glasses and anticipating – even hoping for – their early departure when, out of the blue, one turns to the other and says; “Tell you what, let me get you another and I’ll tell you about this great money-making idea of mine.”
Almost instantaneously, two frothing pints of Wadnam’s Best Bitter appear before them to the obvious delight of the other fellow, who is engaged in his usual practice of patting his pockets for a non-existent wallet. “Going to make us Mill-yon-hairs, are we, and doing what this time?”
“It’s a new type of natural fibre suitable for real top-class cycling clothing. It is based on wool but with a difference; more performance-orientated so the clothing could be sort of tailored, like if you were buying a suit.”
“You’re joking, never catch on, and anyway cost a fortune.”
“Yeah, but that’s the point, it’ll be ideal for the fancier brands.”
By now our pair has an audience amongst the regulars, who fancy themselves as fellows of the road and feel the need to chip in with what they consider as constructive criticism.
“And who do you think is going to buy this Armani Lycra, eh?” This from a chap whose present attire consists of a pair of stained overalls.
“No, no; it will be made in this special new wool, it’s the new thing from the major wool-producing nations. Anyway, it’s made specially for sporting activities” By now, everyone wants to chip in with their own ideas.
“I kid you not,” shouts one who appears rather unsteady on his feet “but from what I’ve heard the only sport that Kiwi wool gets is being chased half way across the hills by some demented shepherd on a quad bike.” Amid the ensuing raucous behaviour, our hero persists; after all, this could be big.
“I tell you, it’ll sell; all those merchant bankers with loads of money want something exclusive, something that sets them apart from the rest of us.”
Best Bitter had now been replaced by Old Hangdog and our empire builder was in full flow despite good natured heckling from his audience. He expanded on his theme of a new dawn for cycling Haute Couture based on his new high-performance animal-sourced fibre, of a range of clothing harking back to the days when cyclists rode fixed wheel and carried their spare tubs in a figure of eight across their shoulders, to a time when water bottles were fixed to the handlebars and clothing was made from a rather less appealing type of wool. He could have gone on.
“Thought you said this was going to appeal to them Yuppies?”
“Don’t worry, it will,” he says, starting to sound like Mary Portas; “ Just you wait till you see what I’ve got planned for the start of my collection. I might even have a pinstripe super-wool suit complete with button hole, white shirt and black tie….”
“TIME, gentlemen please” wails the landlady
“…the shoes will look like brogues and I’m going to design a crash hat that looks like a bowler” Howls of laughter and general derision fill the bar and someone asks if the umbrella will look like a pump.
“I got a thort ” All eyes turn to a small rotund figure dressed in corduroys, green wheelies and a lived-in tweed jacket, “I got a thort” (for the second time) “What about calling it – SportsWool?”
“RIGHT that’s it, OUT, the lot of you” The landlady’s not insubstantial forearms propel our group of drunken dreamers out into street. So inebriated are they that they will surely recall nothing evening’s details by the next morning.
The door is shut, bolts rammed home, glasses cleared and, with surprising agility, our landlady quits the bar and descends into the cellar, where her cycling-mad, mildly entrepreneurial husband is clearing space for the morning delivery.
“Darling… DARLING!”
“Yes, luv.”
“This club jersey I’m making for you. I was thinking about knitting it in SportsWool. Ever heard of it?”
