I didn’t create this Instagram reel. But I was in the vicinity—near the World Trade Center—on Tosca, my Mercian fixed gear bike.
Someone confirmed what I suspected: Many of the people were students or teachers at a nearby high school and college. What could be more educational than seeing a solar eclipse, even if we were about four hundred kilometers away from the path of totality.
What might you have in common with Miguel Indurain?
Well, not five Tour de France victories—unless you’re Jacques Anquetil, Eddy Mercx or Bernard Hinault.
Otherwise, it’s most likely that if you share any experience with the Basque legend, it’s that of having your bike stolen.
Last month, he was prepping for the six-day Titan Desert mountain bike race when his machine was taken from a van parked outside a hotel in Vilaseca, a Catalonian town where Indurain was staying.
Now, if you’re lucky, you might have another commonality with him: one that might seem almost as rare as five Tour de France victories.
He got his bike back. The local police force reported the return, which they effected.
Now we are, unfortunately, in still-rarer, if not quite as rare as five TdF wins, territory: the constables actually helping someone to reunite with their bike.
Miguel Indurain deserves such cooperation. So do you, should your bike ever be stolen.
