Book Excerpt: Michael Barry's Inside the Postal Bus
By Michael Barry
Jun 3, 2005, 13:09
The first time I saw the
bus, I was both impressed and nervous. It was my first trip with the team in
Europe; we were heading to
training camp in Javea,
Spain, from the airport in
Alicante.
“How do you like the
1980s strip club?” Christian asked.
The bus has a gray,
blue, and red interior and exterior, is covered with logos on the outside, and
lined with gray leather chairs with red trim on the inside. In the front there
are 12 seats, two pair facing the front window and two sets of four facing each
other with a table in between. The tables are rarely used for much other than a
leg rest. Two long benches stretch toward the back of the bus, about 4 meters in
length. After a race has ended and we’re driving to a hotel, every seat is
filled by eight riders and a director.
Lance always takes the
corner spot on the back bench, a spot where you can see everything going on in
the rest of the bus and also a comfortable spot where you can put your legs up.
When he’s not there, George takes that seat, and when George isn’t there nobody
else really seems to care who has it.
For some reason the
Spanish guys always seem to sit in the front of the bus, sprawled over the
chairs, whereas all the other guys like the couches in the back. In the 2003
Vuelta, it became the joke that the front half of the bus was for the guys doing
well, Triki and Roberto, and the rest of us were at the back of the bus where we
had been all day on the climbs. None of the seats on the bus are used in a
normal fashion. Most of the time legs are up in the air, guys are stretched out,
and bags of clothing are scattered. Some packs become pillows while others
become footrests.
Everybody gets ready at
the same time and the bus becomes a zoo. Backpacks of race clothing are opened,
with gear spilling out—numbers, jerseys, shorts—everything that we need for
racing. Riders punch the buttons of the coffee machine while others push to get
to the race food. Sugar, milk, creamer, condensed milk, and stir sticks all sit
beside the automatic machine. Luc and the soigneurs take care of the coffee
machine, while the rest of us abuse it and demand that it supply our needs with
no complaints, and when it doesn’t, we call on them to remedy the situation.
Cakes of different kinds—apple tarts, rice tarts, jam tarts, and small rolls or
paninis filled with Nutella or jam—sit in paper bags next to the coffee machine.
We can choose between a huge variety of Clif Bars, cakes, and Clif Energy
Gels—all sugary and all fuel for the day’s efforts. Sometimes they’re hard to
get down and other times they taste like the candy bars my allowance was saved
for as a kid.
The cakes come from
Belgium. They are ordered and
bought by Freddy Viaene, our soigneur, from a local shop in his hometown—always
the same quality and always the same taste. They’re buttery and sweet, fresh,
with a homemade taste, but also heavy and not ideal for a fast pace or a
lactose-intolerant rider. We eat the cakes because they are high in calories,
full of energy that we need to get us to the finish line without becoming
hypoglycemic.
Michael Barry.
Cereals are packed away
in the shelves of the bus for the trips home from the races. Soy milk, for the
lactose-intolerant, is in the fridge beside the sweetened condensed milk for the
coffee.
Tucked away in one of
the storage bins on the bus is an ultrasound machine. In the early season it
seems the ultrasound machine is always out and riders are lining up to use it in
the soigneurs’ room. While one rider is on the massage table, another will be
sitting on a bed using the ultrasound on his knee while another rider roots
through the food bin looking for a cookie or piece of fruit. MTV, CNN, or
Eurosport is usually on the television as background noise.
In the bus there are
also bags of ice and ice packs, which we tuck under our tights or place over our
knees, necks, or any other part that aches from the race. It’s not uncommon for
us to be spread out across the body of the bus, nursing our aches in hopes of
better muscles the next day.
The kitchen is beside
the shower that is beside the bathroom. On the way to the races all of the doors
separating the different compartments need to be closed, as the stench that
comes out of the toilet is unbearable for the passengers. Most musicians have a
“no number two rule” on their tour buses for good reason, whereas we pretty much
have a bus so we can take care of number two before a race. On a bumpy, sinuous
mountain road, the stench is even worse as the corners seem to stir odors up
from the depths of the bus. The soigneurs do their best to keep the bathroom and
shower clean, but there are odors they can’t remedy, even with all the air
fresheners and antibacterial sprays available.
Cyclists are generally
not clean and neat right before or after a race. The bus is a sty after
everybody has scurried and pushed about in an effort to get ready. After the
race all anybody cares about is consuming calories and putting their feet up.
When we arrive at the hotel for the evening, from the front to the back of the
bus there are wrappers and open empty cans and bottles rolling around on the
carpeted floor. It was really nice to have Berry Floor as a sponsor—they would
replace the carpeting when it became nasty with stains.
During the few years I
spent racing with the U.S.–based Saturn cycling team, we had no bus or camper,
so we often had an issue finding toilets prior to the races. In
Europe riders duck behind
buildings or bushes and nobody really seems to care, whereas at several races in
the States the organizers penalize or disqualify riders caught peeing in the
bushes. As a result, we frequently ended up simply using a water bottle in the
team van prior to the start and then tossing the bottle in the garbage. PDM, the
Dutch superteam of the late ’80s and early ’90s, was the first team in the
peloton to get a bus. Prior to the PDM bus, teams used minivans and team cars to
shuttle the riders to the start line and then to the hotel after the finish. Now
every team in the peloton either has a bus or a camper van. It seems a necessity
now, and it’s hard to imagine how the riders managed before the bus.
The team buses, like the
mechanics’ trucks, often get shuffled around between teams. When a team folds,
another team will buy its bus or truck, or when a team upgrades their truck, a
team with a smaller budget might buy the old truck. All the vehicles end up
getting worked over during the season. They are cleaned and well cared for but
they do rack up at least a few trips around Europe throughout the
season.
Click here to read
our recent interview with Michael Barry.
