Different times

What was the cycling world like 75 years ago? Now in his midnineties, Scottish former champion Ramsay Mackay remembers those times like they were yesterday

- Trevor Ward

The exercise bike in the middle of the converted attic is flanked by a pair of comfortable armchairs and a table, on which sits a portable typewriter with a half-finished document poking out of it.

Scattered about the room are a red rotary-dial telephone, a wooden sculpture of a golfer mid-swing and framed black and white photographs of cyclists in woollen jerseys and Coppi-style sunglasses astride thin machines replete with leather saddles, toe-clips and an alarming absence of gears.

A skylight in the sloping ceiling looks out on the back gardens and bungalows of a quiet neighbourhood of Edinburgh.

The titles among a small shelf of cycling books give a clue to the personality of the owner of this unlikely 'pain cave': Racing Hard, We Might As Well Win and Every Second Counts.

The story that connects all these elements will unfold over the course of the next three hours as I listen to the memories of 94-year-old Ramsay Mackay, a former Scottish Hill Climb Champion and veteran of the Tours of Britain and Ireland who, at the age of 16, rode all the way from Edinburgh to Dublin just to buy a tin of pineapple.

'It was 1946 and we hadn't seen any since the start of the War,' he offers matter-of-factly. 'I was with two mates who I assumed knew how to "go a bike" as we all rode Post Office bikes in our jobs. But halfway to Glasgow I realised we were getting slower and slower.

The overnight ferry to Belfast cost two shillings and sixpence each for us and our bikes; that's 12 and a half pence today [about £1.50 with inflation].' Mackay, it will become clear, retains a forensic recollection of prices, distances and timings.