le maillot jaune
So here's the thing: after three weeks of obsessively watching the Tour de France, I've decided that there needs to be an SGA/Tour de France AU. It makes perfect, perfect sense.
See, in my head, John Sheppard is a veteran cyclist. He's not great. He's good enough to be there, but he's not on the radar-- and he's never wanted to be. He's done the Tour seven, maybe eight times, and he's a respectable climber-- he's nothing special on the flats of Bordeaux or heading into Marseille, but he loves the mountains. He lives for the Alps and the Pyrenees: the incredible, never ending grind of pulling himself inch by excruciating inch up endless switchbacks, the crowd swelling into the road, screaming silently behind the the blood pounding in his ears and McKay's voice over the radio, reporting the time splits and berating him all the way.
("Faster, you idiot, faster-- what are you, comatose? Go go go go! Radim's only got twelve seconds on you, and you are not going to let that Genii bastard get the split points on this, do you understand? Elizabeth will kill me, and then I will kill you if that happens. I don't care if your legs fall off at the knee and you have to finish the race pedalling with your hands, Sheppard, you are going to win this one for Atlantis, you've got this one, do you hear me?"
And if John had been able to do anything other than gulp thin mouthfuls of air and push against gravity and a decade and a half's worth of injuries, he would have laughed and said: "Yeah, Rodney. I hear you," and kept going.)
The thing is, John hates the climbs. Hates them. They're tedious and painful and the crowds make him want to scream with frustration and-- worst of all-- they take patience. But he endures them, beats them, owns them, scratches his way up them because there's that one moment when the road falls away under his bike, when there's nothing but sky and space and the potential for speed. That is what Sheppard lives for: the moment where climb turns irrevocably into descent.
And he is utterly ridiculous on descents. Every year, the announcers have to look up his name and his background, because he's a solid climber, respectable-- usually in the first chase group, and occasionally in the breakaway. But they need to know his name because he flies on descents. He's impossible: his machine centimeters away from the edge of the road, the edge of the world, down in a skier's crouch on shaking and exhausted thighs, his bike tilted at angles that McKay would swear break laws no man can circumvent.
("I've never seen anyone like him on those switchback curves," Ford said. He was a new hire-- a rookie, and a good contender for the white jersey. Weir had great hopes for the kid, who looked to be a strong time trial man-- and maybe even a front-runner overall, someday. Climbing wasn't his best area, though, and after watching a tape of Sheppard on the Dolomites during last year's Giro di Italia, it seemed he had a new hero. "He just-- whoosh. Two hours climbing up the damn mountain, and, like, ten minutes to get back down the other side. No braking at all. It's unreal," he continued. "And he never wipes out!"
"Oh, he wipes out," McKay scoffs. "I've seen the machines he's broken doing it. He's bent a wheel in two, wrapped his handle bars around a signpost-- which should never have happened, those bars had an unbelievable tensile strength, and I still haven't found the seat from the last time he went over a guard rail." Ford winced. "He was fine, of course, except for the massive brain damage he must have sustained, because he still takes the curves like he's some sort of crash test dummy."
Zelenka rolled his eyes. "You are only upset because he tore his shorts that time he crashed."
McKay turned red. "That is patently untrue."
Zelenka turned to Ford. "Five years ago, we were in Spain, and John slid out early on a stage-- road was wet. He was fine, but he had landed on his hip, and the shorts are very, very thin." Ford smirked; he knew where this was going. "So," Zelenka continued, "John gets back on the bike, and everything is fine. Bike is fine, John is fine. But Rodney and I-- and most of Spain-- we had an excellent view of his hindquarters for about ninety kilometers." Ford snickered. McKay groaned, and scrubbed his face with his hands.
"I do not think," Zelenka said thoughtfully, "that Rodney has ever really got over the trauma.")
So. The thing is, John really has no aspirations as a cyclist. He doesn't really want the King of the Mountain competition-- he's good on climbs, and that's good enough for him. The downhill and speed are enough of a reward-- he doesn't need a polka-dotted jersey to make the ride worthwhile. He's not a sprinter, so he'd never win the green jersey, and he's way too old for the white. A stage win would be nice, sure, but John's not holding out hope. And as for yellow-- well.
It's just not his color, now, is it?
Really, John's just in the Tour for his team. He can hold off some of the threats on the climbs, make them push themselves to the limit, make them take stupid risks on the descent. He can keep up with the peleton, take his turn at the helm, let Sumner ride slipstream. He'll do water bottle duty and check in with the team car on non-climbing days, whatever. He'll do whatever Weir tells him to do, whatever will keep him in the sport. He's not an idiot, whatever McKay says-- he knows he's getting up there, for a cyclist. So is Sumner, but he's got the respect and cache that Sheppard's never had, and never wanted. Everyone expect that that this is Sumner's year-- that this year, Atlantis will be the team that protects the yellow jersey. So John will be a drone, a water boy, a domestique. He'll protect Sumner. Whatever will let him keep the exhilaration of descent.
But the best laid plans mean nothing on the Tour, so-- when Sumner breaks his shoulder and has to pull out on Stage 5, when Ford resigns on Stage 16 (publically, there's a family emergency; privately, Beckett found signs of blood doping in one of Weir's mandatory in-house drug tests and suggested that Ford remove himself before Atlantis did)-- maybe yellow is more of John's color than he'd thought.
See, in my head, John Sheppard is a veteran cyclist. He's not great. He's good enough to be there, but he's not on the radar-- and he's never wanted to be. He's done the Tour seven, maybe eight times, and he's a respectable climber-- he's nothing special on the flats of Bordeaux or heading into Marseille, but he loves the mountains. He lives for the Alps and the Pyrenees: the incredible, never ending grind of pulling himself inch by excruciating inch up endless switchbacks, the crowd swelling into the road, screaming silently behind the the blood pounding in his ears and McKay's voice over the radio, reporting the time splits and berating him all the way.
("Faster, you idiot, faster-- what are you, comatose? Go go go go! Radim's only got twelve seconds on you, and you are not going to let that Genii bastard get the split points on this, do you understand? Elizabeth will kill me, and then I will kill you if that happens. I don't care if your legs fall off at the knee and you have to finish the race pedalling with your hands, Sheppard, you are going to win this one for Atlantis, you've got this one, do you hear me?"
And if John had been able to do anything other than gulp thin mouthfuls of air and push against gravity and a decade and a half's worth of injuries, he would have laughed and said: "Yeah, Rodney. I hear you," and kept going.)
The thing is, John hates the climbs. Hates them. They're tedious and painful and the crowds make him want to scream with frustration and-- worst of all-- they take patience. But he endures them, beats them, owns them, scratches his way up them because there's that one moment when the road falls away under his bike, when there's nothing but sky and space and the potential for speed. That is what Sheppard lives for: the moment where climb turns irrevocably into descent.
And he is utterly ridiculous on descents. Every year, the announcers have to look up his name and his background, because he's a solid climber, respectable-- usually in the first chase group, and occasionally in the breakaway. But they need to know his name because he flies on descents. He's impossible: his machine centimeters away from the edge of the road, the edge of the world, down in a skier's crouch on shaking and exhausted thighs, his bike tilted at angles that McKay would swear break laws no man can circumvent.
("I've never seen anyone like him on those switchback curves," Ford said. He was a new hire-- a rookie, and a good contender for the white jersey. Weir had great hopes for the kid, who looked to be a strong time trial man-- and maybe even a front-runner overall, someday. Climbing wasn't his best area, though, and after watching a tape of Sheppard on the Dolomites during last year's Giro di Italia, it seemed he had a new hero. "He just-- whoosh. Two hours climbing up the damn mountain, and, like, ten minutes to get back down the other side. No braking at all. It's unreal," he continued. "And he never wipes out!"
"Oh, he wipes out," McKay scoffs. "I've seen the machines he's broken doing it. He's bent a wheel in two, wrapped his handle bars around a signpost-- which should never have happened, those bars had an unbelievable tensile strength, and I still haven't found the seat from the last time he went over a guard rail." Ford winced. "He was fine, of course, except for the massive brain damage he must have sustained, because he still takes the curves like he's some sort of crash test dummy."
Zelenka rolled his eyes. "You are only upset because he tore his shorts that time he crashed."
McKay turned red. "That is patently untrue."
Zelenka turned to Ford. "Five years ago, we were in Spain, and John slid out early on a stage-- road was wet. He was fine, but he had landed on his hip, and the shorts are very, very thin." Ford smirked; he knew where this was going. "So," Zelenka continued, "John gets back on the bike, and everything is fine. Bike is fine, John is fine. But Rodney and I-- and most of Spain-- we had an excellent view of his hindquarters for about ninety kilometers." Ford snickered. McKay groaned, and scrubbed his face with his hands.
"I do not think," Zelenka said thoughtfully, "that Rodney has ever really got over the trauma.")
So. The thing is, John really has no aspirations as a cyclist. He doesn't really want the King of the Mountain competition-- he's good on climbs, and that's good enough for him. The downhill and speed are enough of a reward-- he doesn't need a polka-dotted jersey to make the ride worthwhile. He's not a sprinter, so he'd never win the green jersey, and he's way too old for the white. A stage win would be nice, sure, but John's not holding out hope. And as for yellow-- well.
It's just not his color, now, is it?
Really, John's just in the Tour for his team. He can hold off some of the threats on the climbs, make them push themselves to the limit, make them take stupid risks on the descent. He can keep up with the peleton, take his turn at the helm, let Sumner ride slipstream. He'll do water bottle duty and check in with the team car on non-climbing days, whatever. He'll do whatever Weir tells him to do, whatever will keep him in the sport. He's not an idiot, whatever McKay says-- he knows he's getting up there, for a cyclist. So is Sumner, but he's got the respect and cache that Sheppard's never had, and never wanted. Everyone expect that that this is Sumner's year-- that this year, Atlantis will be the team that protects the yellow jersey. So John will be a drone, a water boy, a domestique. He'll protect Sumner. Whatever will let him keep the exhilaration of descent.
But the best laid plans mean nothing on the Tour, so-- when Sumner breaks his shoulder and has to pull out on Stage 5, when Ford resigns on Stage 16 (publically, there's a family emergency; privately, Beckett found signs of blood doping in one of Weir's mandatory in-house drug tests and suggested that Ford remove himself before Atlantis did)-- maybe yellow is more of John's color than he'd thought.