Page:The fastest bicycle rider in the world - 1928 - Taylor.djvu/93

 thing they had in that race against time, and the best they were able to do was :01 4/5 over the goal I aimed at—1:30. I am confident that they could have ridden several seconds faster on a hot day, but on that cold bleak November day when I lowered the mile record, my pacemakers were absolutely going at their utmost speed when I established the record of 1:31 4/5.

I might mention an incident that occurred shortly before I made my record-breaking ride to establish the mile record to show just how fast I was riding. In my record trials every day I was continuously calling to my pacemakers for more speed. My requests in themselves annoying my pacemakers somewhat and doubly so as some newspaper men overheard me as I called for more speed. The pacemakers unknown to me, got together and decided to shake me off at the next day’s trial against time. They purposely held the fastest pacing quintet on the track, all picked men, to take me on the last lap, one-third of a mile, in my record-breaking one-mile race. I had a fresh quintet for each lap in that record-breaking attempt. As a matter of fact, I had another spare quintet take me around the track for the bell lap just prior to the start of the race. This combination giving me a much desired warming up sprint before picking up the team that would take me around the initial lap to my record-making mile.

However, on the last lap I called again and again for more speed from my pacemaking quintet and failing to get the desired results I set out on my own hook, and actually passed that crack combination on the home stretch, leading them over the tape. It was long after that that I was told about the “frame-up” arranged by my pacemakers in their efforts to shake me off in this record-breaking mile sprint. The laugh was certainly on the pacemakers and the newspaper men took good care that it was widely heralded.