Spotted on Carlton Reid’s YouTube channel, Quickrelease.TV, this wonderful period piece from British Transport Films. Carlton is a top advocate and activist for cycling in the UK, and I thank him for preserving this remarkable work. If only it were still like this, but sadly, money was far more important than preserving our world-beating railway system.

I’m surprised at the clothing – when did touring cyclists stop wearing tweed and collar shirts with ties? However, some references are timeless. The explanation  of ‘bonking’ – running out of fuel during a ride, and feeling ill and faint – still holds, and indeed, is in common use. Just look at the restaurant car. And those bikes… ah, for what was lost.

Also lurking on YouTube from British Transport Films is ‘Let’s go to Birmingham’, a classic of the period – a speeded up journey in a 1962 pullman train filmed from the cab. Note the driver, Ernest Morris, looks more like a milkman in that uniform than a train driver. Sadly, Ernest was killed in the Dorridge train accident a year later. A poignant little film, a classic even, set brilliantly to Perpetuum Mobile by Strauss.