Ben and he laughed heartily and then fell silent while Luca’s impressive organ was analysed.
‘Good,’ said Ben, ‘you’re really in good nick. Just take care, young man. Recuperation is the key to success.’
Luca sat up on the side of the examination table and took a couple of deep breaths. ‘Drink tonight?’
‘You can have a beer,’ Ben cautions, ‘and no women. Or vice versa.’
‘Yeah,’ Luca laughed, ‘something like that.’ He sprang down from the bench, slipped into his tracksuit, gave Ben a high five and arranged to meet him later.
Ben smiled as he prepared for the next rider.
For me, Luca personifies the point of the Tour de France – the international flavour and colour that epitomizes the peloton. He’s going to hit his peak during the Tour and do great things for the team. It’s going to be his first Tour de France, coming only a month after his first Giro where he won a Stage in fine style. He’ll go far. With my help. Ambition is in his soul but his body is in my hands. That’s the kick for me.
Ben is sharing beer and banter with Hunter and Travis, the two American stars of Megapac. Hunter Dean and Travis Stanton are as focused and earnest as Luca is cavalier and spirited. Both are all-American boys: Hollywood handsome, open demeanour, and awesomely fit, for whom Commitment is their creed, Dedication their dogma and very much with capital letters. They’re ambassadors – representing Megapac and the United States in general, cycling in particular, their families, their colleges, their home towns specifically. They love their bikes and their moms and dads and kid siblings, their buddies in the teams and their fiancées with dreamy daft names to whom they dedicate race wins, Stage wins, tough days or good rides.
‘Cycling is lucky to have been chosen by you,’ Ben says, eating peanuts, ‘because I suspect you could have turned to any sport you wished and excelled.’
They know more about vitamin supplements than I do. They love sports massage; they love citing their VO2 Max and how many kilometres they ride a year. They love knowing what their ideal body fat percentage is and they love training hard and eating the right things to ensure that they maintain it. They love quoting their power output in terms of watts, and mantras which they chant and believe in. They believe in themselves. Belief is both the ultimate and minimum requirement for any cyclist who wishes to survive the Tour de France, let alone do well.
‘As I said in my mission statement,’ says Hunter, touching a peanut and then forsaking it, ‘When I was a kid, I had a dream and my dream was to represent a great national team, to represent my country. I’m living my dream, man, living my dream.’ He sighs and nods gravely at Ben. ‘My statement continued: They say that racing takes it out of you, but by racing, I believe I’m giving something back. I ride because I love it but I race for all of you. That’s me, Ben, that’s how it is for me.’
Ben sips his beer thoughtfully.
I don’t know whether to kiss the bloke or piss myself laughing.
‘Your mission statement,’ Ben says instead, ‘did you write it? Were you interviewed?’
‘Interviewed? Was I fuck,’ says Hunter. ‘Sure I wrote it.’
‘And you, Travis?’ Ben asks.
‘It’s a mission statement,’ Travis exclaims, as if Ben is mentally deficient, ‘of course you write it yourself. Or it ain’t yours. What would that make the mission? Fucking bogus.’
‘Do, er, you know yours off by heart?’ Ben enquires, grateful that Luca is out of earshot or keeping his straight face would be a physical impossibility and mental torture.
Travis balks, as if Ben has asked a most ridiculous question. ‘It starts off: They say you never forget how to ride a bike and I guess that’s true. Racing professionally enables me to make my living out of a pastime that is a pleasure for so many people.’ He pauses and shrugs. ‘And it goes on, you know?’
Ben is saved a rendition of the entire statement by a rumpus at the other end of the bar. It is Luca, surrounding himself with an impressive, hungry female entourage. ‘What is it about Luca?’ Hunter shakes his head. ‘Huh, Ben?’
‘A blend of sound and vision,’ Ben shrugs, raising a bottle of beer on catching Luca’s eye.
‘Huh?’
‘The aural senses send nerve impulses to woman’s carnal core,’ Ben expostulates, knowing it’s bullshit but that Hunter would never think so. ‘At least, that’s my theory.’
‘Huh?’ Hunter repeats, wondering whether it is a finer point of medicine, Ben’s grammar or the effect of the rare beer that is making comprehension a little difficult.
‘Ears, right?’ Travis clarifies.
‘The accent,’ Ben specifies. ‘Luca’s curious blend of Italian and Carnaby Street peppered with Americanisms causes an involuntary chemical reaction in womenfolk.’
Hunter laughs and chinks bottles with Ben and Travis. ‘Way to go, Luca!’
‘You can kissa my ass ’cos I’m not going up that fuckin’ ’ill,’ Ben imitates Luca perfectly.
‘Fucking Al!’ Hunter proclaims, chinking bottles again and taking a good swig.
‘Plus,’ Ben continues in all seriousness, ‘it comes out of the mouth of a perfectly formed, aesthetically pleasing twenty-four-year-old.’
They observe the younger rider, in his element, flirting for England, or Italy, or America. Wherever. Perfect white teeth surrounded by pillowy lips, set into a boyish face atop a beautifully athletic physique.
‘Look at those women,’ Ben remarks objectively, motioning to the throng with his beer bottle, ‘they are utterly bewildered. They are caught in an extreme dilemma.’
‘They are?’ Travis probes, inquisitiveness keeping him in the bar though he’s glanced at his watch and thinks that, at half past nine and after half a bottle of beer, he really should be leaving so he can get eight hours’ sleep. ‘What’s the problem?’
‘Well,’ says Ben contemplatively, ‘they don’t know what they want more – to mother him or fuck him.’
‘Je-sus!’ Hunter exclaims. ‘He’s a fucking bike rider.’
‘Exactly,’ says Ben, ‘they can’t decide whether they’d rather run their fingers through those soft, Botticelli curls or grab hold of his buttocks and drive their nails right in.’
‘Go, Luca!’ Travis jockeys, ordering another beer and thinking what the hell.
‘Son of a bitch,’ Hunter agrees with admiration.
Luca extricates himself from the tangle of women and saunters over to his team-mates and doctor. ‘You guys, you talking about me, hey? What you saying?’
Bottles chink.
‘You’re a chick magnet,’ Hunter congratulates him so solemnly that it should be impossible to take seriously.
‘Cheers!’ Luca responds ingenuously. ‘Here’s to France and the belle femmes.’
‘Coming hot on the heels of the Giro and all those belle signorine,’ counters Ben.
‘Ah, the Giro,’ Luca says wistfully, as if it were something he’d done as a young man. ‘All those pretty babes in denim shorts and bikini tops, waving and calling your name from the roadside, coming to you at the village départs wanting an autograph—’
‘And being rewarded with your double kiss,’ Travis adds.
‘Gawping, in