Regular followers of BigCake will know of my fondness for cycle race analogies.
An old one is that the world economic wealth race between countries has sorted itself out into bunches, just like a bike race. There are clear groupings of countries and some are going faster than others.
Stretching this analogy a bit further. The best time to jump across to another bunch that’s up the road is when the conditions are tough, as in a climb.
It’s virtually impossible to span any serious gap between bunches when there’s a downhill or a tail wind. Minimal effort is required by the other racers to stick with you.
Not so on a serious hill. Most riders are often already maxed out, so anyone going faster, either because they are in better physical shape or tougher mentally (or both), is going to get to get away.
If that superior speed can be maintained during the whole climb, the rider will find themselves in a new bunch that’ll form at the top.
Then of course this bunch can’t get caught till the next climb.
They say the world’s toughest bike race, the Tour de France, is won in the mountains.
Cycling has a great term to describe how your eye can fool you about the gradient of a section of road, meaning you are working hard, but you’re not going as fast as you think you should.
It’s called a “false flat”. That is, it’s the flat you’re on when you’re not on a flat, probably a gradient of just 1 or 2 percent.
And it looks like the NZ economy is stuck in one of these dispiriting stretches at the moment with flukey side winds thrown in to really piss you off.
The “false flats” I can think of, for example the straight into Havelock on the Marlborough Graperide, often happen after a down hill – the bike’s momentum just dies when you’re thinking you should be cruising.
But the economy’s one has come after a bugger of a climb – it’s crested the hill and a flat ride into the distance beckons and maybe a downhill around the corner.
Oh happy days.
Except not. We’re going faster than before, but not as fast as we think we should be. And as on the bike, you think you’re in the wrong gear, or there’s a been an equipment failure (eg. brakes rubbing).
And all around you, everyone is getting shitty.
I’m picking the “false flat” our economy is part of the international topography. Maybe the bike could be tweaked to go a little bit faster, perhaps we should have taken on more fluids or eaten that energy bar earlier, but basically we are a shit bit of road.
Australia’s in the same spot.
There, business conditions dropped to their lowest level in more than a year in October, which the Sydney Morning Herald says suggests the Australia’s economic activity is faltering.
The National Australia Bank business conditions index dropped to 2 in October from 7 in September, well below the long-term average of 6. It was the lowest monthly level since July 2009, when business activity was still recovering from the impact of the global financial crisis.
The profitability index dropped to -4 from 6, going into negative territory for the first time in more than two years as prices weakened.
The trading index dropped from 13 to 4 over the same period, NAB said, while retail conditions trended down for the first time since September 1997.
NAB business confidence also slid to 8 in October from 10 in September, while remaining well above the levels seen during the financial crisis.
The results of NAB’s October survey were taken before the Reserve Bank surprised the market by lifting the official rate to 4.75 per cent from 4.5 per cent in November.
Rod Oram Sunday Star Times piece on rail’s revival overlooks one big issue.
Significant parts of the rail network – for example the Napier to Gisborne line – are million dollar millstones and should have been shut down years ago.
KiwiRail has given the affected regions two years to come up with viable clients so these lines can stay open.
Declaration of interest here – I’m a supporter of the Napier-Gisborne rail trail.
Lines like the Napier-Gisborne one are big culprits in the underinvestment in rail over the years, sucking up good money to be invested after bad. At last count, one train a week travels on this line, returning to Gisborne pretty much empty.
Like many of the marginal lines it is incredibly expensive to maintain thanks to its tough typography (which BTW is why it’d make a great rail trail).
Getting it up to speed, if KiwiRail wants to keep it open, will also require huge investment, inevitably continuing the drain on the good parts of the business.
BigCake has quietened down a bit over the nationalisation of rail, because the new owners have done what the private sector couldn’t or wouldn’t do – invest.
But there’s still the fundamental issue that parts of the rail network are commercial duds and, if not closed, will continue to weaken the rail network as a whole.
Government ownership is just going to make it that much harder to do anything about this.
[Further declaration of interest - I worked for Tranz Rail from 1999 to 2001]
When I started out cycling in the mid-1980s, Frenchman Laurent Fignon was a bit of a role model – he showed that bald men who had to wear glasses could ride.
I like to think my current riding glasses have a hint of Fignon.
Spot the difference.
Fignon died a couple of weeks ago from cancer which I didn’t see any coverage of in the NZ media till a Dom Post story in the always excellent obituary section yesterday.
He won the Tour de France twice (1983 and 1984), but was probably more famous for losing to American Greg LeMond by 8 seconds in the 1989 Tour – the slimmest margin ever.
BTW – my cycling jersey is from Solo who take their inspiration from the classic jersey styles of the 1950s – 1970s.
The 97th Tour de France:
• 3,642 kilometres long – the longest was the 1926 Tour which was 5,745 km long (17 stages: average stage 338km long)
• 2010 21 days of racing (average stage 173.4 kms)
• Budget: NZ$195 million (2009)
• 3rd largest sporting event in the world (after World Cup and Olympics)
The riders
• 198 riders in 22 teams started
• 31 different nationalities: 35 French, 31 Spanish, 18 Italian, 16 German, 13 Belgian, 10 Australian, 8 Dutch, 8 American…1 NZer
• Number of calories a rider burn off on the tour: 123,900 – that’s nearly 500,000 hours of brisk walking
• The heaviest rider ever: Magnus Backstedt at 95 kgs. He rode in the 2008 Tour for Garmin Chipotle, but did not finish. The big Swede won the Paris-Roubaix in 2004.
• Number of pedal strokes: 323,000 at 60 rpm, 485,000 at 90 rpm
• Total number of tyres changed: 790
• Overall winner earns NZ$800,000, but split among team
The audience
• Watched by 12 to 15 million
• 70 % men and 30 % women
• 85 % French
• Average distance travelled to watch race: 130 km
• Average time watching: 6 hours
• Covered by 2477 journalists from 118 TV channels, 75 radios, 398 newspapers, 61 Internet sites, representing 41 nationalities, i.e. 2 477 journalists
• TV coverage in 186 countries, live in 60
• Internet: 155 million pages viewed and 11. million visits
Support
• 4500 support people involved (2009)
• 2400 support vehicles (2009)
• Cost of police and emergency services – $6 million (2009)
Sources:
• www.letour.fr
• http://realanalytics.wordpress.com/
• www.roadcycling.co.nz
• http://mistupid.com
• http://studenttravel.about.com
• www.finger-jam.co.uk
• http://paris.thover.com/home.php?l=en&redirect=true
Cyclist Lance Armstrong’s been on BigCake’s mind a bit lately.
Firstly watching him in the Tour of California. He’s no longer a force of nature clamped on to some carbon and two wheels, but you always look out for him in the same way you follow Michael Schumacher around the race track, Maradona in his final playing days or Carlos Spencer around the rugby field.
The shadow of greatness is hard to lose.
Then fellow US cyclist and former friend Floyd Landis revived allegations of Armstrong’s drug taking and then he crashed out of the tour.
Mastering the obvious, ESPN points out: “Safe to say, Lance has had better days.”
Like a bike crash, the drug cheat allegations are not new.
But what BigCake is mostly thinking about is Armstrong’s book It’s not about the bike spotted on the bookshelf while hunting for another book.
He’s always thought the title was a play on the old cyclist fixation on the bike – how much did it cost, what technology, the brand, how light, now rigid, does it look good? When ultimately it’s about the rider and the quality and quantity of the work he/she puts in.
And this sort of struck a chord around Budget time because it’s true of economies also.
Countries like Singapore have crap bikes, but have clever and focused riders who are willing to put in the hard yards.
New Zealand’s got a pretty slick bike, and though a bit old, it has features that are coming back into fashion. However the riders are a bit all over the shop in tactics and commitment.
Then as BigCake sat down to write the story, and think more about the book’s title, he saw another message:
• Material things ultimately don’t matter, even objects that you’ve spent so long on they’ve pretty much become an appendage to your body. Life is most important – your health, your family, friends and the people around you. The book of course concerns Armstrong’s successful battle with cancer, hence the book’s subtitle you don’t really notice “My journey back to life”.
Not incidentally, Armstrong “a kid with about four chips on his shoulder” saw bike riding as an escape from a troubled past and American suburbia. Doctor’s little helpers may have helped propel him along the way, and it is suggested into the cancer ward.
Like Armstrong, BigCake is a bit inclined to see everything as a race or competition, for example the world economic bike race for the title of world’s wealthiest nation…’New Zealand once again leading the world, rider and bike a taut supercharged machine.’
But then would we end up like Lance, awakening to the deeper message?
How you get there matters.
Lengthy periods on a push bike get you thinking.
BigCake completed the Christchurch – Akaroa race on Saturday thinking mainly about when would the pain (and the hills) stop.
But during more pleasant training rides, alone with his thoughts, he often comes up with great plans (this blog being one) and theories.
Anyway, one BigCake theory is that the world economies travel in bunches like a bike race.
If you look at the world’s economies there are clear groupings of countries and some are going faster than others.
Sometimes countries jump across to the next bunch up the road, for example Singapore and Hong Kong, and sometimes they drop off the back of a bunch because the pace is too hot (New Zealand).
The leading bunch consists of a three country teams and a couple of individuals:
o Team oil (Qatar, Brunei etc)
o Team Europe ‘Mini’ (Luxembourg, Switzerland, Norway…)
o Team North America (the US and Canada)
o Australia is up in the leading bunch on its own, having dropped its other Oceania team member New Zealand on one of the early hills
o Two members of the Asian Tigers team – Singapore and Hong Kong – have jumped across to the leading bunch from the second bunch.
The second bunch, which is mostly losing ground to the lead bunch, includes:
o Team Europe ‘Grand’ (United Kingdom, Germany & France)
o Team Europe ‘Nice Beaches’ (Greece, Spain, Italy…)
o New Zealand is hanging around the rear of this bunch along with some up and comers from Team Europe ‘Once were Commies’ (The Czech Republic and Slovenia) and remaining members of Asian Tigers team (South Korea and Taiwan)
Other teams can be seen further back:
o Remaining members of Team Europe ‘once were commies’
o Team West Indies
o Leading riders from Team Africa ‘Elite’ (Equatorial Guinea and Gabon)
o Team South America
Falling right off the back is Team Africa ‘Basket Case’ including the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Zimbabwe.
These positions (based on IMF 2009 GDP per capita rankings) chop and change depending on prevailing conditions.
New Zealand was right up front in the early half of last century, but fell off the pace as the winds of global trading shifted against it.
Now we are trying to hang onto the back of a bunch that includes the aggressive South Korea and Taiwan and the fast rising Team ‘Once were Commies’.
Scarily for New Zealand, we don’t have any natural allies (apart from Australia who are now well up the road) to help pull us along.
The powerful combos are powered by common interests in oil and geography (especially being in Europe).
If New Zealand was to belong to a team it would be Team Commodity which would include Australia, but then we have to go back to maybe Chile, the lead rider for Team South America.
Our best hope for support looks to be the Asian teams – Team Asian Tiger, Team China, Team India and Team Japan (once it recovers from a couple of crashes).
But we’ve got to get on their wheels (to draft) or we’re out the back again.
Then we’re fighting for survival in the third bunch…
Rod Oram Sunday Star Times piece on rail’s revival overlooks one big issue.
