Origins Obree was born in
Nuneaton, a large town in northern
Warwickshire, England, but has lived almost all his life in
Scotland and considers himself Scottish. He attempted suicide in his teens by gassing himself. He was saved by his father, who had returned early from work. He thought the start and finish were at the same place and stopped where he had started, 100 metres short of the end. He had started to change his clothes when officials told him to continue. He still finished in "about 30 minutes." one man in a velodrome against the clock. I didn't tell myself that I will
attempt the record, I said I would
break it. When your back is against the wall, you can say it's bad or you can say: 'I'll go for it.' I decided, that's it, I've as good as broken the record. Obree later regretted admitting to the bearings experiment, because journalists referred to that before his achievements and other innovations. Obree called his bike "Old Faithful". It has a narrow
bottom bracket, around which the
cranks revolve, to bring his legs closer together (giving a smaller
Q factor), as he thought this is the "natural" position. As shown in the film, he thought a
tread of "one banana" would be ideal. The bike has no
top tube, so that his knees did not hit the frame. The
chainstays are not parallel to the ground. Thus the cranks can pass with a narrow bottom bracket. The
fork had only one blade, carefully shaped to be as narrow as possible. A French writer who tried it said the narrow handlebars made it hard to accelerate the machine in a straight line but, once it was at speed, he could hold the bars and get into Obree's tucked style. :At a high enough speed, [I could] tuck in my arms. And, above all, get in a very forward position on the bike, on the peak of the saddle. The Obree position isn't advantageous simply aerodynamically, it also allows, by pushing the point of pedalling towards the rear, to benefit from greater pressure while remaining in the saddle. You soon get an impression of speed, all the greater because you've got practically nothing [
deux fois rien] between your hands. Two other things I noticed after a few hundred metres: I certainly didn't have the impression of turning 53 × 13, and the Obree position is no obstruction to breathing. But I wasn't pedalling at 55 km/h, 100 turns of the pedals a minute, yet my arms already hurt. He failed by nearly a kilometre. He had booked the track for 24 hours and decided to come back the next day. The writer Nicholas Roe said: :To stop his aching body seizing up, Obree then took the unusual measure of drinking pint upon pint of water so that he had to wake up to go to the lavatory every couple of hours through the night. Each time he got up, he stretched his muscles. On the next weary day, he was up and out within minutes, at the deserted velodrome by 7:55 am and on the track ready to start just five minutes after that. He had barely slept. He had punished his body hugely the previous day. Surely this was a waste of time?
Losing the record Obree's triumph lasted less than a week. On 23 July 1993, the British Olympic champion,
Chris Boardman broke Obree's record by 674 metres, riding 52.270 km at
Bordeaux. His bike had a carbon monocoque frame, carbon wheels, and a
triathlon handlebar. Their rivalry grew: a few months later Obree knocked Boardman out of the world championship pursuit to take the title himself.
Regaining the record Francesco Moser, whose record Obree had beaten, adopted Obree's riding position—adding a chest pad—and established not an outright world record but a veterans' record of 51.84 kilometres. He did it on 15 January 1994, riding in the thin air of
Mexico City as he had for his outright record, whereas Obree and Boardman had ridden at close to sea level. Obree retook the record on 27 April 1994, using the track that Boardman had used at Bordeaux. He had bolted his shoes to his pedals, to avoid what had happened in the final of the national pursuit championship, when he pulled his foot off the pedal during his starting effort. He rode 52.713 kilometres, a distance beaten on 2 September 1994 by the Spanish Tour de France winner,
Miguel Induráin.
Old Faithful banned The world governing body, the
Union Cycliste Internationale, grew concerned that changes to bicycles were making a disproportionate influence to track records. Among other measures, it banned his riding position: he did not find out until one hour before he began the world championship pursuit in Italy. Judges disqualified him when he refused to comply. The magazine
Cycling Weekly blamed "petty-minded officialdom." Obree developed another riding position, the "Superman" style, his arms fully extended in front, and he won the individual pursuit at the
world championships with this and Old Faithful in 1995. However, in May 2014 the UCI relented, acknowledging that fixing the kind of equipment to be used was hindering technical progress. It restored previous banned world records, from 2000, now to be described as "Best hour performance". The original
Old Faithful bike is on display at the
National Museum of Scotland in Edinburgh, while two near-replicas built for use in the
Flying Scotsman film are displayed in the
Riverside Transport Museum in Glasgow. In March 2018, Obree tested another replica of
Old Faithful in the
Mercedes-Benz F1 team's
wind tunnel to gauge the
aerodynamic efficiency of his various riding positions on the bike, having never previously participated in wind-tunnel testing. It was found that the (
drag coefficient) of Obree's initial "tuck" or "crouch" position was 0.17, compared to a conventional 1990s bike position of 0.20 and a modern conventional position of 0.188, leading to an estimated gain in speed of about 2-2.5 km/h over his rivals in the 1990s and a gain of 1.5 km/h over contemporary track cyclists: meanwhile the "Superman" position was found only to be marginally more efficient than the 1990s conventional position, and less efficient than the modern conventional position. Obree however noted that the discomfort of the "crouch" position takes a lot of energy out of the rider through holding the hands and shoulders in place, whilst the "Superman" position was much more manageable.
Other achievements Obree was
individual pursuit world champion in 1993 and 1995. He broke the British 10-mile
individual time trial record in 1993, won the
RTTC 50-mile championship the same year (a record 1h 39m 1s), and won the 25-mile championship in 1996. In 1997 he joined forces with coach Joe Beer and clocked 18m 36s in a 10-mile time trial (V718 Hull) and next day won the
British Cycling Federation 25-mile championship - this was part of building towards an hour record attempt that was eventually shelved. The writer Peter Bryan, of
The Times, said: To see Obree in full flight, shoulders hunched and elbows tucked into his ribs, is a memorable sight. His face contorted with pain illustrates the effort he is putting in. And yet, not too many minutes after he has finished a ride the champion is sufficiently relaxed to talk with a queue of pressmen. Obree had been racing in Florida when the team first met. But he was on holiday there when the team met again for publicity photographs. He got to the next get-together but flew to Paris instead of
Lille, where the meeting was held.
New Hour record attempt In May 2009, Obree announced that he would make an attempt at the "Athlete's Hour" record on a bike he had built himself during 2009. Obree said in October 2009 that the attempt had been cancelled as the bike he'd built himself was not suitable for the conditions. He will not be attempting this again. In December 2009, he was inducted into the
British Cycling Hall of Fame while in March 2010, he was inducted into the Scottish Sports Hall of Fame.
Human-powered vehicle land speed record In December 2011, Obree announced that he would make an attempt at the human-powered vehicle (HPV) land speed record, hoping to hit 100 mph. In May 2012, he revealed that the bike he is building for this attempt is a
prone bike. The attempt was originally to take place in Britain, and the record speed was then . However, he competed in the 2013 World Human Powered Speed Championships in
Battle Mountain, Nevada, where the record was also set. He achieved a speed of on the morning of Friday, 13 September. While Obree did not break the HPV land speed record, he did set a new record for a rider in the prone position. The previous day, Obree had set a speed of , which was a record speed in the prone position on a two-wheeled HPV (the overall prone record being held by a trike).
Personal life Obree's achievements on the bike, his personal life and battle with mental health have combined to make him one of cycling's most enigmatic and eccentric figures. The Scotsman claimed both the World Individual Pursuit title in 1993 and 1995 however is well known for his attempts at the World hour record. In the 1990s he took an overdose of
aspirin washed down by water from a puddle. In January 2011, Obree disclosed in an interview with the
Scottish Sun that he is gay and that his difficulty with coming to terms with his sexual orientation contributed to his earlier suicide attempts. "I was brought up by a war generation; they grew up when gay people were put in jail. Being homosexual was so unthinkable that you just wouldn't be gay. I'd no inkling about anything, I just closed down." He
came out to his family in 2005. Obree has
bipolar disorder. He continues to race occasionally in individual time trials for
Ayrshire-based Fullarton Wheelers
cycling club. In May 2005, he crashed in the rain in the national 10-mile time trial championship near
Nantwich in Cheshire. He was a member of the winning three-man club squad that took the team title in the Scottish 10-mile championship in May 2006. In December 2006, he competed in the track event, Revolution 15, in a four kilometre pursuit challenge. == Book and films ==