OLSTACLE RACLS.

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THE SACK RACE—THL LADDER OBSTACLE.

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great but—mnever fall an inch soon, or you will go under without touching it.

In a bicycling obstacle race, the general 1dea of the conspiracy is to mock the boasted speed of the cyclist by making his machine a hindrance, a tribulation, and an incubus unto him. He 1s tempted, for instance, by a long stretch of level track to “pile it on,” and go ahead ; only to be met at the end by a row of hurdles, or something cqually solid, which he cannot pull up in time to avoild running into, and over gy which he must then drag his ~

damaged vchicle.

The bicvele P - o 2ABATN obstacle race, like, gt e v S N

indeed, other ob- stacle races, 1s chiefly to be scen at small country meetings. It 1s a shy and modest plant, and ncver ventures mto the glare of metro- politan notoricty. A town racing cyclist will not adventure his feather-weight instrument among the bangs, bumps, and general mis- adventures native to the obstacle race. Wherefore it comes to pass that in such a race, when it 1s found, many machines of uncertain age and build are to be seen, and many riders with gets-up and styles of

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riding which would mightily astonish the crowd at, say, the Herne Hill track. It 1s, perhaps, only _ at such a race that one may encounter a Dbelated survival of the jockey cap among cyclists, and the rule is for the costume to partake of the characteristics of road and path, the former predom- inating, with now and agam a distinct suggestion of the jockey or sulky-driver thrown in by way of imparting as sportive a flavour as possible. Sometimes fancy costumes are presented, and then jockeys and sweeps, Ally Sloper and Mecephistopheles chase one another on bicyeles of varying sorts and dates of manu- [acture.

A country meeting, too, where sports are held n a grass field, affords many advan- tages n the way of natural obstacles, through which the track may be laid, with a resulting steeplechase highly gratifying to such enemies of the cycling pastime as may be present.

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“OFF AND AwAav.”

The track at a country meeting, prepared for an ordinary straightaway level race, presents in itself more often than not a series of ditficulties not to be despised. There wasa field (possibly is still) in Bedfordshire, used annually for bicycle races and other sports, wherein the unfortunate competitor, in what