KEY POINTS:
Two of the more bizarre conversations I've had this year have been with cycling folk.
At pre-dinner drinks for an Academy of Sport dinner celebrating New Zealand's world champions and Commonwealth Games medallists I was chatting quite happily with some BikeNZ staff until either the former chairman of that organisation or Cycling NZ, I cannot recall, started haranguing me about an incident at the Melbourne Games.
He'd cancelled his Herald subscription, he said, because of the reporting of the "incident" involving Liz Williams, Tim Gudsell, Marc Ryan, urine, and a pair of shoes.
This incident, you might recall, was denied and then, embarrassingly, admitted by New Zealand chef de mission Dave Currie. One athlete said it had ruined the "atmosphere" in the New Zealand camp. Williams' mother, Patricia, went on radio to lambast the "destructive, unsafe" environment in the national cycling team. Hardly a piffling matter then.
After five minutes talking to this faceless administrator I learned that there was no such thing as bad behaviour, just bad reporting.
My second bizarre encounter was a telephone chat with an ex-Cycling New Zealand president who also happens to be BikeNZ's legal adviser. When Hayden Roulston made his sensational comeback from a heart problem serious enough to have him retire, there was caution from BikeNZ who had to investigate questions around liability should a worst-case scenario occur in an event Roulston was competing in.
To clarify matters, I was directed to their legal adviser. Here is my favourite excerpt:
"Image is only created by the media. It doesn't exist unless you make an issue of it and we're not choosing to make an issue of it at all. We didn't choose to make an issue of the Commonwealth Games [incident], of Anthony Peden [pulling out of the Olympics because he would have tested positive for steroids], or Matt Yeats or Lee Vertongen."
Again the message was clear - the only stains on the maillot jaune of cycling are from the mud slung by the media.
So it is with caution that I enter the fray concerning the shenanigans at BikeNZ over the past week regarding the "resignation" of high-performance guru Michael Flynn. I am sure for some cycling folk this is just another non-issue, a media beat-up. But here's a reality check - it is probably the most important issue cycling will have to deal with in this country and has ramifications for others beholden to Sparc for funding.
Flynn, the likeable Australian, hopped on his 10-speed and threatened to ride into the distance because he didn't like the outside interference in the high-performance programme. But he might need to back-pedal. The programme only exists because BikeNZ had to show it could turn around a factionalised and, yes, dysfunctional sport. Its money from Sparc - too much say some - came with caveats.
Some of the caveats are clearly proving restrictive, but here's where it gets tricky.
BikeNZ has six self-interested sub-groupings, including Cycling NZ. It is a model which by definition is bureaucratic, even political. At board meetings the question is never about what might be good for the sport as a whole, but what each federation can expect from BikeNZ.
But BikeNZ, as an organisation, is necessary because these separate bodies had a track record of not being able to administer themselves and Sparc had no interest in doling out money to well-meaning, but incompetent, administrators.
So it is within this tangled web that Flynn is trying desperately to produce a world-class programme. He probably feels he is a) chained to his desk and b) failing through no fault of his own.
Flynn has support from riders such as Julian Dean and Roulston. All of the cycling community - the same that came back with an anaemic haul of medals from the Games and covered themselves in such ignominy in the aftermath - has rallied around him. That's OK, they have that luxury without having to see the wider picture.
They're also surrounded by the sort of people mentioned at the top of this column, who are happy to blame everyone, particularly the media, for cycling's ills when they should be looking at their own doorstep.
Flynn is high-quality. The sooner he sorts out his differences with Sparc and delivers the programme he wants, the better for the sport. It won't happen overnight, or this year. In fact, you can't expect many drastic changes before Beijing.
Hopefully Flynn will ride back for the long haul. Ironically, one thing he should be wary about is taking advice from cycling people.
