Sometimes getting a newspaper out every week can be a hard-nosed business. Take for instance this article. It was supposed to hit the streets last week because of its time-sensitive subject matter, but it got bumped. I laid out a logical argument to my editor that included breath holding and foot stomping, but all it got me was a woozy head and a sore foot.

You see, it had been a while since I let my inner bicycle nerd loose, so I wanted to tell you about two momentous cycling events that began a very long time ago. The first is the Paris-Roubaix race (pronounced Paree Roobay rayse). When most American’s think of a bicycle race, the first and usually only thing that comes to mind is the Tour de France. The Tour is a wonderful but complicated event that takes 21 individual races in 23 days to crown a winner. To the uninitiated, it is a bit daunting to understand. A much easier race to follow is the Paris-Roubaix. It is considered one of cycling’s classics because it is a very old (first run in 1896) and very prestigious one-day race. Depending on who you talk to it is nicknamed either Queen of the Classics or Hell of the North.

What makes this race unique is that about 40 percent of it is ridden over cobblestones or, as the Dutch call them, kinderkopjes — children’s heads. Some of the roads are so old they were laid by invading Romans. As a consequence, racing on a 2,000-year-old road can be dicey, especially when it rains, and it always rains. This is one of the most crash-prone races, not only because of the slick cobbles, but because the constant vibration makes balancing a challenge, especially with numb hands. So it is not unusual to see rider after rider go cartwheeling off the road and explode into flames. Maybe that last part was an exaggeration. The race ends with mud-caked riders flying around a velodrome (a banked, oval track for bicycles) to determine the winner in front of a delirious crowd.

Even though this is a simple point A to point B race, it can still be hard to understand a rider’s tactics considering how a modern race works. In the beginning, cycling teams would simply hire several fast cyclists and hope one of them came in first. They were basically opponents wearing the same jersey.

Team Peugeot is credited as the first to come up with the philosophy that a bicycle race is contested by teams but won by an individual. Basically in the run-up to the racing season, Peugeot chose the toughest, fastest man as the captain and it was the task of the rest of the team to assure his victory. It is not all bad for the domestiques, as the French call them. Not only are they paid to help their leader, but they share in the spoils if he wins.

How do they accomplish this? The most important thing they do is ride in front of the captain and block the wind. When someone rides in the slipstream, they use about 30 percent less energy than the man in front. The team will take turns at the front so the captain stays in the best aerodynamic position. Teammates will also get food and water, help him steer clear of crashes and keep an eye on key opponents. If everything works out, by the end of the race each team’s strongest rider will be as fresh as possible for the final push.

When the Peugeot team first tried this, it choose Georges Passerieu as captain. He was an extremely strong rider who could maintain a high speed for a long time, but he was a very poor sprinter. That meant if anyone was close to him at the finish line, he would probably lose.

The plan of giving him a large lead by the end of the race worked perfectly. Each teammate worked to exhaustion and fell away as George pedaled with relative ease. It almost came to naught, however, because as he was making his way to the velodrome with thousands of screaming fans lining the route, a French policeman stepped out of the crowd and demanded that he show he had paid his bicycle tax. It is like leading in the last lap of the Indianapolis 500 and getting pulled over to show your licence and registration. As Inspector Clouseau’s grandfather argued with Georges, his competitors were racing through the town. Finally he relented, and Georges passed the finish line just ahead of his opponents. So I urge you to set your DVRs for 51 weeks in the future and catch the 2016 version of this racing spectacle.

Oh and what was the other momentous cycling event that began a long time ago? It was the birth of the woman who gave me my first bicycle. Happy 96th birthday, mom.

— Chris Austin is a writer, cyclist and The Beachcomber’s circulation manager.