DRAMATIC Alpine passes, break-neck time trials, super-fit riders and cheering crowds on the Champs Elysees.
That's the Tour de France.
The Tour de Frank is different. Very different.
Glasgow's cycling tsar, Frank McAveety, has undertaken to ride as many official paths and popular commuter routes as he can over the summer to get an idea of the problems faced by the city's growing peloton of cyclists.
When he texted me with news of his plan, inspired by a recent fact-finding trip to the Netherlands, I texted back: "I'll come with you."
So a few days later we found ourselves in the Siempre bicycle cafe at Partick Cross, reflecting on pot-holes, confusing signs and irate motorists. Oh, and this being the day after the heatwave, a monsoon.
Before setting out, I reeled off a few of the complaints I'd collected from fellow cyclists. The emails had come in fast and furious: the "crater" in the cycle lane on Kilmarnock Road near Clarkston; the "hairy" stretch of Renfield Street up to the O2 Academy; the "death trap" of Shawlands Cross; "hellish" Charing Cross.
Angry messages revealed rutted and fading green cycle ways around Clarence Drive ("worse to ride on than the main carriageway"), the equally neglected painted strips along the A81 Milngavie Road, and broken glass. Lots of broken glass.
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