WORK SONGS: CYCLING BLACKBOARD SCRIBE HANNAH POLE

It takes a certain sort of person to be a blackboard scribe in a professional cycle race.  

You’ve probably seen them on TV at the Tour de France – those brave souls hanging off the back of motorbikes, letting the riders know what’s going on by simple means of chalked up message. It’s a job that requires physical and mental agility, a strategic grasp of bike racing, and a calm head.

Hannah Pole, 34, spends half a dozen weekends a year volunteering in this crucial role. A qualified race official, and no mean cyclist herself (the kind whose Instagram feed is peppered with casual jaunts up eye-watering Alpine passes), it’s her responsibility to ensure the riders are informed of the time gap between them and their rivals when they make a break from the peloton. It’s often the all-important knowledge which allows them to decide how (or whether) they need to react.

‘It’s a very traditional role, and part of the whole spectacle of cycle racing,’ says Pole. ‘In the old days, scribes played a crucial part in races like the Tour de France, when a stage might fracture over a big mountain pass and there’d be long gaps when riders couldn’t see one another. Back then, they didn’t have the benefit of intelligence from their team cars, or earpieces and race radios to relay information.’

While there are some moves towards modernising the technology, things haven’t changed that much. Scribes today still use a simple blackboard and chalk to relay information, which can be updated quickly and easily. They ride on the back of a motorbike piloted by an experienced moto rider, and listen in to two radios to pick up the latest race information on the move.

‘I like to think of it as a kind of counselling role to the riders,’ Pole muses. ‘If a team car radio is down, or it’s a low-budget local race where riders don’t have earpieces to communicate with their team cars, a scribe is often the only link between the riders and the information from officials in the convoy. A simple number on a board can offer reassurance, or instigate an attack.’

This kind of dynamic intel really comes into its own after a climb, or a descent, where a race can get blown apart incredibly quickly. Motorbikes go in and get a picture of where the riders are, and the gaps between them. ‘The challenge comes when there are lots of attacks,’ says Pole. ‘You might get something on the board and then, at the last minute, need to scrub it off to add riders in or out. I try to get stuff on the board as fast as I can and show everybody safely and quickly before the next update comes in. You need to be able to keep a calm head.’ 

All that concentration, not to mention the physical strain of riding pillion on a motorbike for four or five hours a day, often over several days, isn’t easy. But there’s no danger money, and no realistic prospect of making a living out of it. Pole says she does it ‘for the good of the sport.’

She started out administering events for Welsh Cycling, and trained as a British Cycling commissaire (the officials who keep competitive cycling events safe and fair). ‘I’d seen blackboard scribes on races before,’ she says, ‘but thought the job could only be done by very tiny people who wouldn’t act like a dead weight! I didn’t really understand all the nuances of the role back then and thought it was just a bit of an odd thing to do. I mean, who still uses chalk?’

Luckily, she’d competed a bit on a bike herself, which really helps when it comes to understanding how a race develops. When the race officials were struggling to find a willing blackboard scribe at the Grand Prix of Wales in 2015, Pole was asked to try out. ‘How hard can it be?’ she remembers thinking. ‘A week later, more nervous than I was for my GCSEs, and having revised the manual the night before, I rocked up in some borrowed moto gear and a helmet 12 sizes too big for me, chalk in hand, and gave it my best shot.’ 

She clearly got the bug, and started picking up regular work at events like The Women’s Tour, Velothon Wales, and Ride London, designated pro level races which involve meticulous advance planning. At special briefings, usually the day before the race, scribes are paired up with their moto pilots and get the chance to discuss the race and work through any potential challenges. 

The connection between the front and the back of the motorbike is the difference between a good job and a bad one. ‘It’s so, so important to be able to communicate with your pilot,’ says Pole. ‘You’ve got to understand each other, and be able to tell them when you’ve shown the board, whether you need to keep moving down the peloton, whether to show TV cameras, when to get out, where to go next, and how fast to move to allow me to board up properly. When you get to know your pilot you can develop a lot of procedures and signals for all this information – a tap on the leg, a hand signal, a buzz word. A pilot needs to know when to speed up and when to hold off, and where all the key points of the race are – the feed zones, the King of the Mountains and sprint zones, and the key hazards. Then they’ve got to be able to communicate a lot of these to me behind them, all the while paying attention to the other race and road traffic, the hazards of street furniture and the dreaded speed bumps.’

Is it as dangerous as it looks? ‘If you assess it purely from a risk perspective, then yes, it does carry a degree of danger and risk,’ Pole concedes, ‘not only to yourself but the convoy around you, the riders, and the general public.’ She shrugs. ‘But that’s part of bike racing, and that’s why I work with experienced people who are exceptional at minimising that risk. Often you’re putting numbers on the board at speed, so you’ve got to be comfortable on a moto and completely trust your pilot in those moments. You need to understand how racing works, and to have a race instinct for things like which side of the road riders are likely to take in the wind conditions, where they’ll go off a descent, when and where to show the board, and how quickly to get out.’ Any times when it hasn’t worked out? She smiles. ‘I’ve had occasions where we’ve needed to move past the peloton or through the break and they’ve squeezed us into a hedge. And I remember coming out of a wet corner on a descent last year at the Women’s Tour and the rear wheel skidded out with me on it. My whole body flooded with fear for a few seconds, but my pilot Russ turned back to me and just giggled. He knows what he’s doing.’