GRAHAM PAUL WEBB
A truly remarkable
CHAMPION
Isn’t Birmingham peculiar in its attitude to the achievements of its citizens who have made a mark on this World?
Sure, some of its most prominent people have been honoured with a Street or area named after them. Some of them have been immortalised by a statue or building named in their honour, and quite rightly too!
But, I am talking about the average everyday citizens who pull off a remarkable achievement, against the massive odds stacked against them.
I am also aware that for some people this simply means living and getting through one day at a time and to these people I raise my hat.
Every once in a while a true Champion will step forward and give his all for something he believes in.
It could be in the field of politics, the arts, entertainment, industry, education or a thousand and one other branches of humanity. They are all equally important as each other.
In my case, it is in sport that I found a true World Champion, and all the more pleasing for me because he is a Brummie!
He fought through illness, as a child having had the last rites read over him, twice! And poverty, his Mother was a war widow trying her best to bring up a family of five children on virtually nothing, to become a TRUE World Champion in a very competitive and strenuous sport.
The man I am talking about is the one and only Graham Paul Webb. Now most people who read this article will undoubtedly say “WHO”? And that is exactly my point.
There has never been or likely to ever be again an individual to achieve the outstanding feats of courage and endurance to win over 25 championships, including the most important one of all, THE WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP , in the sport of Cycle racing.
If he had been born in Liverpool, London or Manchester he would have had honours heaped upon him and should have even have been Knighted, not my words but the words of Dave Creasey, coach to British Cycling.
Why does Birmingham only seem to attract bad publicity, who is responsible for not recognizing that there are indeed people to be proud of as well those that bring shame to our great City, who can we turn to and say “hey, come on you guys, lets put the records straight, we are not a City of losers, lets recognize the achievers and right so many wrongs.
You may be asking yourselves why I am campaigning on behalf of Graham Webb, what’s in it for me I’ll tell you straight, NOTHING, except to get the rightful acclaim for both the man and the City I love. I have never met Graham or even spoken to him, but I have built up a good rapport and an insight of what makes him tick, by lengthy correspondence on the internet.
Graham has given EVERYTHING for his sport and his Country, Now its time to show that we do respect our Winners and we are capable of honouring them.
There must be someone reading this that knows the right way avenues to go down to get this injustice put right once and for all.
Please, if you can help or advise in any way, contact me by e-mail on [email protected], I need as much help as I can get.
The rest of this article will told in Grahams own words, warts and all.
Go for it Champ, the stage is all yours.
Graham Paul Webb born at Dudley Road hospital on the 13th January 1944 to a battle of El Alamein war widow, Lily Webb (nee Sheldon). https://www.cwgc.org/search/certificate.aspx?casualty=4040977
I was brought up believing that Edwin Webb was my dad, but on my mother’s death bed she confessed that Edwin’s brother, Dennis was my father. After Edwin’s death Dennis had taken over as Lily’s partner but the relationship didn’t last and that’s how I came into the world. I was constantly in and out of hospital with some very serious illnesses, Meningitis, double pneumonia ETC, and was given the last rites on two occasions as it was not expected that I would live very long. But I’m a fighter and managed to pull through, though due to my early health problems soon lagged behind at school and was often ridiculed as a bit of a dunce. My health slowly improved and my liberation came at the age of 8 when I managed to buy an old sit-up bicycle from one of my cousins for the princely sum of 9 (old) pence. This was my saviour and my gateway to better health.
The bicycle needed a lot of work doing to it and having no dad had to do everything myself, my two older brothers never helped me in any way. Just the opposite they were very jealous of me and did everything to destroy my life, I was physically, mentally and sexually abused. I never told my mother of my problems as I knew that she had enough of her own, she had lost her husband and her own dad in two world wars. One of my brothers would, later on, steal all my hard earned cycling equipment and sell it to pay for his amorous life with his girl friends!
I soon found out that I was good at cycling and enjoyed the freedom that it gave me to escape the city grime and slums. By the age of 10 I was doing Sunday rides of up to 100 miles. At school those of us that had a cycle said “wouldn’t it be great to cycle a magic 100 miles”, so we got an Atlas out in the class and looked for a point 50 miles from Birmingham. We soon found one, the city of Gloucester, and our little band said Sunday we ride to Gloucester and back. I was of course the only one that turned up on that Sunday morning and set off alone. I didn’t know that there was a range of hills waiting for me, the Malvern’s. I heaved my body and old bike to the top of the British camp where I almost died with pains in my abdomen. I quickly found a toilet and to my horror passed an awful lot of blood from my anus. As I said I’m a fighter and carried on to Gloucester where upon reaching the town centre started my return journey to Brum. I once again managed to cross the Malvern British Camp without dismounting and speeded on home. Then at about 15 miles from home I just collapsed in a ditch at the side of the road, I hadn’t had anything to eat or drink since my mum had fed me the evening before. I think that I lay there for some three hours before I could get back on my bike and stumble home. I had learned self inflicted punishment and I must have enjoyed it because the very next Sunday I was off again to Gloucester, I fell off my bike again with 15 miles to go but this time only had to spend an hour recovering. Glutton for punishment I did the same ride a week later but this time without falling off my bike!
By the age of 16 I had become a real power house on my bike and by chance met a cyclist that was attached to a cycling club, the Solihull Cycling Club. One club night I was asked if I would like to take part in the club’s 25 mile championship, I jumped at the chance. So the next Sunday morning I turned up with my old crock of a bike dressed in a pair of cut-off jeans, a ‘T’-shirt and tennis pumps. Now I didn’t know that this event was a time-trial and turned up at the start too late for my slot and had to wait until someone didn’t turn up, and this time was added to my actual time. At the start of the race I knocked my bicycle pump off its pegs and turned back to collect it, losing a lot of time. Then on a downhill stretch my chain jumped off and got jammed between the rear sprocket and the frame. I had to stop; luckily I had a complete toolkit with me, spanners, oil can, spare inner tube ETC. Not having the money for ‘quick release’ wheel hubs I had to unscrew the nuts with a spanner, put the chain back on, tighten the wheel back up and put my toolkit away. After the event I returned home none the wiser as to what cycle racing was all about. On the next Thursday club night someone came over to me, Graham Kelly, very strange as no one ever spoke to me, and asked “are you Graham Webb”, “that race on Sunday you had the fastest time!” I was so ashamed with this sudden fame that I went red from ear to ear. If I had started in my slot and had not lost time with my pump and chain, think that I would have been close to the national 25 mile record! There was a 10 mile TT next Tuesday evening and I was asked to ride that. The number of people that turned up to see this kid in cut-off jeans and ‘T’-shirt screw all the established riders was unbelievable! I won this event without the troubles of the week before, I was a racing cyclist.
At the age of 18 I was a prolific weekly winner in junior road races and time-trails. Reaching the age of 19 in January 1963 I was looking forward to my first year as a senior and won my first road race by a minute after having to start with a 3 minute penalty behind the rest of the field! My next race was a 100 km mountain time-trial; (see my story here) https://www.beaconrcc.org.uk/open_races/lmtt/archive/gpw1963_article.html
In the years that followed I won 4 National track team pursuit titles, one individual pursuit title, seven Birmingham division titles and in 1963 clocked the fastest 25 mile time-trial of the whole year with the second ever ride inside the then ‘magic’ 55 minutes, a barrier similar to the 4 minute mile in athletics. After a 13th place in the 1963 world championships and 9th in 1966 I decided to try my luck abroad feeling sure that I could make a living as a professional racing cyclist. I was forced to exile myself from my country, friends and family as there was no professional class in Britain where I could make a living. In the winter of 1966-67 I worked 16 hours a day at a steel stockholder’s in Smethwick to get enough money together for my attempt to make a living from cycle racing in 1967. 8 to 10 hours of cutting and welding steel in the factory then another 6 hours in the evening delivering what goods I had made during the day.
In 1966 I had met a Dutch cycling promoter in England, Charles Ruys, and had asked him if he knew of any place that I could stay, race and train in Holland. I knew that the world championships were to be held in Holland that year and I had a lot of respect for the hard Dutch racing cyclists, they were the best in the world and I wanted to match myself with them. After a successful Easter track weekend in London and Coventry I said farewell to England on the Tuesday after Easter in 1967.
I soon settled down to the pace of racing in Holland and became a well liked prolific winner, often winning circuit road races with one or two laps ahead of the best Dutch riders. During the week I would ride the Dutch track league, where I cleaned up every night winning sprints, scratch races, Madison by 5 laps and point’s races by 4 laps! Thus in this way keeping enough money coming in for my daily needs and travelling expenses. Unlike today the Madison, scratch and point’s races were not official world track events; otherwise I would have won many more titles.
At the 1967 world track championships, held at the Amsterdam Olympic stadium, I finished 9th in the pursuit. This after the whole British team had done their best to destroy my moral and the team manager just standing at the track side with his hands in his pockets unable or unwilling to help me with my lap schedule! Despite all their efforts I still ended up the best placed male in the whole of the British track team. The very next day I was invited to ride a road race at Schellebelle near Wetteren in Belgium. This was my very first road race in ever in Belgium, and on a 4 kilometre circuit won 2 laps ahead of the field! Two days later I cycled the 200 miles from Ghent to Achen in Germany where the rest of the Great Britain road team for the world championships were staying in a hotel.
The 1967 world cycling road championships were being held at Heerlen, Dutch Limburg, near the German border. From the gun I kept the pace very high, to sort the corn from the chaff. This tactic worked very well as after 50 kilometres I had whittled the leading group down to 13 riders making life much easier as in a 200+ group one has a constant struggle and fight with the elbows to stay near the front. In the closing kilometres I made an attack off the front and by the finish had opened a gap of 30 metres, so winning by a clear margin the world road title for Great Britain. Because of world political problems in 1967 it was decided that no national anthems would be played during the winners ceremony! So in that year even the honour of flying the Union Jack and the playing of the British national anthem were denied to me.
In 1968 I tuned professional for the French Mercier cycling team but due to a cycling accident with my knee, that had always been weak since my childhood knee infection while hop-picking in 1950, I never realized my full potential causing me to live in near poverty. Without the necessary correct nourishment and equipment I soon fell short in the professional races, of which I still managed to win 4, some Profs never win any, but after two years of struggling with my health I had to retire from the cycle sport. I opened a pub in Belgium and started work at the newly opened steel works in the Ghent dock area, keeping these two jobs going to get out of the debt that I had built up while trying to carve myself a career as a professional cyclist.
Life started going well for me again and by 1986 I had started cycling again and even started to take part in cycle races, quickly becoming a winner again. In 1988 I was invited to take part in the Belgian open national track championships and by 1989 had won 4 Belgian track championships. This was after 20 years away from racing and the riders that finished 2nd and 3rd to me were 20 years younger! I am still the only Brit ever to have won a Belgian cycling championship. By 1990 my health was playing up again and forced me once more to retire from my first love, cycle racing. Another 10 years past by before I started cycling again and in 2004, at the age of 55, I started racing again! This time my aim was to win 4 gold medals at the 2004 world masters cycling track championships held at Manchester. For some reason I couldn’t get into top form and ‘only’ won two silver medals. I thought no worry this is only a stepping stone to winning 7 gold’s at the 2005 Olympic Games for masters to be held in Canada that year. But once again my body decided otherwise, and at the begin of 2005 while out training with a group of friends my aorta split open from on my heart right down into my legs and I was totally paralyzed. Now normally with this you just drop dead, but somehow, for some reason I survived this new ordeal. See here my story posted on a Birmingham forum in 2006, a story that has since given hope and helped many others get over their personal problems.
First of all I am in no way religious and certainly don't believe in God or the church. Yet I have always had the feeling that something or someone has been watching over me. I should have been dead at least a dozen times from illness and accidents. My most amazing experience, and just one of many, as kid was falling off a very high fairground attraction onto a pile of broken wine bottles, from the gypsy winos. Though I fell from a great height I floated down and landed on my hands and knees in a mass of broken glass, I scrambled away without a single mark or scratch on my body!
I will have to keep this short; I had my latest ordeal in May 2005 was a split aorta while out training on my bike. Normally with this you just drop dead, I did and saw the white light. If by a million to one chance make it alive to the operating table you die during the operation. If you survive all this then you are likely to be a vegetable. Now as fate has it I survived but it all went wrong in April 2006 and they had to replace most of my aorta again and fit a titanium heart valve to replace my heart valve, they had destroyed my aorta valve during the first op! Before the operation they had packed me in ice and brought my body temperature down to some 12° C. After a seven hour op and long coma I awoke in the intensive care unit this time with severe pneumonia from the under cooling.
Because of all the water on my lungs they had to shove a tube down my nose into my lungs and suck all the water out, this several times a day. Sucking the water out also sucked all the air out of my lungs; it was like being strangled to death. Because I fought against this 'murder attempt' they had to tie me down, hand and foot. I was fighting for my life! Now at the height of my struggle, just an inch from death, I opened my eyes and lying next to me was a Pixie. It, in the form of a 12 year old child with no fixed gender, was lying perfectly still next to me with its hands on its chest apparently sleeping. I closed my eyes and thought "if you can lye perfectly still at a time like this, then so can I". 'It' saved my life. A sort of calmness came over me and I took another look, but it had gone. Now I don't think that I was supposed to see what I did see, I think I caught it napping on the job. I hope it doesn't get the sack! If it does I hope they send a replacement.
I have told this story to a perfect stranger in America that I met on eBay. Now it turned out that this guy, Michael Bauman, is a lifetime professor of theology at university in the states. He said that I had seen something that not many people have ever seen, that is my own guardian angel. Now I am honoured but can't recommend getting into the state I was in just to see your guardian angel.
The morel is, they do exist, they are not angels or ghosts but they are real and they watch over us. Have I survived for good or bad reasons? Only time will tell, sorry but instant death would have been a blessing. I just wonder what life has in store for me next time!
Graham Webb.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
So now you have read the facts, is this man worthy of the true recognition he deserves. Is he not the most remarkable sportsman that this great city has ever produced?
He has been honoured TWICE by the King of Belgium, adored by the Cycling fraternity and famed throughout the World as a true Champion.
In 2005 his home town of Ghent gave him a lifetime achievement award and his own page in their “Golden Book”.
What did his City of birth give him? NOTHING, not even a thank you. This can’t be right, let’s pull together and do the right thing by showing our support for a TRUE BRUMMIE CHAMPION.
A truly remarkable
CHAMPION
Isn’t Birmingham peculiar in its attitude to the achievements of its citizens who have made a mark on this World?
Sure, some of its most prominent people have been honoured with a Street or area named after them. Some of them have been immortalised by a statue or building named in their honour, and quite rightly too!
But, I am talking about the average everyday citizens who pull off a remarkable achievement, against the massive odds stacked against them.
I am also aware that for some people this simply means living and getting through one day at a time and to these people I raise my hat.
Every once in a while a true Champion will step forward and give his all for something he believes in.
It could be in the field of politics, the arts, entertainment, industry, education or a thousand and one other branches of humanity. They are all equally important as each other.
In my case, it is in sport that I found a true World Champion, and all the more pleasing for me because he is a Brummie!
He fought through illness, as a child having had the last rites read over him, twice! And poverty, his Mother was a war widow trying her best to bring up a family of five children on virtually nothing, to become a TRUE World Champion in a very competitive and strenuous sport.
The man I am talking about is the one and only Graham Paul Webb. Now most people who read this article will undoubtedly say “WHO”? And that is exactly my point.
There has never been or likely to ever be again an individual to achieve the outstanding feats of courage and endurance to win over 25 championships, including the most important one of all, THE WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP , in the sport of Cycle racing.
If he had been born in Liverpool, London or Manchester he would have had honours heaped upon him and should have even have been Knighted, not my words but the words of Dave Creasey, coach to British Cycling.
Why does Birmingham only seem to attract bad publicity, who is responsible for not recognizing that there are indeed people to be proud of as well those that bring shame to our great City, who can we turn to and say “hey, come on you guys, lets put the records straight, we are not a City of losers, lets recognize the achievers and right so many wrongs.
You may be asking yourselves why I am campaigning on behalf of Graham Webb, what’s in it for me I’ll tell you straight, NOTHING, except to get the rightful acclaim for both the man and the City I love. I have never met Graham or even spoken to him, but I have built up a good rapport and an insight of what makes him tick, by lengthy correspondence on the internet.
Graham has given EVERYTHING for his sport and his Country, Now its time to show that we do respect our Winners and we are capable of honouring them.
There must be someone reading this that knows the right way avenues to go down to get this injustice put right once and for all.
Please, if you can help or advise in any way, contact me by e-mail on [email protected], I need as much help as I can get.
The rest of this article will told in Grahams own words, warts and all.
Go for it Champ, the stage is all yours.
Graham Paul Webb born at Dudley Road hospital on the 13th January 1944 to a battle of El Alamein war widow, Lily Webb (nee Sheldon). https://www.cwgc.org/search/certificate.aspx?casualty=4040977
I was brought up believing that Edwin Webb was my dad, but on my mother’s death bed she confessed that Edwin’s brother, Dennis was my father. After Edwin’s death Dennis had taken over as Lily’s partner but the relationship didn’t last and that’s how I came into the world. I was constantly in and out of hospital with some very serious illnesses, Meningitis, double pneumonia ETC, and was given the last rites on two occasions as it was not expected that I would live very long. But I’m a fighter and managed to pull through, though due to my early health problems soon lagged behind at school and was often ridiculed as a bit of a dunce. My health slowly improved and my liberation came at the age of 8 when I managed to buy an old sit-up bicycle from one of my cousins for the princely sum of 9 (old) pence. This was my saviour and my gateway to better health.
The bicycle needed a lot of work doing to it and having no dad had to do everything myself, my two older brothers never helped me in any way. Just the opposite they were very jealous of me and did everything to destroy my life, I was physically, mentally and sexually abused. I never told my mother of my problems as I knew that she had enough of her own, she had lost her husband and her own dad in two world wars. One of my brothers would, later on, steal all my hard earned cycling equipment and sell it to pay for his amorous life with his girl friends!
I soon found out that I was good at cycling and enjoyed the freedom that it gave me to escape the city grime and slums. By the age of 10 I was doing Sunday rides of up to 100 miles. At school those of us that had a cycle said “wouldn’t it be great to cycle a magic 100 miles”, so we got an Atlas out in the class and looked for a point 50 miles from Birmingham. We soon found one, the city of Gloucester, and our little band said Sunday we ride to Gloucester and back. I was of course the only one that turned up on that Sunday morning and set off alone. I didn’t know that there was a range of hills waiting for me, the Malvern’s. I heaved my body and old bike to the top of the British camp where I almost died with pains in my abdomen. I quickly found a toilet and to my horror passed an awful lot of blood from my anus. As I said I’m a fighter and carried on to Gloucester where upon reaching the town centre started my return journey to Brum. I once again managed to cross the Malvern British Camp without dismounting and speeded on home. Then at about 15 miles from home I just collapsed in a ditch at the side of the road, I hadn’t had anything to eat or drink since my mum had fed me the evening before. I think that I lay there for some three hours before I could get back on my bike and stumble home. I had learned self inflicted punishment and I must have enjoyed it because the very next Sunday I was off again to Gloucester, I fell off my bike again with 15 miles to go but this time only had to spend an hour recovering. Glutton for punishment I did the same ride a week later but this time without falling off my bike!
By the age of 16 I had become a real power house on my bike and by chance met a cyclist that was attached to a cycling club, the Solihull Cycling Club. One club night I was asked if I would like to take part in the club’s 25 mile championship, I jumped at the chance. So the next Sunday morning I turned up with my old crock of a bike dressed in a pair of cut-off jeans, a ‘T’-shirt and tennis pumps. Now I didn’t know that this event was a time-trial and turned up at the start too late for my slot and had to wait until someone didn’t turn up, and this time was added to my actual time. At the start of the race I knocked my bicycle pump off its pegs and turned back to collect it, losing a lot of time. Then on a downhill stretch my chain jumped off and got jammed between the rear sprocket and the frame. I had to stop; luckily I had a complete toolkit with me, spanners, oil can, spare inner tube ETC. Not having the money for ‘quick release’ wheel hubs I had to unscrew the nuts with a spanner, put the chain back on, tighten the wheel back up and put my toolkit away. After the event I returned home none the wiser as to what cycle racing was all about. On the next Thursday club night someone came over to me, Graham Kelly, very strange as no one ever spoke to me, and asked “are you Graham Webb”, “that race on Sunday you had the fastest time!” I was so ashamed with this sudden fame that I went red from ear to ear. If I had started in my slot and had not lost time with my pump and chain, think that I would have been close to the national 25 mile record! There was a 10 mile TT next Tuesday evening and I was asked to ride that. The number of people that turned up to see this kid in cut-off jeans and ‘T’-shirt screw all the established riders was unbelievable! I won this event without the troubles of the week before, I was a racing cyclist.
At the age of 18 I was a prolific weekly winner in junior road races and time-trails. Reaching the age of 19 in January 1963 I was looking forward to my first year as a senior and won my first road race by a minute after having to start with a 3 minute penalty behind the rest of the field! My next race was a 100 km mountain time-trial; (see my story here) https://www.beaconrcc.org.uk/open_races/lmtt/archive/gpw1963_article.html
In the years that followed I won 4 National track team pursuit titles, one individual pursuit title, seven Birmingham division titles and in 1963 clocked the fastest 25 mile time-trial of the whole year with the second ever ride inside the then ‘magic’ 55 minutes, a barrier similar to the 4 minute mile in athletics. After a 13th place in the 1963 world championships and 9th in 1966 I decided to try my luck abroad feeling sure that I could make a living as a professional racing cyclist. I was forced to exile myself from my country, friends and family as there was no professional class in Britain where I could make a living. In the winter of 1966-67 I worked 16 hours a day at a steel stockholder’s in Smethwick to get enough money together for my attempt to make a living from cycle racing in 1967. 8 to 10 hours of cutting and welding steel in the factory then another 6 hours in the evening delivering what goods I had made during the day.
In 1966 I had met a Dutch cycling promoter in England, Charles Ruys, and had asked him if he knew of any place that I could stay, race and train in Holland. I knew that the world championships were to be held in Holland that year and I had a lot of respect for the hard Dutch racing cyclists, they were the best in the world and I wanted to match myself with them. After a successful Easter track weekend in London and Coventry I said farewell to England on the Tuesday after Easter in 1967.
I soon settled down to the pace of racing in Holland and became a well liked prolific winner, often winning circuit road races with one or two laps ahead of the best Dutch riders. During the week I would ride the Dutch track league, where I cleaned up every night winning sprints, scratch races, Madison by 5 laps and point’s races by 4 laps! Thus in this way keeping enough money coming in for my daily needs and travelling expenses. Unlike today the Madison, scratch and point’s races were not official world track events; otherwise I would have won many more titles.
At the 1967 world track championships, held at the Amsterdam Olympic stadium, I finished 9th in the pursuit. This after the whole British team had done their best to destroy my moral and the team manager just standing at the track side with his hands in his pockets unable or unwilling to help me with my lap schedule! Despite all their efforts I still ended up the best placed male in the whole of the British track team. The very next day I was invited to ride a road race at Schellebelle near Wetteren in Belgium. This was my very first road race in ever in Belgium, and on a 4 kilometre circuit won 2 laps ahead of the field! Two days later I cycled the 200 miles from Ghent to Achen in Germany where the rest of the Great Britain road team for the world championships were staying in a hotel.
The 1967 world cycling road championships were being held at Heerlen, Dutch Limburg, near the German border. From the gun I kept the pace very high, to sort the corn from the chaff. This tactic worked very well as after 50 kilometres I had whittled the leading group down to 13 riders making life much easier as in a 200+ group one has a constant struggle and fight with the elbows to stay near the front. In the closing kilometres I made an attack off the front and by the finish had opened a gap of 30 metres, so winning by a clear margin the world road title for Great Britain. Because of world political problems in 1967 it was decided that no national anthems would be played during the winners ceremony! So in that year even the honour of flying the Union Jack and the playing of the British national anthem were denied to me.
In 1968 I tuned professional for the French Mercier cycling team but due to a cycling accident with my knee, that had always been weak since my childhood knee infection while hop-picking in 1950, I never realized my full potential causing me to live in near poverty. Without the necessary correct nourishment and equipment I soon fell short in the professional races, of which I still managed to win 4, some Profs never win any, but after two years of struggling with my health I had to retire from the cycle sport. I opened a pub in Belgium and started work at the newly opened steel works in the Ghent dock area, keeping these two jobs going to get out of the debt that I had built up while trying to carve myself a career as a professional cyclist.
Life started going well for me again and by 1986 I had started cycling again and even started to take part in cycle races, quickly becoming a winner again. In 1988 I was invited to take part in the Belgian open national track championships and by 1989 had won 4 Belgian track championships. This was after 20 years away from racing and the riders that finished 2nd and 3rd to me were 20 years younger! I am still the only Brit ever to have won a Belgian cycling championship. By 1990 my health was playing up again and forced me once more to retire from my first love, cycle racing. Another 10 years past by before I started cycling again and in 2004, at the age of 55, I started racing again! This time my aim was to win 4 gold medals at the 2004 world masters cycling track championships held at Manchester. For some reason I couldn’t get into top form and ‘only’ won two silver medals. I thought no worry this is only a stepping stone to winning 7 gold’s at the 2005 Olympic Games for masters to be held in Canada that year. But once again my body decided otherwise, and at the begin of 2005 while out training with a group of friends my aorta split open from on my heart right down into my legs and I was totally paralyzed. Now normally with this you just drop dead, but somehow, for some reason I survived this new ordeal. See here my story posted on a Birmingham forum in 2006, a story that has since given hope and helped many others get over their personal problems.
First of all I am in no way religious and certainly don't believe in God or the church. Yet I have always had the feeling that something or someone has been watching over me. I should have been dead at least a dozen times from illness and accidents. My most amazing experience, and just one of many, as kid was falling off a very high fairground attraction onto a pile of broken wine bottles, from the gypsy winos. Though I fell from a great height I floated down and landed on my hands and knees in a mass of broken glass, I scrambled away without a single mark or scratch on my body!
I will have to keep this short; I had my latest ordeal in May 2005 was a split aorta while out training on my bike. Normally with this you just drop dead, I did and saw the white light. If by a million to one chance make it alive to the operating table you die during the operation. If you survive all this then you are likely to be a vegetable. Now as fate has it I survived but it all went wrong in April 2006 and they had to replace most of my aorta again and fit a titanium heart valve to replace my heart valve, they had destroyed my aorta valve during the first op! Before the operation they had packed me in ice and brought my body temperature down to some 12° C. After a seven hour op and long coma I awoke in the intensive care unit this time with severe pneumonia from the under cooling.
Because of all the water on my lungs they had to shove a tube down my nose into my lungs and suck all the water out, this several times a day. Sucking the water out also sucked all the air out of my lungs; it was like being strangled to death. Because I fought against this 'murder attempt' they had to tie me down, hand and foot. I was fighting for my life! Now at the height of my struggle, just an inch from death, I opened my eyes and lying next to me was a Pixie. It, in the form of a 12 year old child with no fixed gender, was lying perfectly still next to me with its hands on its chest apparently sleeping. I closed my eyes and thought "if you can lye perfectly still at a time like this, then so can I". 'It' saved my life. A sort of calmness came over me and I took another look, but it had gone. Now I don't think that I was supposed to see what I did see, I think I caught it napping on the job. I hope it doesn't get the sack! If it does I hope they send a replacement.
I have told this story to a perfect stranger in America that I met on eBay. Now it turned out that this guy, Michael Bauman, is a lifetime professor of theology at university in the states. He said that I had seen something that not many people have ever seen, that is my own guardian angel. Now I am honoured but can't recommend getting into the state I was in just to see your guardian angel.
The morel is, they do exist, they are not angels or ghosts but they are real and they watch over us. Have I survived for good or bad reasons? Only time will tell, sorry but instant death would have been a blessing. I just wonder what life has in store for me next time!
Graham Webb.
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So now you have read the facts, is this man worthy of the true recognition he deserves. Is he not the most remarkable sportsman that this great city has ever produced?
He has been honoured TWICE by the King of Belgium, adored by the Cycling fraternity and famed throughout the World as a true Champion.
In 2005 his home town of Ghent gave him a lifetime achievement award and his own page in their “Golden Book”.
What did his City of birth give him? NOTHING, not even a thank you. This can’t be right, let’s pull together and do the right thing by showing our support for a TRUE BRUMMIE CHAMPION.
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