The sun rises like a ball of fire between the two high-rise towers that form the portal to the artificial island of The Pearl. The minaret of the nearby mosque stands out sharply against the silvery-red morning sky. It is a beautiful, calm atmosphere on this Friday morning in October 2016 on the outskirts of Doha in Qatar. Just before six in the morning.
Friday is cycling day in Qatar
It is still dark down in the car park at the Commercial Bank - but a hustle and bustle begins. Car tailgates open, racing bikes are unloaded, wheels are put into the dropouts, greetings are shouted. Friday is cycling day in Qatar. In Muslim countries, almost everyone is off on this day of the week, many shops are closed - it's like Sundays in Europe. People have time. An opportunity to visit Qatar Chain Reaction - one of around half a dozen large cycling groups that defy the conditions in the desert state. The group was formed around 2006, in the early days of the Tour of Qatar for professionals (the last time the tour was held was in 2016; editor's note). In 2016, the group had almost 2,100 Facebook members, and on good days around 100 cyclists gather for training. There are probably 50 or 60 this morning too.
Race against the position of the sun
In many countries around the world, the sun makes cyclists blossom, in Qatar it is an opponent with whom the cyclists are engaged in a relentless race - against temperatures that are rising by the minute. Groups are quickly formed: "Terminators" is the name given to the fastest, then there are the 35s and 32s groups - the numbers stand for the average pace that is set. After all, there is still the "Cookie Club", as the US American Steve Brault explains: "The slowest group is good if you want to chat a bit. Average speed: also 30 km/h. Brault, an embassy employee, has worked in many places around the world, but Qatar is "special" for cycling. He means that in a positive sense.
You could say that. The heat is not enough of an opponent for the cyclists. "What we lack in mountains, we make up for in speed," says Neil Melville, a Scot who maintains the cycling group's website. He is also unable to explain exactly why they manage to fill almost every free minute of daylight with cycling in Qatar, which is extremely flat and a desert of rocks outside the city. "It's not a beautiful country," he has realised, "and it's really boring here."
Rich Qatar
He has been living in the boomtown of Doha with his wife Julie and their children for a good two years now. New skyscrapers are springing up like mushrooms here. Thanks to the third largest natural gas reserves - after Russia and Iran - the emirate has almost fabulous wealth. As a European, you can quickly earn two to three times as much in the same job, rents in Qatar are horrendous, but are often paid by the employer. For the "expats" - immigrants from a wide variety of countries - this is a good opportunity to reorganise their finances within a few years or to pay off debts or loans at home more quickly. "We are a better international representation than the UN," jokes Irishman Ben Keane, one of the founding members of the group - they have already counted more than 30 nationalities on trips.
Here we go. To celebrate the day, the group rides onto the world championship track used by the pros. There is no warm-up, rather a sharp start. After just a few hundred metres, someone loses their water bottle. Into the desert without water? Not a good idea. So he turns round and picks up his bottle. Meanwhile, the group disappears into the horizon. Luckily, every group is followed by a taxi - for the breakdown service or as a rolling cooling cell for overheated cyclists. The rider who has been left behind waves the support car past, hangs on to its slipstream and begins his chase to catch up. Several kilometres later, he makes it back into the group.
Heat? The term is relative
For him, the small participation fee of 15 Qatari rials, just under four euros, has already paid off. The escort vehicle and driver cost 50 riyals per hour, the equivalent of around 12.50 euros. "A very old price," grumbles Shiameer, the 25-year-old taxi driver from India, who patiently follows the Terminators for around five hours with his hazard lights switched on. But he doesn't need that much patience. The speedometer needle on his Honda Accord usually fluctuates between 40 and 50 km/h. The chase is only interrupted by short drinking stops after every 50 kilometres. The widely scattered petrol stations with their attached shops shine like oases in the desert in Qatar.
Heat? "It's the best day we've had in weeks," says 33-year-old Australian Glenn Bull, who as group leader is endeavouring to bring riders who have fallen behind back into the group. Eight months of the year, the climate is okay, say the cyclists in the Gulf state - okay by local standards. It is only in the summer months between June and September that many prefer to sit indoors on a fully air-conditioned roller trainer. Only the toughest riders also meet up for rides in the summer months - then for a quick round at four in the morning. At midday, the temperatures rise to almost 50 degrees.
Stunned construction workers
But even on this comparatively mild October day, construction workers wearing neck scarves to protect themselves from the scorching sun turn round in amazement at the groups of cyclists who are voluntarily toiling in the heat. Car and lorry drivers film the cyclists with their smartphones. Even the locals, long a minority in their own country, are now attracted to cycling. Most of them gather at the Qatar Cyclists. Fawaz Alshammari is the only Qatari in the Terminators - the jersey with rainbow stripes sits tightly on the 31-year-old's slim body. He has been cycling for a year and has worked his way up from the Cookie Club to the Terminators. And slimmed down from 97 to 69 kilograms. One of many small success stories in Qatar's still young cycling sport.
The thermometer in the accompanying taxi shows 34 degrees at the end of the 140-kilometre lap - in the shade, which is nowhere to be found in the desert. The Terminators read an average speed of 37 km/h from their bike computers at the end of the World Championship test lap. Another good day - even if some of them look exhausted. The slogging in the heat is chic, the cycling scene is growing as fast as the country's population. In 1950, Qatar had just 47,000 inhabitants, in 2004 there were around 75,000,000 - today there are almost three million. Neil Melville says he has no goals in cycling: "It's all about pain." Simply getting out of the comfort zone of high earners in a boomtown.
Andreas Kublik
Editor
