Manayunk Wall

About once a week, Rollin Wilber and Sally Lou Nation walk halfway down the steep slope in front of their house in Manayunk to look at the Wall. Sometimes they stand in silence, following with their eyes the trail of curling honeysuckle and Virginia creeper and drinking in the thick fragrance of the place. Most of the time, they talk excitedly about their hopes for what is known as the Manayunk Wall - a natural stone formation buttressed by man-made retaining walls in the 200 block of Lyceum Avenue, one of Manayunk's steepest hills.

On June 17, the CoreStates U.S. Pro Cycling Championship, the event that put Manayunk on the international bike-race map, returns for the sixth year. More than 100 top professional cyclists will vie for $110,000 in prizes in the 156-mile race. Competitors will pedal off at 9 a.m. in front of the Philadelphia Museum of Art and proceed to the "Manayunk Wall" on Levering Street before heading down Manayunk Avenue to the museum at speeds reaching 50 miles an hour. While waiting for the cyclists' return, spectators along the Benjamin Franklin Parkway can browse through Cycling Expo '90, 60 booths of bicycle equipment, clothing and other products.

AS NEARLY 200 cyclists fought their way up the infamous Manayunk Wall at Sunday's 2012 TD Bank Philadelphia International Cycling Championship, their moxie was mirrored by Jon Martin of Bluebell, who pushed a double stroller containing his sleeping Marianna, 2, and Anthony, 4, up the adjoining Lyceum Avenue sidewalk. No clanging cowbells for Martin as he doggedly made his way up the 17-degree incline over broken pavement and the protruding steel legs of race-route barricades, around weaving partygoers and oncoming strollers.

A 19-year-old woman was charged with DUI and aggravated assault after her 20-year-old boyfriend was run over by a car early yesterday while he was trying to push it up the Manayunk Wall, police said. Mary Opel, of Ridge Avenue near Heritage Drive, in East Falls, was steering the disabled 1996 Volvo sedan east on Levering Street about 4:15 a.m. while her boyfriend tried to push it up the steep hill, police said. The car rolled back over him and dragged him 25 to 35 feet, police said.

The hill - rising about 250 feet in less than a half-mile - is a killer when you walk down it. It's beyond description when you ride a bicycle up it 10 times. Yesterday, a crowd of thousands lined the narrow streets - Levering Street and Lyceum Avenue in Manayunk - to watch the pain as cyclists in the CoreStates U.S. Pro Cycling Championship challenged the Manayunk Wall. From yesterday morning until mid-afternoon, the hill alternated between race course and block party, and Philadelphians just loved it all. Tim Cosenza of Kensington was sipping beer, leaning against a guardrail at a rowhouse in the 100 block of Levering.

A 20-year-old man is in extremely critical condition after he was run over by a car he was trying to push up the hilly street known as the Manayunk Wall early today in Northwest Philadelphia, police said. Police said the man's girlfriend was behind the wheel of a disabled 1996 Volvo sedan on the 200 block of Levering Street about 4:15 man when he attempted to push it uphill. The street has a steep 10-percent grade at that spot, police said. That means the elevation increases 10 feet for every 100 feet traveled.

Chong Park runs the new Palm Tree Market, located in an old furniture building at the bottom of the Manayunk Wall, which on Sunday will be the center of Philadelphia and the cycling universe. The owner of the building, Sam Kroungold, in Manayunk for 40 years, urged Park, his tenant, to keep the store open on Sunday. "You'll make more money in one day than you will in a month," the building owner said. The grocer refused. Since opening six months ago, he has always obeyed the Sabbath.

LEMON HILL was easy. So was the other steep hill on the TD Bank International Cycling Championship Course. But then I got to the Manayunk Wall. Let me back up a bit. I'm no jock, but I usually hold my own. Not long after completing my first marathon last November, I signed up to do it again. I've even been toying with the idea of doing a triathlon. And so I figured I was ready when signed up to do the amateur portion of the TD Bank International Cycling Championship last Sunday.

The world's longest, rowdiest and most exhilarating block party - also known as the CoreStates U.S. Pro Cycling Championship - rolls through Philadelphia for the 12th straight year tomorrow, perhaps to a more enthusiastic audience than it has known in the past. The U.S. Pro will start at 9 a.m. on Benjamin Franklin Parkway and is scheduled to finish there, in celebration and perspiration, some six hours later. The nation's richest one-day bike race will offer $115,500 in prize money, including $25,000 for first place, and, as before, will take its contenders over a 10-circuit, 156-mile course whose most prominent feature is the 285-foot Manayunk Wall.

The CoreStates U.S. Pro Cycling championship, easily mistaken for the world's longest and rowdiest block party, plays Philadelphia for the ninth straight year on Sunday. To appreciate this event - it begins at 9 a.m. at the Philadelphia Art Museum and ends in the same place 10 loops and six hours later - as something more than a gang of lean and Lycra-layered athletes zooming through the streets in manic pursuit of a $110,000 purse, the following may prove helpful: Cycling is almost as much a team sport as football, with performers who carry out specialized roles and sacrificial duties that can determine the success of race strategy.

The 2013 Parx Casino Philly Cycling Classic will start and end at the Manayunk "Wall" but skip the Art Museum and Benjamin Franklin Parkway in favor of a more compact course. But at least the June 2 race will actually happen, surviving a threat to its existence when previous organizers could not find a corporate sponsor. U.S. Rep. Bob Brady and other civic leaders organized to save the event, recruiting Parx Casino and New Penn Financial as sponsors. The race, famed for its leg-burning ascents up Manayunk's hills, will end atop Lyceum Avenue, part of the climb known as the Wall, which organizers hope will provide dramatic finishes for the crowd.

The 2013 Parx Casino Philly Cycling Classic will start and end at the Manayunk wall but will skip the Art Museum and Benjamin Franklin Parkway in favor of a more compact course. But at least the June 2 race will actually happen, surviving a threat to its existence when previous organizers could not find a corporate sponsor. U.S. Rep. Bob Brady and other civic leaders organized to save the iconic event, recruiting Parx Casino and New Penn financial as sponsors. The race, famed for its leg-burning climb up Manayunk's hills, will end atop Levering Street, part of the climb known as the Wall, which organizers hope will provide dramatic finishes for the crowd.

The story of the great Philadelphia bike race, the beautiful, sweeping event that would rival any one-day classic in the world, always begins in Barcelona with sangria and cigars. Nearly 30 years later, however, it does not end that way. It ends with recrimination and accusation, with debt and death, and with a local legacy that, if it continues, will be diluted by economic realities and remain alive mostly as a colorful backdrop for a community block party. "It's been disappointing," said David Chauner, cofounder of the now-defunct Philadelphia International Cycling Championship.

PHILADELPHIA will have a bike race this year, and it will climb up the Manayunk Wall. The new 2013 race, dubbed the Philly Cycling Classic, will be organized by a nonprofit team of sporting-event professionals, cycling advocates, business and community leaders, U.S. Rep. Bob Brady said Thursday. After David Chauner, founder of the Philadelphia International Cycling Championship, said there would be no race due to rising city costs and loss of sponsors, Brady met with other local elected officials, cycling enthusiasts and corporate leaders.

AFTER A DAY full of meetings with elected officials, corporate representatives and community and cycling groups, U.S. Rep. Bob Brady said Friday that he was hopeful that there might be a 2013 bike race in Manayunk after all. "I don't want to lose 2013," said Brady. "I'm a traditions type of guy . . . salt pretzels and all of that. The bike race is known throughout the country as a great bike race. Everyone loves the [Manayunk] Wall. " Organizers of the famous annual Philadelphia International Cycling Championship said this week they've have been forced to cancel the race because its biggest corporate sponsor, TD Bank, has pulled out. Brady plans to soon begin fundraising to revive this year's race.

LOOK OUT! It's biking Byko! Friday afternoon, just days after bicycle rentals resumed at Lloyd Hall on Boathouse Row (and elsewhere), Your Favorite Columnist became Your Favorite Bicyclist to enjoy riding on a sidewalk legally along Kelly Drive, where bicyclists, walkers, joggers, skaters, hopscotchers, etc. share the same path. I could almost hear Louis Armstrong's "What a Wonderful World" humming in the blooming trees along the fragrant (Canada goose droppings) drive. For the second summer in a row, I boarded a bike to have some fun (and enrage bikeheads who don't believe I can ride and who think I hate cyclists)

LEMON HILL was easy. So was the other steep hill on the TD Bank International Cycling Championship Course. But then I got to the Manayunk Wall. Let me back up a bit. I'm no jock, but I usually hold my own. Not long after completing my first marathon last November, I signed up to do it again. I've even been toying with the idea of doing a triathlon. And so I figured I was ready when signed up to do the amateur portion of the TD Bank International Cycling Championship last Sunday.

As they crossed the thick white line on the Benjamin Franklin Parkway to begin the fifth of seven laps in the Philadelphia International Cycling Championship, two riders who grew up within 60 miles of the city were at the front of the pack. They already had been riding for three hours, and the Pennsylvania duo was with a group of five cyclists a full minute in front of the 164 other riders. One of them was 2008 Olympian Bobby Lea, who grew up in Topton, Berks County, in a family of athletes.

Ina Teutenberg woke up Sunday morning with a stomachache. She had a tough time sitting up and worried that she wouldn't be able to keep down Saturday's plate of vegetables. When she got to the Benjamin Franklin Parkway, she looked at the teammates she has trusted all season. "I'm a bit worried," she told them. "I don't feel good. " Two hours after uttering those words, Teutenberg crossed the same thick white line on The Parkway that began her race. Only this time, her hands were high above her head as she celebrated her fifth win in the 17th running of the Liberty Classic.

AS NEARLY 200 cyclists fought their way up the infamous Manayunk Wall at Sunday's 2012 TD Bank Philadelphia International Cycling Championship, their moxie was mirrored by Jon Martin of Bluebell, who pushed a double stroller containing his sleeping Marianna, 2, and Anthony, 4, up the adjoining Lyceum Avenue sidewalk. No clanging cowbells for Martin as he doggedly made his way up the 17-degree incline over broken pavement and the protruding steel legs of race-route barricades, around weaving partygoers and oncoming strollers.