Precision Personified

Known as the most skilled wheel-binder in the country,his love for the bicycle and the wheel comes from inheritance and his penchant to hit “open roads” has made cycles his passion.

At the age of 56,he cycles 50 km every day.

In December 2012,when the Mumbai Pune Cycling Race (151 km) turned 50,the organisers sent a vehicle to pick Khale,who had completed 29 races,the game’s most decorated fixture.

Khale says the stretch remains much the same,but aggression is slowly showing. In 1985,a cyclist took 4 hours,15 minutes to complete the race. A recent winner brought it down by 32 minutes. “It’s good,for cycling,” he says.

Inside his shack,the roof “streams in the perfect sunlight” like spokes diverging from the hub of the wheel he expertly handles. It’s here he creates the perfect racing wheel. In his words it’s as simple as assembling and stitching the wheel’s rim,spokes and hub together.

Satish Patki,61,an Audax Club Parisien ambassador,who brought the French Endurance Randonneuring to India in 2011 says Khale’s modesty is what stops him from acknowledging he is probably the best wheel-binder in Asia.

“I have submitted wheels bound by him for the scrutiny of experts across the world,including in America and France. They have certified that it’s rare and skilled handwork. It’s worthy. In other countries technology is used,while Khale is a master of the craft. It is an art that cannot be learnt.”

The tribute is evident when one hears of cyclists who trust their expensive wheels with him. Professional cyclist and globetrotter Pooja Kashyap,48,who got her Italian beauties Pinarello and Kuota to his workshop,says,“He listens to you,looks at the wheel and gives it back in one session based on what he hears. If he asks you to come a day later,it means the problem is grave. It’s when you ride the reworked wheel that you feel the precision in alignment. Human eye can sometimes reach where technology cannot.”

She believes he is a scientist and any other term would not do him justice.

What Kashyap may not know is that Khale who spends around an hour to align a motorbike wheel,takes over four hours to work on a bicycle wheel. Son of a bicycle mechanic,he says he fixes the wheel in his 60-year-old wheel truing machine he inherited from his father.

The science is to adjust the tension of every spoke and consequently the rim to give it the perfect balance. “Earlier,there were 32 spokes in a British standard bike. Since the 1990s,the spokes got reduced and a racing cycle today has 16,” says Khale.

During racing,with speed the only differentiator,a well aligned wheel decides the rider’s capability,and life,he says,explaining,“Sometimes a bump on the track can be huge at that speed.”

“The axle when rotated should keep lateral movement to the minimum to be called a true axle. Khale rotates the wheel over 400 times in his truing machine to get it just right,” says Patki.

Khale’s son Prathamesh says he has seen his father drowning himself in his craft,minutely listens to catch the faintest of sound the rim would make is it scratches the machine as it rotates. Prathamesh says this dedication cannot be inherited even if he attempts it.

“It’s peaceful here. I can pick the most errant scratch it makes,” says Khale,the proud owner of the “BMW of cycles”,a 1980 Raleigh.

Khale starts the day with a 50-km dash across the city in his Cannondale 16-spoke racer,and wishes the city had more cycling competitions. “Cycling philosophy will always be the same. Long roads always ask you to pedal,” he says.