Velography

Claude Marthaler, aka “the yak” or “yakman” was born in Geneva in 1960. A passionate cyclist who became a lecturer and writer, he spent some 16 years cycling the globe, including a 7 years world tour (1994- 2001,122,000 km, 60 countries crossed).

He is the author of nine books (published in french, among them 2 titles translated in german and 4 in italian), two digital slideshows and the co-director of the documentary Bike for bread (2003, 26′). Two television documentaries were dedicated to him: La fin du voyage (52′, 2003) and Claude Marthaler, embrasser la terre (70′, 2015) His childhood passion for cycling, which has also become his livelihood, is nowadays like two wheels on his bike.

The yak is the est le programmer since the end of 2008 of the Café des Voyageurs (Geneva), one of the founding members and programmers & the mentor of the Festivélo (Lausanne).

He is member of Cyclo Accueil Cyclo (F), Vélogîtes (CH) and Warmshowers.

The yak online

In 1996 in Peking, the yak meets Stephen and Alison Guerin who create the website www.redfish.com/Yak (entirely in English). In 2005, Minh Cao built the yaksite.