Here is a cute little game made by Sam Robinson in New Zealand. He offers the game as a print-and-play game. His aim is to make every game available to print out at home, as shipping from New Zealand to the world can be a bit challenging. The game is meant to fit in a mint tin, small and lightweight enough to take it with you. I love the idea. As you can see, I did not use a mint tin but a playing card's plastic box instead. Scroll down to see Sam's tin.

By the way, sometimes I cannot keep the pace, and I do not print (nor, of course, play) print-and-play games as diligently as I should. As you can see, this has not been the case with Pocket Peloton. I have printed it, and I have played it too.

The game features 18 double-sided track cards, 18 boost cards, stage cards (including 3 actual stages from each of the Giro d’Italia, Tour de France, and Vuelta a España; you can make the rest of the stages yourselves), and scoring cards. You only will need to provide one die and a few tokens to play the game. I did, as you can see.

By the way, I had to enhance the colours of the boost cards before I printed them, as they were quite hard to read. (Sam, maybe you could do something about that).

 

This is the author's version of the game, including the mint tin, as seen on his website. His printer is probably better than mine.

 

The game is a dice game where each player controls a team of two or three riders. Simple as they are, the rules take into account aspiration, climbs, descents, and even some energy management: there is a feed zone where riders can collect boost cards to be played later. The rules even offer the possibility to play a stage race (with a points classification). Not bad for such short, easy-to-read rules.

Of course, most of the rules will be familiar to cycling games fans (you might think of this game as a small Flamme Rouge with dice), but there are some new things too. For instance, I am not sure I have seen the climbing rule in any other game, or the sprint boost card for that matter. This game will surely not appeal to hardcore gamers who hate dice, but for the rest of us it is a pleasant little game to play. 

 

Thanks, Xavier, for the tip!