Monthly Archives: January 2012

I love cycling club dinners

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Stephen Coe, CTC board member for South West England casually asked me in December if I would be willing to be the guest at the Cycle Somerset annual dinner in January. He seemed awfully taken aback when I offered with enthusiasm.

Call me a bit of a sad case but I have been going to cycling club annual dinners since I was about eleven years old. Each year of my childhood my parents would get either excited or wound up like springs in early February because of the forthcoming club dinner, one of the social high spots of the year. Usually this involved one of them bringing home truckloads of trophies as well but what always struck my childish mind was how special and exotic it all seemed in a household where going to dinner wasn’t exactly common.

Then at some point when I felt bold enough I piped up and said “can I come to the club dinner” and to my amazement they said yes. No real idea when or where, just large numbers of adults having a good time talking bikes, races and riders. I felt wonderfully grown up but as I look back I sense that I was really part of the extended family of the Godric Cycling Club which I seemed to have known all my life.

I became a regular after that – hoping desperately that one day I might land one of the trophies as well. However I can confirm that my career in cycling has little to do with my speed on a bike and it took many years until I finally landed one – nearly 13 I think. However you could spot the future organiser and front man because it was at our club dinner that I did what I think must have been my first ever public speech in about 1978, aged about 17.

The guest of honour was cycling journalist Mick Gambling, well known on theUKcycling scene at the time, and I had to propose the vote of thanks. I don’t even remember how my jokes went the applause was addictive and I knew this was something I could do, somewhere I felt at home.

Since I became CTC Director in 1998 I have done many more dinners and had the pleasure of being Master of Ceremonies for the CTC National Dinner for the last few years. A lot of the speakers on the circuit charge, I guess it’s because it is an extension of their day job – the TV commentators, journalists and former riders. I guess I’m lucky that the day job pays, I can’t imagine having to turn people down who can’t pay, we are all family aren’t we?

And what of Cycle Somerset?

A lovely bunch who made us feel really at home in the Italian restaurant at the Somerset County Cricket Ground inTaunton. No trophies to present, this really is a friendly touring club who feature rides for riders of all abilities. The racing is left to the other clubs in the area, Cycle Somerset was formed to fill the gap.

One thing I have also noticed is that all the really vibrant clubs I have been to recently have started a ladies only section, there’s a real case for dedicated rides. Most of us would like to think we can keep the inner bloke in check when on a ride, but the evidence suggests otherwise, dedicated women’s rides are definitely a coming trend in group riding.

On Sunday after the dinner I was also invited to help launch the Taunton Bike Clubwhich caters for young riders of all ages and abilities. They are going to have multiple launches – this one was the touring launch and featured a Sunday ride to a café. Look like the next generation is in safe hands inTaunton, especially with pied piper Jonathon Sladden at the helm.

Taunton Bike Club Launch

Taunton Bike Club Launch 22nd January 2012

Thanks to CS for the invite, it was great to get another fix of cycling company. I have no idea if this tradition carries on outside theUK, I’ll have to use visits home to get a fix. However it will be quite a while before I can deliver an after dinner turn in French or Flemish.

First thoughts of Brussels and London

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Over to Brussels this weekend to start on our new lives living in mainland Europe. Frustratingly no cycling as we used public transport and shoe leather to start a recce of the suburbs.

But of course the mind turns to cycling, not least because it was glorious sunny day on Sunday. And today it was back into the bustle of London and the thriving bike scene around Waterloo Station.

Villo! Brussels Bike Sharing

Villo! Brussels Bike Sharing

Having ridden in Brussels I find it similar to theUK. Infrastructure is intermittent, most cyclists seem to be on the road and the drivers really haven’t got the awareness of cyclists that comes from a larger cycling share of traffic.

But today I was looking more carefully, seeing something different, something I couldn’t put my finger on initially.

On Friday night in Brussels I was watching commuters around the European District and all through the weekend  I saw recreational cyclists out and about, a couple going to church and a few people probably visiting elderly aunts. What almost all had in common was day clothes and what we can only call sensible bikes, including a few Bromptons. Scattered through them were some users of the regional public hire scheme Villo! in similar clothing.

This morning in London I had missed the rush hour but there were quite a few riders about and the evidence was parked around Waterloo and Lower Marsh. Fixies were in high proportion, quite a few tourers, dropped handlebars and far too many skinny tyres for mid winter. The presence of a bloke mending his puncture in the middle of the parking racks only reinforced my opinion. The dress code summarises the whole feel, the riders still feel they have to wear some sort of cycling style to get about.

London Waterloo Station cycle parking

Typical London commuter bike?

Belgium has one of the greatest histories of cycle racing in the world, and yet its daily cyclists seem to take their cue from the cycling cultures of Holland, while so many of ours seem to think that cycling is a statement, not a bus substitute. I must admit I am usually cycling in London in a suit, often on a Boris bike so I am determined not to break into a sweat. But as a fit(ish) bloke should I really be the slowest cyclist in London? I find the pace people ride at extraordinary. I hope all of them have got a change of clothes or a shower at work because if they haven’t they can’t be doing much good for the image of cycling. I’m all for a ride in lycra or baggies when I’m doing what I might call a serious ride but I really cannot see us making cycling mainstream until everyone can see that cycling is something so much more ordinary.

I do not despair – H. G Wells was right

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So why “I do not despair”?

It is derived from many cyclists’ favourite quote by H. G. Wells “When I see an adult on a bicycle, I do not despair for the future of the human race.”

But it’s more than that. Wells wrote extensively about society and social structures including utopian societies. Perhaps in our utopian society (Copenhagen?) the bike is so common that the there is no special feeling about seeing people on bikes.  City officials talk about cycling in Copenhagen being as common as cleaning your teeth, and why would anyone be uplifted by cleaning their teeth?

Wherever I travel I retain an innate enthusiasm for anyone on a bike, no matter what sort of machine or the environment. In China it was extraordinary cargo carrying machines with the whole family involved, in Amsterdam it is ubiquitous daily riders on black bikes and of course there is the thrill of the pros climbing the great passes every summer because I am addicted to cycle racing on TV.

There is also the proven link between cycling and mental health, something I have been learning about much more in recent years. There are few situations that I can’t improve by riding my bike, but too see the benefits spelt out by mental health professionals is a real breakthrough in getting cycling supported by the health sector.

I was at a CTC Roadshow in Leeds in December and one of the keynote presentations was by Richard Davis of Sheffield Care Trust,  the mental health trust in Sheffield.  Richard described how the in-patients at the Trust had a weekly cycling day at a local park which appeared to have an amazing effect on their wellbeing. He then highlighted that patients who had left the hospital were returning to the Thursday rides after they had been discharged and it was having an important effect on keeping them out of hospital. These sessions which cost just a few pounds to put on were saving the state £16,000 per patient kept out of hospital.

Another health professional in the room asked him specifically what it was about cycling that worked? He was pretty honest. “I don’t know, they just start cycling together and talking and it works.”

I think we can all sign up to that.

Links

H. G. Wells on Wikipedia 

CTC’s work in Sheffield

New year, new blog

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Geoff Mayne; Kevin Mayne; Ben Mayne

New Year's Day Ride by three Maynes

Following a long tradition in the Mayne family we celebrated the new year with a bike ride. The ritual matters to us, we know that under the skin, no matter how overstuffed we are by the Christmas period we are at heart cyclists.

Getting the blood moving, opening the lungs and feeling the pedals turn over means that the year will be OK because riding a bike will be the physical and mental therapy that we fall back on when we are jaded.

This year we were three generations.

Geoff, Grandad, Dad – call him what you will. At 74 years old he has just completed a 14,000 mile year, one of his highest ever. Riding almost every day back in Bungay, Suffolk he is the picture of health. Those miles will have moved him still further up the league table for mileaters, the 300,000 Mile Club. You wonder why I became a cyclist – look no further.

And at the other end of the spectrum is son Ben, who as a student has managed to dedicate himself far more to his computers than his bike this term, but with no miles in his legs can still jump on a bike and join me for a couple of hours yesterday and over an hour today.

As the weather looked a bit mucky we did my byways route around Finchampstead, linking together dirt roads and minor tracks through Barkham and Arborfield until the increasing rain forced us home after about 90 minutes. Job done, honour satisfied, we have reaffirmed ourselves.