Strava Cyclists Ride to Pluto in 2018!

For those of us obsessed with our Strava stats, intent on climbing up the leaderboards, Strava has just released its data for 2018. Their top statistic is that 8.7 billion kilometres were ridden worldwide over the course of the year, which equals the distance between Earth and Pluto!

Despite this, most UK ‘athletes’ only managed 34.1 rides during 2018 (that’s about one outing every 10 days). Does that make you feel better if you didn’t quite manage to achieve all your cycling goals this year? And don’t forget the old adage that if it didn’t happen on Strava, it didn’t happen at all, so not recording your workout is no excuse!

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The Tour de France Goes Back to School

"The departure ... is fixed ... at 1 pm ... comma."  Christian Prudhomme tries to read slowly and pause after each word. The big boss of the Tour is in the village hall of La Châtaigneraie (population 2,500) in the Vendee region to dictate to a hundred students, from 9 to 11 years old.

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Nova Eroica Britannia: True Grit on Modern Bikes

We all know Eroica Britannia as that glorious celebration of vintage bikes and clothing that has us nostalgically waxing lyrical about the joys of steel and merino wool. But they have just announced the inaugural Nova Eroica Britannia event which features many of the gravel paths that we’ve come to love and enjoy as well as some great climbs and descents in the Derbyshire hills. It’s named ‘nova’ because, shock horror, it’s ridden on modern bikes.

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Ben Tulett - New Kid on the Podium

Young British rider, Ben Tulett, earned his stripes this weekend as he took the Junior Cyclo-Cross title at this weekend's UCI World Championship title in Valkenberg. In an emotional interview after the race, he dedicated the win to his friend and rival Charlie Craig, who tragically died in his sleep just over a year ago.

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Strava Heatmap Reveals Cycling Hotspots

Strava unveiled their Global Heatmap today. It’s an interactive visualisation of more than 1 billion activities by 10 million athletes across the globe.

While it features data from 31 activity types from mountaineering to skiing, it gives you the option of selecting a specific sport like cycling. Even mountaineers scaling Everest and cross channel swimmers are featured.

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Your Chance to Be a Pro Cyclist!

Applications have just opened for amateur cyclists to compete for a chance to become a pro! The BIKE Channel is offering the opportunity for one talented rider to join a professional racing team in their forthcoming production ‘The Coach PRO’. The pro team, Bike Channel Canyon, will pick the rider who performs the best in a gruelling 24 relay race around Brands Hatch.

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British Cycling Roasted by Nicole Cooke

Olympic gold medalist Nicole Cooke held nothing back when she gave evidence to MPs on the Culture, Media and Sport Select Committee on Tuesday. British Cycling, Team Sky and UKAD all came in for a roasting from the former winner of the 2006 Grande Boucle, the women’s Tour de France.

She described cycling as “a sport run by men for men” and that the attempts to combat doping were being conducted by “the wrong people, fighting the wrong war, in the wrong way, with the wrong tools.”

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Mark Gunter Photography Award: Winners Announced

Cycling Tips announced the winners of its Mark Gunter Photographer of the Year Awards today. The competition was launched in memory of Mark Gunter, a professional photographer who sadly died after a brave fight with cancer last year. Proceeds from the competition go towards oesophageal cancer research and setting up an educational trust fund for Mark’s young son. See some of the shortlisted entries and winners here...

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Cycle Courier Wins Tribunal

Maggie Dewhurst, a cycle courier from South London, will be going to work this week knowing that she is now entitled to holiday pay, sick pay and the right to a basic national wage. She won her tribunal case against her employer, City Sprint, in what could turn out to be a far-reaching judgement benefiting not just fellow cycle couriers, but other workers in the ‘gig’ economy.

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Wiggins Bows Out But Leaves a Tarnished Legacy

As Bradley Wiggins ‘hangs up his lycra’ as The Times put it today you would expect that it would be an opportunity to celebrate his outstanding lifetime achievements as the most decorated British Olympian, breaker of the Hour record and the first Briton to ever win the Tour de France. Sadly, for any British cycling fan, if we’re going to be absolutely honest with ourselves, any retrospective of his career has to be tainted by the TUE revelations that came out this year and the unconvincing stories and explanations behind ‘that package’ delivered to him at the 2011 Dauphiné.

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Happy Christmas from Ride Vélo!

It seems that cyclists love Christmas! Twitter, Facebook and the internet have been bombarded by Christmas messages, videos and pictures from everyday cyclists as well as the professionals.  As we wish you a Happy Christmas from Ride Vélo we bring you a selection of some of our favourites.

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What To Do If You Get Knocked Off Your Bike

The Guardian released a video yesterday which showed Chris Grayling, the minister for Transport, swinging open a car door into the path of a cyclist, knocking him off as a result. Ironically, it was only a few weeks ago that he told the Evening Standard that segregated cycle lanes “cause too much of a problem for road users.” If there had been a cycle lane he’d have been less likely to have knocked the cyclist off.

“Dooring” is a hazard that many cyclists will have had some experience of, either having to swerve to avoid it or actually colliding with a vehicle as in this case. But whose fault is it and what should you do if it happens to you?

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Strava 2016: How Do Your Stats Compare?

It’s that time of year when we look back on what we’ve achieved in our cycling: how far we went, how many metres climbed and what our average speeds were. Yep, the cycling community is over represented by stato - bores who like nothing more than analysing and poring over a set of numbers to gauge performance and set new goals. This week Strava released data on their followers – how do you compare to the rest of the country and the world?

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Mark Gunter Cycling Photography Awards Announced

Cycling Tips have announced an exciting new competition for professional, up-and-coming and amateur photographers of cycling sport. The inaugural Mark Gunter Photographer of the Year Awards have been set up to commemorate the life and achievements of Mark Gunter, a widely respected Australian photographer who sadly died after a brave fight with cancer last year, aged just 41.

Mark worked in cycling photography for nearly 20 years and covered the Tour de France, Giro d’Italia and the Tour Down Under among other prestigious races. Cycling Australia said that “he built a tremendous career across a number of world, national and local events of all disciplines…capturing the attention of the cycling world through his amazing imagery.” 

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Wiggins' Six Day Triumph Hailed by Maurice Burton

As a former Six-Day racer who rode with Gary Wiggins in the 1970s, Maurice Burton felt that he couldn’t miss the opportunity of seeing Gary’s son, Sir Bradley Wiggins, take part in his last race at Ghent this weekend. 

The former national champion and owner of De Ver Cycles in Streatham in South London, said, “I saw an online article about Bradley riding his last Six-Day. He said I’ve trained really hard for this. And it made me think, although I really need to be in the shop selling bikes and trying my best at this time of year, I thought, you know, I better go to Ghent. Because there’s a lot of history behind all of this, and I was there when Bradley won the tour on the Champs Elysées, and I thought I needed to be there.”

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Maurice Burton Assaulted While Cycling

Former pro cyclist and National Champion, Maurice Burton, was assaulted while out riding his bike yesterday. A bank holiday Monday ride through picturesque Kent villages ended up with the De Ver Cycles owner in hospital after a motorist pulled 60-year old Burton off his bike in an unprovoked attack. 

The pretty village of Downe, home to Charles Darwin, is on a popular route for club rides and tensions often arise between motorists and road cyclists but the police rarely have to intervene.

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