Riding the Tour de France?
Posted: 21 Feb 2021 21:53
One of the things I love about the Beacon RCC is the rich and storied history of our club.
It’s not just distant history either, the last few years have been a golden age as we’ve savoured the achievements of the Hughes household, marvelled at Stu White’s Transcontinental adventure, applauded the long distance Audaxers taking on Paris-Brest-Paris and of course celebrated the numerous time trial successes delivered by Jess, to name just a few. Heroes, one and all. But here’s the thing – can we claim to have sent a rider to the Tour de France? I think not. Until now. Well, kind of...
In June this year, I'll be part of a team riding all 21 stages of the Tour de France, one week ahead of the professional peloton. Led by ex-professional footballer, Geoff Thomas, our team of 25 riders is aiming to raise £1m for Cure Leukaemia to help fund a network of specialist nurses and a Trials Acceleration Programme across 12 blood cancer centres throughout the UK, connecting blood cancer patients with pioneering treatments and clinical trials.
This year’s route is 3383km in length and has been described as a classic Tour route, with more time trialling miles than in recent years, which I'm seeing as a bonus because they’ll be short days! We also tackle a double ascent of Mont Ventoux on stage 11 and of course the obligatory challenges in the Alps and the Pyrenees. Our objective though, is simple; just to complete each stage and raise as much money as possible for Cure Leukaemia. It promises to be a long way outside anything I’ve done before on a bike. The Weston ride in 2013 just felt like it lasted 3 weeks.
I’ve been involved with Cure Leukaemia for a couple of years and they do fantastic work, making a real difference to the lives of people with the disease. If you want to read more about our Tour 21 team, https://www.thetour21.co.uk/ has all the details.
If you’d like to contribute, you can donate via my just giving page https://www.justgiving.com/fundraising/geoff-GT15 and every single pound helps get us another step closer to our £1m target.
So, with 118 days to go until we set off from Brest on Stage 1, I’m currently combining fundraising activity with increasingly long and steady rides as my training steps up. I'd love for people to join me on some longer rides as we head into Spring (assuming we'll be allowed to ride in groups again soon) and I’ve also got a few fundraising events planned for April and May if you feel like getting involved. More details to follow in the next few weeks…
Cheers - Ian
It’s not just distant history either, the last few years have been a golden age as we’ve savoured the achievements of the Hughes household, marvelled at Stu White’s Transcontinental adventure, applauded the long distance Audaxers taking on Paris-Brest-Paris and of course celebrated the numerous time trial successes delivered by Jess, to name just a few. Heroes, one and all. But here’s the thing – can we claim to have sent a rider to the Tour de France? I think not. Until now. Well, kind of...
In June this year, I'll be part of a team riding all 21 stages of the Tour de France, one week ahead of the professional peloton. Led by ex-professional footballer, Geoff Thomas, our team of 25 riders is aiming to raise £1m for Cure Leukaemia to help fund a network of specialist nurses and a Trials Acceleration Programme across 12 blood cancer centres throughout the UK, connecting blood cancer patients with pioneering treatments and clinical trials.
This year’s route is 3383km in length and has been described as a classic Tour route, with more time trialling miles than in recent years, which I'm seeing as a bonus because they’ll be short days! We also tackle a double ascent of Mont Ventoux on stage 11 and of course the obligatory challenges in the Alps and the Pyrenees. Our objective though, is simple; just to complete each stage and raise as much money as possible for Cure Leukaemia. It promises to be a long way outside anything I’ve done before on a bike. The Weston ride in 2013 just felt like it lasted 3 weeks.
I’ve been involved with Cure Leukaemia for a couple of years and they do fantastic work, making a real difference to the lives of people with the disease. If you want to read more about our Tour 21 team, https://www.thetour21.co.uk/ has all the details.
If you’d like to contribute, you can donate via my just giving page https://www.justgiving.com/fundraising/geoff-GT15 and every single pound helps get us another step closer to our £1m target.
So, with 118 days to go until we set off from Brest on Stage 1, I’m currently combining fundraising activity with increasingly long and steady rides as my training steps up. I'd love for people to join me on some longer rides as we head into Spring (assuming we'll be allowed to ride in groups again soon) and I’ve also got a few fundraising events planned for April and May if you feel like getting involved. More details to follow in the next few weeks…
Cheers - Ian