Thursday 23 October 2014

A few places left - Ride Leader.

We have one or two places left on our Ride Leader Course next Tuesday 28th October.

This course is for low level rides with two qualified leaders on routes such as converted railway lines, canal towpaths, and other off-road cycle infrastructure. Course covers leadership, navigation, group management strategies, games, fun, etc… Combined training and assessment course. No hidden costs.. From £125 per person.

Call Peter on 01785 818193 to reserve your place.


Wednesday 22 October 2014

Mac Forest

Fancy this one for the Tueday ride during November ?

ttp://www.getamap.ordnancesurveyleisure.co.uk/?key=Jhpx5QpNouUaUEAlP9AWgg2

Autumn & First Snow

Before sitting down tonight to watch the News or Strictly What Ever, check out this video  and then make yourself a promise not to miss out on our local and (nearly) equally stunning scenery. See you on Saturdays ride.

http://vimeo.com/59614925

Oh yeah, the first snow fell this week in Highlands, Im looking forward to our first, any bets on when it will be ?

Tuesday 21 October 2014

Free Lights for Commuters in Stoke

The nice boys and girls over at Travel Smart have asked us, (the not so nice, but much better bike mechanics) to put on two Pit Stops in Stoke On Trent this week. The first one is running on  Wednesday 22nd of October 5.15 to 6.15 next to the canal near the Britannia Stadium. Just ride over to us, fill in survey about bike travel and get a free set of lights. Follow the same routine on Thursday - except this time we will on the canal near the bridge to Festival Park.


Winter Miles ???




Sunday saw the Velo M club ride head out for a first run of winter and for some steady miles onto the edges of the Peak District. And well it got me thinking what is a winter run and its base miles. We all band it around but what should we be looking to get out of it.



Well for me its two fold, its getting out on the bike despite the weather and just enjoying being out on the bike with friends.
But in terms of training to be fitter and faster what should our miles look like ?, and what the bugger are winter miles anyway?


Well my take on it, is that winter is a time to ease back on intesity and think of it as a base for evertyhing else to come from, a foundation. The better the foundation the higher the peak will be. This is where your endurance comes from, but dont be fooled into thinking that your foundation is flat, you still need hill miles if you want to ride hills in summer, but they should be controlled and done in your levels/zones, none of your foundation should be done at peak levels. In the past it was thought the best way to build a base was, get out on the bike and ride lots of miles. This resulted in a lot of ‘junk miles’. ‘Junk miles’ refers to miles added into your training plan with no purpose other than to increase your mileage count. However Junk miles are some of my favourite miles, but then I suppose Im a bit strange. I like the wind, rain, snow and fog, but thats because I like winter boots, Gore Jackets and Gloves, not to mention lights and winter bikes.
Princy checking his Make up at the back of the group.

Wednesday 15 October 2014

Whyte Bikes / Short Sleeves / In October Demo Ride

Great turnout last night for the Whyte Demo night at the Velo Store. Niel Halcro from Whyte came along with 905 T129's and G130s. We had twenty riders out and hit the trails acoss the downs and Spooky woods. Via (with out stopping) barlastons own cannabis factory, the smell alone gave it away.

Paul who hasnt riden a NTB since childhood showed us all how not to pull a wheely going upo hill and then how to walk home from the downs after picking up a punture whilst being dropped off the back. Thanks Paul

Every Tuesday a 6pm the club rides out from the Velo Store,  guests are welcome to come along and try us out. We also have Weekly Saturday road rides and mlonthly Sunday rides.


Wilier Performance Testing at Velo

Wednesday 8 October 2014

Autumn has arrived.


September was a mega busy month for us in CTL with Velo seeing a pick up after the summer lul of holidays and the shock of back to work / school.






With the help of four new instructors our team of 46 instructors trained 3086 children across Staffordshire Stockport Stoke and Cheshire East in all levels of Bikeability. This essential road saftey session enable children  and adults aquire the skills to make journeys on the bikes in a variety of road scenarios from quite roads on Level 2 or town and city centre commuting in Level 3.

Meanwhile Sam and Nick have been busy taking groups of year 3 and 4 out on thier Scooterbility training. Between them they have trained 273 children in September alone.  This fun course covers all sorts of skills but essentially teaches children how to choose good road crossing points and how to cross the road.

At the other end of the education scale CTL and Velo have been busy on the college and university sites across North Staffordshire. Working with the Travel smart scheme we have loaned out forty free loan bikes to students and staff wishing to ditch the car and travel to and work/ study by bike. Weve also been holding DR bikes with how too maintenance sessions and cycle confidence sessions.

On the Business front weve been working with Churchill China Emma Bridgewater BT, Hanley Building Society and Michelin running Dr Bikes sessions for staff . Along with route planning, learn to ride and Cycle Confidence for employee's

Today at Churchill we had a visit from helping staff fix or advise on problems…


Velo M has been running its Thursday night Chain Gangs and had rides heading out into the Deep Peak District, Cosford and our Saturday morning club runs.  Our Tuesday Night MTB rides are as gresat as ever and in October we have our Whyte Demo Day. Thats on top of delivering a maintenance course for Shrugborough Outdoors Eduction Centre building, 40 odd Scoots for Stoke Schools, and taking in all the 2015 bikes from De rosa, Whyte, Mondraker, Kinesis and Willier.












Me well Ive started to pick up on my running and cycling with my first plus 100 mile week for some time. Hopefully this will continue as we have some new additions to the team Amanda In the offie looking after Staffordshire bookings and Simon working across Bikeability and LSTF contracts.



We also hgad our very first Brompton Challege race in Stoke on Trent, check out our Velo facebook site for more of the photos but heres a few.

 And October ........