The penultimate stage of the Tour of Britain starts from Bury on Friday 17^th September. There has already been a good deal of publicity about this, and more will follow in local and national media in the next week or two.

West Suffolk Wheelers and Tri Club have been involved in the arrangements that have been made, and I’d like to make all members aware of our involvement and ask for volunteers to help.

THURSDAY 16^th SEPTEMBER

There will be various activities on the Angel Hill and in the Abbey Gardens, setting up exhibition stands and other infrastructure. The exhibition stands officially open at 2pm, at which point the Angel Hill is being closed to traffic, to enable the start gantry and track barriers to be set out. We have a stand in the Abbey Gardens and we need volunteers to man this from 2pm through till 8pm.

At 4pm British Cycling will be organising races for school teams on the Angel Hill on a short circuit that we will help them layout outside the Athenaeum. We have agreed to run races for novice youngsters on this circuit from about 5pm, for which we will be charging £3 per entry. We need a number of volunteers for this please, which we expect could run till 7pm.

 FRIDAY 17^th SEPTEMBER

This is the day the stage starts and the exhibition stand in the Abbey Gardens needs to be manned from 8am. It is expected to be very busy as all the riders will be signing on and there is likely to be much media attention.

At 9am there will be a briefing for those riders taking part in the ‘lead off ride’ which place at 10am. This will be a group of invited riders, including school children and disabled riders, plus a nut-case on a Penny Farthing. These riders will ride up Crown Street, left into Honey Hill and then return via the Churchyard. We have agreed to supply three riders to bring up the rear of this group and shepherd them back safely. Volunteers please. The lead off riders will be followed by race roll out, which proceeds out of town up Horringer Road.

The exhibition is planned to continue till 12 noon, but I suspect it might close earlier, once the public leave to follow the stage, or go about their normal business.

Please can I have volunteers for these activities ~ it has all got to be good for cycling in general and our club in particular.

~ Barry Denny       barrydenny@btinternet.com