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Monday 27 August 2012

Leicester Sky Ride

This year's Sky Ride in Leicester brought  many thousands of local cyclists out to enjoy the privilege of riding without traffic on their normally busy city streets.

Here riders pause by the city centre fountain, one of many sites where interesting cycle based activities were in progress.
Although the weather was cloudy to start with, the sun came out as did the cyclists from 10am and made the whole thing a fascinating and most enjoyable event.

Here riders arrive at The Curve (theatre) which was another stamping/control point, overlooked by the gigantic inflatable man who appeared to have a leak somewhere in his anatomy as an electric air pump was running continuously to keep him inflated.
 In addition to the great crowds of cyclists there was  a plethora of bikes of every imaginable type and model, some of which were one-off models that you would not see normally on the streets.
 Most of these strange machines were freely available for the public to try out.

How about some of these?

Note no front brakes on these choppers. The guy who owned them said that front braking had a tendency to bend the forks.
I would not wish to be going very fast on these things anyway.

Hard work pedalling this one, but it does have the advantage that when you get off it, it does not fall over.

This machine seemed quite rideable, although I did not try it.
The dual front wheels turned in unison, but were not always both in contact with the ground.

Another chopper - with somewhat dodgy steering I suspect, and again no front brake.

The Sustrans stand in the Market Place was well patronised and we were honoured by the support of the Duke of Rutland (he of Belvoir Castle) whose statue resides between the Market Place and the Corn Exchange, the latter being now a Weatherpoons pub.
 Some good planning here, and we were able to partake of the excellent value food and drink at convenient intervals during the day.




Sadly the Duke's tee shirt did not fit him, as they do not come in his size (XXXXXL) and he had to make do with the M size.
 
 

His wife the Duchess was more fortunate, as the Sky Ride vests are less restrictive,  having open sides and no sleeves.
She is of smaller stature than His Grace, in spite of having given birth to no less than ten children, which may account for her stoney stare and look of bewilderment.

2 comments:

Unknown said...

Just had a flick through the photos and noted the name ATHENA over what used to be The Odeon cinema. The very large building on the right hand side, at the end of this street was a factory, and was burned down in an early German air raid on Leicester. The only casualty I believe, was the night watchman.
JohnS

Unknown said...

I am off on the Leicester GoSkyRide Strong Plus this weekend.....50km at a *fast pace *...i may be some time :-()