Malvern Red Riders

Recruiting

Hey, this is the home of the Malvern Red Riders ,”MB MRR, MB MRR”, anyway. Our numbers are low at the moment, all 2 of us regularly cycling, but then again there was only 5 of us to start with. We usually meet at the fountain, at the top of church street at 9 on sundays, unless it raining then its usually later.

So if anyone thinks that they want to join, almost undoubtedly the worlds smallest cycle group then there are a few criteria.

1. you must like mountain biking, and not mind going up in order to come down

2. you must be slightly insane, in order to keep up with Uncle Wozzer down some of the back paths.

3. you must not want to sit around all day/ or work on sundays, as this is our chosen day for cycling due to work and higher education.

 If this hasnt put you off then check out the rest of the blog, then leave a comment telling me, and uncle Wozzer, a bit about you, youre bike/s, and youre email address so we can contact you.

Thanks, BENNI

Who are we??

This is a site where I ,Ben, will be Blogging about the cycle group i am part off, the Malvern Red Riders.

We are a group comprising of 5 guys between the ages of 16+ who go cycling at weekends.

These are the people who make up the Red Riders,

Who are we??

- Austin, the ‘leader’ of the group. He maps out most routes, rides at the front (because he’s fast), and also fills the role of Mechanic as he can fix most minor problems by the roadside using little more than a set of allen keys, scewdriver, puncture repair kit and small pump. Austin was also one of the “original” bikers who really got regular cycles going. His daily ‘no-matter-the-weather’ bike to school keeps hit fit as it’s all up hill on the way back!

- Ben, is the ‘techy’; he handles the computer sides, like this blog for example! He is also the camera man, when we feel like documenting or crazy antics, armed with a camera practically screwed to the handle bars! His usual ride to and from school keeps him fit.

- Adam, is Adam! He adds caracter to most rides, and is also an “original”. He goes to the Worcester Tec, and so uses the bus and is riding to keep fit! and all respect to him, he does keep up despite being slightly unfit and likes his little “go-slows”!

- Mat, is a another member of the Red Riders. He is lucky as his house is half way up the hills already! He rides with Austin from school on weekdays, well, part way anyway!

- Smatt, the yongest in the group. He’s Bens younger brother, and is also named Mat but we call him Smatt the reduce confusion! He rides to and from school with is big brother, and so is plenty fit enough for weekend rides over hills and is mad enough too!

By Austin (unclewozzer.wordpress.com)

The past to the present, a History of the group

Where to start!? The Malvern Red Riders has been going for quite a while, but not under the same banner. In fact we had no banner back in the early days, we were just boys on bikes going cycling.

   Really, the group formed around me, Austin. I moved to Malvern in August 2004 and started at The Chase. I also started to cycle, mainly to and from school. Then I made friends with Adam, who also liked to cycle, and thus began the Red Riders. It wasn’t too good back then, we were both unfit and riding an Apollo Excel each we aimed for the hills! The first experiments on bikes up hills didn’t go too well as we couldn’t go very far and weren’t sure of where exactly we were going. And living near the link at the time didn’t help as the hills were quite far off! But after a year in that house I moved again, for family reasons.

   This new house was, and is, in Link Top, much closer to the hills with Tank Quarry Car Park being visible from my bedroom window. And from this new base I cycled the harder journey to and from school, started getting fit. Adam also increased his cycling activity and got fitter too. The introduction of a new bike – the DiamondBack - (which i still have) helped greatly and Adam’s new bike – the Carrera –  (which he got before I got my new one) meant we could cycle more, the hills became open even more! Clocking up many, many miles just got  Adam and I fitter and more keen to cycle.

   This was the ‘original group’. My best friend and I. And soon we were doing 10 to 15 miles every weekend, plus school and back on weekdays. and it was onto the original two that others attached themselves, namely Mat and Ben. For a while it was 3 or 4 boys biking on the hills, (or close to on some routes!), and this lasted for a fair while. Thorugh year 10 and into year 11, then the group went down hill (pun intended) during exam leave, GCSE’s and the summer holidays. we just seemed to stop cycling. Adam went off to Worcester for higher education, and back then I wasn’t as good a friend with Ben. So a sad stop was put on the rides we all enjoyed so much.

   BUT! Like a typical cycle maniac, I wasn’t to be stopped! I went on my own a couple of times, went with Mat but neither was regular or like the old days. And after talking with Ben, one fateful free period at school, the group was on the up yet again (sorry about the bad pun there) and Ben and I started a regular weekend cycle, with Mat tagging along if he could. Then we invited Adam along and the group was felling like it had before. The introduction of an expensive mountain bike for me, (cringe at large dent in bank balance) that i had saved up for with my part-time job, really opened many many roads, paths, hills, etc.

   After this had been going for a couple of months, while talking to Ben on MSN, the idea of a proper club was born. First we talked about names as Ben was designing T-shirts online, and after a quite a few ideas featuring; Hill Riders, Hills Angels, Hilltop Scramblers, and many ore were though of then Ben suggested we use Red and, in a flash of digital text, Malvern Red Riders was brought into being!! Shortly afterward we, that is Ben Adam and I, manganed to cycle to Worcester. While there I picked up some transfer paper. And we printed our own t-shirts the first major step to get the group properly going.

   On the 13th January 2008 the Malvern Red Riders was finally together. Quarter to 9, on Adams driveway all 5 Red Riders made the group a reality. And were still going to this day…

The Malvern Red Riders Chant;

Once upon a ride, the Leader and Techy were cycling and started talking about what ‘VC’ meant in cycling groups names, and joked that we would be ‘MB’ (for Mountian Bikers) and we could abreviate our name to MB MRR,

This, somehow, managed to develop into a chant: MB MRR! (pronounced; em-bee em-double-arr) this put to an up beat tempo sounded quite cool, so is now our chant!

So if you hear “MB MRR” you know the Malvern Red Riders are comming!