iCycle – Friday and Saturday rides

With the sad closure of Flamme Rouge iCycle believe it is important to support the cycling community in Bedford and give an opportunity for those that rode the Flamme Rouge shop rides to ride as a group on a Friday and Saturday.

From Friday 4^th and Saturday 5^th July onwards iCycle will run rides on a Friday and Saturday. Here are the details……………

The Rides

iCycle will post a ride on the website each week for the subsequent Friday and Saturday. The Friday ride will be posted on a Tuesday and Saturday ride on a Wednesday.  

• The rides will be an approximately 30 mile ride with the coffee stop towards the end of the ride and close to Bedford. The aim is to use independent coffee shops and cafes.
• The ride will start from the same venue each week at The Piazza - St Paul’s Square MK40 1SQ. 
• The routes will be dictated by the wind direction and by ensuring variety.
• Rides will be posted and signed up to as they are now on the website. 
• The ride will start at 9.15am
• The speed groups will remain the same.
• Fast 19+ mph
• Fast Intermediate  17 to 19 mph
• Intermediate 15 to 17 mph
• Social 13 to 15 mph
• Those riding will need to be iCycle members or on the 6 month membership trial.

NB: The above is to get us going.  Once we are up and running and have collected feedback we can change if necessary.

Posting rides

• Peter has kindly offered to post the first 2 weeks Friday and Saturday rides to get us going.
• We are looking for 3 or 4 volunteers to help us with the route planning and posting on a rota basis.  If you would like to do this please let us Simon or Nick know ASAP.  We will train you how to do it.
• Whoever posts the ride will also confirm timings and numbers with the coffee stop.

iCycle Membership

• Anybody that does join a ride needs to be a iCycle member or be a trial member.  There is a 6 month free trial so hopefully this will encourage people to give it a go.  We will make this clear in the communication. Please do encourage anyone you know who was a Flamme Rouge rider to give us a go.

Sunday Rides and the introduction of the Sunday Club Ride

We currently have a growing membership which is great to see.  Given this and to help us attract new members we are going to introduce a third Sunday ride.  The ride will be called the Sunday Club Ride and is aimed to compliment the Long Sunday and Short Sunday ride.  The LSR and SSR do not change as shown in the summary below. 

• The Sunday Club Ride will be pre-dominantly focused at Intermediates but all speed groups are open, it will cover 50 to 60 miles and start at Start at St Paul’s Square, next to ‘La Piazza’ at 9am
• It will be posted on the iCycle website. 

Although this ride is focused on Intermediates it is open to everyone and we hope it gives another option for LSR and SSR riders if they would like to ride a different distance to normal and start at a different time.

Additionally, to attract new members we have extended the 3 months complimentary membership to 6 months so if you do know of any potential members please encourage them to give it a go!

Danny Pelligrin has very kindly offered to support this ride and post the rides on our website.  Thanks Danny.

The first Sunday Club Ride will be on Sunday 25^th May and we will be setting up a WhatsApp group for the ride.

We hope the ride gives you all more choice, allows potential members to see what iCycle is all about and helps us recruitment new members.

Sunday rides - SUMMARY

Here is a summary of the rides.  These are summer mileage ranges which may vary from week to week depending on the weather and the routes chosen.   All speed groups are available for each ride.

Short Sunday ride

This ride remains as is, 35 to 45 miles and starting at The Boat Club at 9am – NO CHANGE

Sunday Club ride

This leaves La Piazza, St Paul’s Square at 9am and will covers 50 to 60 miles.

Long Sunday ride

This ride remains as is, 60 to 70 miles and starting at the Boat House at 8.30am – NO CHANGE

Over the summer a number of 100 mile rides will be planned in.

It has been great to see so many members riding this year and the increasing numbers wearing club kit. Thanks for your ongoing support and here’s to a very enjoyable summer of riding.

Simon Lowe (Chairperson) and the iCycle Commitee

Tiff Fletcher at the Senior Nationals Indoor Championships.

Tiff has been a regular with the mid week and Sunday ride over the last few years and also works for British Cycling. This year she entered the Senior Nationals 10km Scratch Race and competed in iCycle colours. Congratulations to Tiff from us all for taking part and finishing.  Here is a note about her experience.

‘I’ve attended this race with work for the past 2 years and thought I could give it a go. 2025 was the year, I decided to do the scratch race. 10km race and the first over the line is the winner. I was up against current Olympic and world champions which was really inspiring to be in the same race. Most of the field were professional cyclist racing for world tour teams. But I got stuck in and despite how nervous I was, I really enjoyed the race and was really pleased to keep up with the pro riders averaging 47.5kph’

Well done Tiff!

iCycle Gravel Rides

With the onset of the wintery weather and adverse road conditions there has been an enthusiasm to go off road onto the gravel. 

 

This is thanks to the efforts of iCycle member Dave Munday. Dave has kindly started mapping and posting some gravel rides which are posted on the iCycle Cycling Information WhatsApp group. If you are not already on this group, you can access via ‘WhatsApp Groups’ heading on the ‘New Members’ page.

These are usually on a Friday and currently linked to the Flamme Rouge cycle shop on Bromham Road, Bedford. This is the current start and finish point. You are welcome to join the ride. The expectation is you can ride 30-40 miles off road at a pace of around 13-14mph. You will need a gravel or Mountain bike equipped with suitable tyres. You will need to sign up on the Flamme Rouge Ride sign-up page.At present most of the participants are iCycle members. 

On occasions, if the weather is poor iCycle road rides may be changed to off road. If you are a current iCycle member watch out for any postings on the iCycle Cycling Information WhatsApp Group.

If you are reading this as a non-member, are a gravel fan and would like to join in the fun, we would love to have you join us. Please sign up for a 3 month FREE trial.

Simon Lowe Jan 2025