Roger Kockelbergh, Committee Member
I started cycling as a child when the bike provided freedom. For the next few decades it included commuting, some light off road riding and family excursions often with a trailer.
Then in 2008 out of the blue, my wife handed me an application form for a HOPE charity ride from Biarritz to Perpignan (I must have been getting fat). A new road bike and some training made me take cycling seriously for the first time. The next year we did the Raid Pyrénéen, and started entering sportives including four editions of the Dragon ride. Friends formed a Sunday cycle group and we had several trips to the Southern Alps, Corsica and Tenerife. More recently touring with panniers coast to coast, LEJOG and King Alfred’s way were fun (sometimes type 2). I am mainly a road cyclist but enjoy some off road riding locally and in Cumbria and have completed the Dyfi Enduro.
I joined WVCC nearly a decade ago, it was Bill Barrie who encouraged me to try time trialling, which is the main thing I do with the club. I was always intimidated by thought of the chaingang but last year I joined it and found it was welcoming, physically challenging but not beyond me.
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