777km cycle relay (North London)

Wheels of Recovery made good its promise this year to widen endurance events amongst recovery communities by working in conjunction with Air Football who brought service users from Redbridge, Newham and Tower Hamlets to attempt a second 1000km relay ride.

Well,...the weather was torrential rain but perseverance saw us complete an amazing 777 kilometres of walking, running and cycling. Air Football were particularly impressive in pushing everyone on, and all this despite losing their project leader and figurehead Colm, who was badly injured after crashing out of the lead on about the 4th lap. Ambulance gone (amid cheers of encouragement) and did the Airfootball crew stop.......no! They carried on to take eventual 1st and 3rd place at 100km's and most of the top mileages.

next year we go across the UK!..............on foot!

Redbridge Olympic Track

This was our second outing to the new redbridge olympic cycle centre where we go off roading. On the first outing last month we were joined by Air Football (see link) who brought service users from Newham, Redbridge and Tower hamlets. This month BUBIC (see link)joined us from Haringey as well. We are slowly getting a mix of North and East London boroughs, with different age groups and service user backgrounds. Run up to the second "1000k in a day" event is on us and this year we expect to see many London Boroughs participate including Bexley(DASL) who recently won funding from LCC to run a similar project in S.E. London. Good luck guys!

After we all headed back to KINESIS in Tottenham where we met David Lammy M.P. which was an interesting experience.

By the way, you only end up a casualty if you ride hard..! It was a cool fall though J.

1000K in a day success!

We did it. In fact we completed 1099 kilometres in just under 6 hours. Two members of our group had never cycled more than 10 miles before and during this relay they completed more than 35 miles (50k) each. This goes to show that we can exceed our limitations when we have a worthy goal and a strong intent. Currently we have raised just under £500, so thanks to the many people and businesses than sponsored us.

Our success was in part due to having 70 participants, more than we ever hoped for in our wildest dreams. Many members of the public joined us in our effort, keen to assist us in our goal, during a beautiful day weatherwise. Many other members of the public made enquiries and were very interested in our endeavours. About 15 of these people have requested to become involved or kept in touch with what we're doing, which is a most interesting development, as we would like this to become a community event which links the recovery community with the wider community. We were quite moved by the general publics' goodwill towards us, including the young tearaways who gave us an hour of their time - nice one lads!

However, we had a clear vision all along that if people could understand addiction in seeing us aspiring then they would respond positively, and the message that treatment for addiction is a valuable thing becomes accepted. Also despite many setbacks we kept going with the organising and the training which shows that group effort and sustained work will reap rewards. There are parallels here with the recovery process and life in general. That is why endurance is such a symbolically important strength for us to aquire, because unlike speed and strength it takes us further in the end.

Most of the local papers covered it. (see links). Thanks again to all involveded.

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Freewheel-Central London

This was our third or fourth run out on our recently purchased mountain bikes. We've so far been up & down the Lea Valley through Hackney, up the Roman Rd., Grand Union Canal etc, this time we wanted to get ito the city and what better time to do it than when there's no cars around.

We met at The Emirates Stadium, Arsenal North London & proceeded at a leisurely pace into town. We all agreed that the busy meeting spots along the West End, were good fun but we enjoyed ourselves much more letting rip back east through the city on the embankment, going through all the tunnels you usually wouldn't cycle through. One of the more enjoyable aspects of London cycling imparticular seems to be exploring the City & thames to the east as you can really feel the spirit of the place along the wharfs and canals, especially at weekends.
Anyway it's good to support these projects, and it's good training for next weekend, the 1000k event in finsbury Park.

Build up to 1000K in a day.

“Wheels of Recovery” is a sports project run from within Haringey Advisory Group on Alcohol” (reg. Charity no.1054656) an alcohol treatment agency in Haringey-North London. We've been concentrating all our efforts on a 1000K combined cycle relay in Finsbury Park. It is happening, Saturday 27th September. Logistics have been a nightmare, but thats a positive because we now number 10-20 committed recovering people who have taken endurance sports on as a way of expressing ourselves and being of service to others. It's a fundraiser, all proceeds go to providing more sports and outdoor pursuits for people with addiction issues in our borough.
About 2 months ago we were awarded £5000 by the London Cycling Campaign, and since then we haven't looked back, organising this event as a way of publicising our philosophy of physical lifestyle as a way of focusing your life post drugs/alcohol.
All the local cycle shops have sponsored us, the supermarkets and cafes have helped us out with food, and the local press and drug/alcohol therapy trade press will be in attendance.
We've been training hard in the parks and along the canals of North & East London, along the Thames, through the City & West End. if we raise enough money we'll go out to the Chilterns this Autumn for some serious mountain biking (and trail running).
People in recovery often find they are suffering from a feeling of emptiness and a lack of direction. We believe that many people can discover a new power within themselves through the challenge of physical pursuits. Expanding personal limitations & service to the community underpin our philosophy of recovery from addiction. The event will be filmed in order to document these stories of mental and physical transformation.

We are hoping that this endurance event will become a fixture, as it relies on teamwork, and the emphasis is on personal bests rather than racing, but we can race as well if we want to. there should be some great athletes there including ironmen and ultramarathoners as well as people who can't ride but who nevertheless will complete circuits on foot.

Email us for details or a sponsor form.