Pedal4health at the seaside
Our founder, Fred Ellis, will be living at the seaside in West Sussex for the remainder of 2010. He is looking to start a cycling holiday business on the South Coast.
Cycle courses will continue to be provided in London by our experienced team of accredited instructors.
New telephone number
We are changing our mainline telephone number. Please use our mobile to contact us in the meantime 07915 090571
Our founder on TV
Pedal4Health founder Fred Ellis, appeared on BBC London News this week in an article about his work with Smarter Travel Sutton. http://news.bbc.co.uk/local/london/hi/people_and_places/newsid_8585000/8585240.stm
Russell Howard
Pedal4Health is pleased to be able to run courses with funding from Sport Relief. Comedian Russell Howard and a BBC film crew visited our recent half term course which we put on for Merton Young Carers.The item will go out on BBC1 at 9pm on Thursday 18th March.You Tube video here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nmnhfwg2hOk&feature=youtube_gdata
Russell spoke to his local newspaper, thisisBristol,about his visit-
Howard has seen first hand how the money can make a difference to people's lives.
"I was lucky enough to see an example of where the money goes. There's a place called Merton in South London, and they have a bike scheme for young carers. These are young kids who have to look after parents or relatives with disabilities. They lead really difficult, adult lives.
"I went down when it was half term and they had put on a bike club for these kids. They were riding around on adventure courses and having a great time haring around and spraying each other with mud. It was a really cool thing to see.
"These kids are about 11 and they have all this responsibility – if you had a fairly idyllic childhood, like I did, it's hard to comprehend.
"But it was really funny actually, because you treat them like these little angels when at the heart of it they're still 11-year-old kids. It made me laugh when they saw a policeman walking past and said 'Oi oi, it's the filth'!
"I told them that if you're a pregnant woman and you need to pee, you are legally allowed to do it into a policeman's helmet. Well, they loved that!"
Wandsworth Green Awards 2009
A gala awards ceremony took place in February 2009 to honour the borough’s greenest businesses and residents for their environmental achievements.
The Wandsworth Green & Heartbeat Awards were hosted by TV chef Oliver Rowe at the Pestana Chelsea Bridge Hotel in Battersea.
More than 400 guests attended the event to find out the winners of three council run competitions.
The ‘Green Business Awards’ were open to every business in the borough and the individuals who work within them.
Pedal4Health is proud to announce we won the Green Project/Group category.
Cycling and healthy living
On 19th November 2009 London Cycling Campaign published a case study of our Wheel Thing project. Please visit the LCC website where you can download the report. An excerpt is repoduced below.
http://www.lcc.org.uk/index.asp?PageID=1621
‘The Wheel Thing’
As an initiative in their new Bike4Life project, Wandsworth PCT joined with Pedal4Health on 7th March 2009 to create ‘The Wheel Thing’ project. Meant for parents and their children ages 8-16 to get healthy using cycling, the courses give instruction to all ability levels from learning how to ride a bicycle to road safety training.
The free, six week course takes place on Saturdays at Southfields and Roehampton, within the London Borough of Wandsworth. Bikes, vests, and helmets are all supplied for the sessions, making it even easier for families to participate. Also encouraging families to take part is an incentive of £50 worth of vouchers to local bike shops given on completion of the course.
“Cycling was chosen as we have a commitment to active transport and increasing physical activity, so we thought this would be a suitable project for both” said Wandsworth PCT member Emily DeNobrega, “We also thought that cycling may be something that people don’t take part in due to costs, and we hoped that we could help overcome this barrier.”
London Cycling Awards 2009
The Wheel Thing, Pedal4Health's joint project with Wandsworth PCT has been shortlisted for 'Best cycling initiative for young people'.
Cycle Safety Action Plan
The Mayor has released a draft of his Cycle Safety Action Plan today(23/10/09).
www.tfl.gov.uk/assets/downloads/businessandpartners/cycle-safety-action-plan-draft.pdf
Battersea Fields Estate
Yesteday's event(17th September) was a great success. We reckon up to 200 children and parents came and joined in the bike rides and had a free bike check.Even Martin Linton, MP for Battersea couldn't resist having a go on our Penny Farthing.
The event was to celebrate the opening of bike lockers on the estate, which has been making efforts to encourage cycling and also become more environmentally friendly by using renewable energy sources.
Article on page 10 of Wandsworth Guardian.
http://edition.pagesuite-professional.co.uk/Launch.aspx?refresh=d06W9gP1sL05&PBID=47c1cbbd-4d2d-409e-8458-8703ef40dcda
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