About us

Our love of cycling began at an early age when gears meant Sturmey Archer 3-speed hubs, nothing like

the versatility of your 24-speed MTB of today,

albeit a rather clever piece

of kit.

Like Sturmey Archer hubs, our love of cycling is still going strong, although Graham's touring adventures rarely go beyond the boundaries of Dorset and his triathlon days amount to once a year if he's lucky!

Off road MTB still rates pretty high on our agenda, however, and at a time when the volume of traffic rises ever higher, it is wonderful to have some means of escaping it all whilst levering our youngest lad off the Wii to boot!

Our passion for MTBs began in 1990 and developed over the summer with the arrival of Graham's Dutch cycling companion, Peter, who wanted to see all the sights around Dorchester. Between us, we covered a lot of ground, stopping at a few pubs to help us on our way!

Marriage and children soon followed but not to be put off, a child seat was purchased and once again we were mobile in the beautiful Dorset countryside.

The child seat was swapped from bike to bike until one day, "the fearless one" took off independently. In pre-tag-a-long days this meant finding somewhere safe for family cycling.

Locally, we found it in Puddletown Forest. With the aid of a cycle carrier and a weekend without DIY we were able to continue our very relaxing pastime.

Some years on and several cycling proficiency tests later, "the fearless one" has spent many hours cycling in Puddletown Forest with his mates, whilst our younger lad has been able to accompany us across country to Kingston Maurward and thereabouts.

So much to enjoy on our doorstep, and at a time when there are so many concerns about traffic, health, global warming, the environment, etc, it struck me that with a little bit of help, others (without the local knowledge) might also appreciate visiting these places of local interest on two wheels instead of four. And hence the Cycloan idea was hatched!

Having become more active in local cycling we decided to also train as National Standard Cycle Instructors in January 2009. This has been great fun and very rewarding, working with children and adults from various backgrounds and organisations.

Next on the list is the MTB leaders course!

Hope you enjoy it as much as we have.

Holly Harris (Cytech 2)