New Shirt Gets Airing in Cyprus Sun

While the rest of us have been slogging through mud and rain on the trails of Bedfordshire (or, in the case of many, vegging on the couch), Mark "The Fireman" Barter and his brother Simon have been doing some serious riding in the Cypriot sunshine whilst raising money for a local kidney charity.

In completing a six day, 323 KM ride around the island they've raised a fantastic E2887. Full details of the ride can be seen at http://www.look4usincyprus.com/ARC/ARC-index.html.

While there, the guys bumped into the German MTB team and Mark took the opportunity to model his new Ampthill shirt alongside Sabine Spitz, current world champion and Olympic medalist- (see opposite). No Mick- she won't be joining us next season!

All Dressed Up and Nowhere to Go

So after five or so years of discussion, debate and inaction by the majority, followed by a couple of months of intense activity by our chairman the new shirts have arrived, and very good they are too. Well done Brian for making this happen- Hopefully by the time this reaches the net everybody will have stumped up the brass and will be proud owners of shiny new shirts.

Remarkably, it seems that just about everybody ordered the same size as they had last time. Now, I've been looking at some of the photos of past tours, Christmas meals etc and, unless these newfangled digital cameras distort the pictures, I think it's safe to say there's not a man amongst us (with the possible exception of Blunty) who' physique is not showing more signs of Beer than Bikes.
I'm no expert in these matters but I understand that American fashion houses make clothes bigger to kid their lardy-arsed middle-aged customers that, in the words of the Beautiful South, they're still a "perfect ten" . This makes them feel good and spend more. Fortunately it seems Endura have adopted a similar strategy and there's plenty of growing room in my new shirts- to allow for the odd pie along with the beer and banter next term. If this makes anybody feel so good they do have the urge to spend more, there are a couple of spare shirts available.

Now we just need it to stop raining or snowing for an hour or so so we can get out there and show them off.

Thanks Brian.