Bikers mark International Female Ride Day
NOT EVEN a persistent drizzle that later turned to serious rain could dampen the spirits of the more than two dozen women who showed up for the local leg of the 2015 International Female Ride Day.
The run, organised by Lady Bikers SA, is one of five in South Africa and hundreds all over the world in what is now a not-to-be-missed annual celebration among women riders.
The event, now in its ninth year, is not intended as a charity event, but individual runs often become fund-raisers for local charities, or competitions.
One rider at the 2014 International Female Riders Day on Saturday told the Cape Argus it was the first time she had taken her motorcycle out of the garage and gone for a ride without her husband’s support.
International Female Ride Day was launched in 2007 in Toronto, Canada, by motorcycle racer and founder of women- oriented biking website Motoress, Vicki Gray. It went international in its first year and is now held in more than 30 countries.
The local run started at 9.30am from Harley-Davidson Cape Town, where the riders had begun gathering from 8am for coffee and muffins. It included a broad spectrum of riders on motorcycles ranging from 125cc commuters to big cruisers and an imposing, full-dress 1 400cc Kawasaki Concours tourer.
Some of the women had never ridden in rain, and most looked a little apprehensive as they formed up on a wet Somerset Road, but within a few kilometres, the group rode out from under the clouds and by the time they reached their destination – the Dockside Café in Langebaan – about 140km later, they were all bone dry. The ride had also grown to 36 bikes, as riders based on the Atlantic Coast joined in along the way.
Then it was time to party, to celebrate the fact that, all over the world, there were thousands of women riding that day, in groups large and small.
To men they say: “We are women, and we ride free.” And to women they say “You, too, can ride free.”