Bid to bag all 282 Munros – on a bike!

A SCAFFOLDER is halfway through his mammoth challenge of cycling down all of Scotland’s 282 Munros.

Sean Green, from Carnoustie, came up with the idea three and a half years ago, having always had a love of being out in the hills.

The 31-year-old said: “I’ve been biking properly since I was about 11 and then within a couple of years I started taking things really seriously and started racing.

“I’ve done it for the last 20 years and I just got a bit fed up of the sort of stuff that I was doing.

“I ended up just wanting some bigger hills, different terrain, so about three and a half years ago this idea came to fruition.

“I had been climbing Munros on and off basically my entire life – it was something my dad was always into so as a family we were always out in the hills or away camping, so it was a natural progression.

“When I was out walking, I’d always think ‘oh I wish I had my bike’ and even as a kid I would pretend I had my bike, so one day I decided when I was looking across towards the Cairngorms, I’d go exploring.

“Obviously a large part of it is for the biking, but even aside from the biking I just love being in the hills.

“I enjoy the hike up just as much as the descent. For the descent I get to have a little bit more fun than anybody else who is hiking.

“It’s the sights you see, the sunsets, the sunrises – even when the weather is horrendous, it’s just the sense of being out in the wild, the atmosphere. It’s pretty magical most of the time.”

After biking down 15-20 Munros, Sean bought a map of all the Munros in Scotland and told his wife what he was planning to do.

He said: “I walked into the living room and I pulled the map out and showed my wife.

“I said ‘I’m going to bike every single one of these’ and she just looked up at me and said ‘let me know when you are done’ and that was sort of it.

“I’ve basically done it since – I’ve been a bit obsessed about it.”

Sean is just over halfway through his goal, having completed 145 Munros, and is determined to finish the challenge.

He said: “I’ll definitely finish it. Some are obviously a lot harder than others and involve next to no riding at all.

“I might as well get it done. I do ride where I can but most of it it’s not worth trying to ride up, for me it’s all about the descents.

“The quickest ones I have been up and down in less than two hours, but there are days where its taken me nine or 10 hours just to get to the summit.”

Sean believes he is the first person to attempt to ride down all 282 Munros.

Well-known climber Paul Tattersall, from Gairloch, is believed to have been the first to have taken a bike to the summit of each.