MY PART IN THE DREAM

Sponsoring A Women’s Tour of Brita in Team

Aged 13, I fell in love with bike racing, watching Hinault and LeMond battle it out, pretending to be team-mates through the ’86 Tour. Suddenly, being skinny was cool and the hardship and beauty of cycling grabbed my heart and squeezed.

I became immersed in road racing and time trials, which drove my mum crazy. I did multiple paper rounds to buy tyres, shorts and petrol money to races. Every thought and action was cycling.

But it wasn’t easy to enter a very closed clique. Cycling in the UK was dead back then. It seemed so bizarre and misunderstood that the ranks were closed and suspicion of outsiders high. I suppose it was a defense mechanism. It took me many Nottingham-based club runs to be accepted, long painful winter training rides with a crap bike, baggy tracksuit bottoms and a stupid Briançon helmet my mum insisted I wear. I was rubbish but I dug deep and that eventually got me respect.

But there were no women. None. These formative experiences stayed with me. I wanted cycling to be a welcoming place. I wanted cycling to be big, confident and part of our culture, just like the countries of cycling lore.

So I raced to a half decent standard until injuries hit and my ludicrous dreams of winning the Tour were over at 19. I was told I’d never ride again but by ignoring bad advice, I did, albeit in a different way. Every ride was a bonus so I embraced everything from MTB and track to touring. But the same themes kept repeating. I love any kind of cycling yet I hate cliques and snobbery.

In 2009, I left my career in the film world to create a cycling apparel company called Vulpine,

if somewhere down th e line Vulpine gets push ed as ide by a BIGGER sponsor, I’ll be a happ y ma n. I wa nt all th is potential to be realised

which we launched in 2012. We’re growing very fast, which means I meet some fascinating people in cycling. One of the most inspiring was Stef Wyman, husband to ’cross legend Helen Wyman and coach of a top UK women’s team for many years. He was outspoken, passionate, driven and cared deeply about cycling. Exactly the kind of person I gravitate towards. I wanted to be involved. I wasn’t sure how. AFTER JUST OVER a year of Vulpine’s existence it became clear that we were doing something right, and I could be more ambitious about the future. I love elite racing and don’t care who’s doing it. Men, women, paracyclists, hedgehogs, whatever. The opportunity to be a headline sponsor of an elite racing team arose. I already had this connection with Stef and we both wanted to show how exciting elite women’s cycling is. This wasn’t about asking for charity for the poor dear girlies. We are determined to show women racers as ultra tough, committed athletes who race hard, love what they do and just happen to have boobs.

So I took the plunge with Matrix Vulpine – one of only three UK teams in the Women’s Tour of Britain, alongside Great Britain with Lucy Garner, and Wiggle Honda (many of whom Stef coached).

Stef, Helen, the team and I aim to show that backing women’s cycling is a fun, commercially viable, highly attractive part of cycling. Stef has ambitions for it to become a major international pro team although, right now, I’ve no idea whether I’d still be able to headline sponsor such an entity. I damned well hope so. But if somewhere down the line Vulpine gets pushed aside by a sponsor with bigger resources, I’ll be a happy man. I want all this potential to be realised.

Some of the riders are destined to become household names. I hope they get the opportunity to fulfil that destiny, unfettered by financial, infrastructural or bureaucratic constraints. That would be a crime… any unfulfilled life is.

I never became a pro. Boo hoo, poor me. But I did become a cycling entrepreneur, so my dream shifted. I need achievable dreams. Just. Out. Of. Reach. My latest dream had been to see my logo on the jersey of elite cyclists and now that dream is real. It’s me racing with them vicariously.

I’ve fulfilled two of my greatest ambitions – to own my own cycling company and to sponsor a racing team. The next, many years from now, is to get Vulpine to a stage where I can sponsor a team of elite cyclists of all disciplines and ilks. Road, MTB, track, BMX. Men, women, able bodied, paracyclists, whatever, wherever, however I can.

An elite cyclist can do incredible things. I want to feel part of that in any way I can. Do follow Matrix Vulpine’s adventures in Cyclingland.