As shop representative for the semi-niche sport of Single Speeding I thought I had better attend this last weekend.

Myself and two mates, Gil and Mark, took my camper van over from Hull and drove 200Km down Belgium to where the hills start. The event was held in the grounds of a monastery, with fabulous woodland and their own brewery; Maredsous.

On the way I dropped in on a velomobile-making friend in Ghent and took a fully enclosed three wheeled recumbent velomobile for a spin - http://www.fietser.be is where his WAW creation can be seen. Dries had just come back from London and was amazed by the amount of fixed wheel, single speed bikes, with no mudguards or racks. The Belgians have a much more pragmatic approach to cycling in that as they are riding it, it may as well be functional. I will have a velomobile one day, oh yes. Cycling into Ghent from the outskirts is an eye opener, with mandatory cycle lane useage where it exists. They does not always exist, so it is a constant lookout for a lane on either side of the road. Oh, and the Belgian drivers….

So, we reached the beautiful venue on Friday afternoon, just missing the group ride out. The only way to console ourselves was to do a quick camp setup amongst the other 6 Yorkshire attendees and ride up the big hill to the Monastery beer shop. After a few glasses of 6 and 8 abv beers, we rode back through the woods. Beer-fuelled downhilling is not to be recommended and although I avoided the ramp jumps I could not resist the wall of death and almost rode over the edge.

Tea that night was an event provided chip van and various processed Belgian meat products. I snuck off back to the van and cooked chick peas in caramelised onions, with ham. Much frivolity was had that evening, revolving around beer and bicycles.

For those unaware of the rationale behind Single Speed racing, it is less of a race than an event organised around a mass ride in which some game souls actually do their best to get around a course as quickly as possible. A large amount of the other riders dawdle around, chatting and drinking beer, some in fancy dress. For a supposedly simple bicycle concept, the amount of 'bling' on show at the event was mindblowing. Much titanium, carbon and hand whittled loveliness was on show. 

In keeping with the non-race ethos organisers organisers are deliberately vague over the manner of start, the exact location, and even the direction of the course. Previous events have involved the hiding of bicycles. How anyone with the intent to win actually manges to get away from the line in the first 50 of the 300 or so entrants always amazes me. Saturday was no different and I took a casual walk to my bike, along with the gentlemen dressed as naked ladies, naked ladies dressed as ladies, ladies dressed as naked ladies etc.

To be continued, this is turning into an epic…