If you are considering becoming a ride leader, there is plenty of support and training available to you.
The only formal qualifications (dictated by CTC National) are that you must be:
- a Cycling UK member
- over 18 years' old
The committee needs to agree your appointment, you need one committee member to propose you, and another to second you. The club secretary then needs to register your name and membership number with Cycling UK before you can lead a ride.
You should be familiar with our ride guidelines - in particular, those relating to ride leadership.
There are a number of ways to gain confidence before leading your first ride:
- Have a chat with other ride leaders. Find out what they do to prepare for a ride, manage a ride, and what kinds of issue they've encountered.
- Help a leader prepare a ride and, perhaps, join them on a recce.
- Consider a CTC training course.
You don't need to lead your first ride on your own. You can support another leader on their ride. Most ride leaders are prepared to mentor you by riding along with you as you lead a ride. We suggest you lead at least one ride with another leader taking nominal responsibility for insurance purposes before seeking formal approval. Speak to any member of the committee if you'd like to be paired up with another leader.
We are building a route library to help you pick a route. Alternatively, you might want to lead a ride that already has suggested destinations.
Our café list gives you some ideas for where to stop for elevenses, and contact details to warn them we are coming.
The Saturday and Wednesday rides can be daunting, so you might want to start with smaller rides. For example:
- One of the 'slower' rides to elevenses (contact the ride leader who will probably be happy to lead the 'fast' group on that day)
- A section of a ride that has been split because it is large
- One of the Sunday morning or faster Sunday rides
- An easy ride
- A ride in support of an event (for example, a ride to the Christmas lunch)
- A ride taking place in parallel with another event, such as a memorial ride
- A pub ride
Generally, winter rides are smaller than summer ones and Saturday rides are smaller than Wednesday ones.