The Team

Mark

Some say he is compelled to compete by an underlying Napoleon complex and that he lives on recovery drinks and fig rolls. Others, that his house is powered not by the national grid, but by a dynamo attached to his turbo trainer in the garage. All we know is, he's called Mark and he runs the shop.

With competition experience in mountain, cross and road bikes, Mark is the keenest cyclist in the store. Having been trained by his Dad and Grandad from a young age, he is a skilled bicycle mechanic with infectious enthusiasm for the sport and he gets a great deal of satisfaction from building bike wheels, an art he learned from his Grandad.

Mark is the first SICI qualified bike fitter in the North East, a skill he uses to ensure each customer leaves the shop with the right size bike, as well as undertaking bike fits for customers with special sporting or orthopaedic requirements.

Mike

Having retired and passed the running of the business to his son Mark, Mike now only works 5 or 6 days a week, in between entertaining his grand children, walking family pets and performing his other patriarchal duties. An invaluable asset to the shop, he has a lifetime of mechanical experience and now employs this expertise to ensure that each customer leaves the shop with a finely tuned, mechanically sound piece of equipment.

Mike normally rides the 6 mile journey to work and back and over the last few years has completed a number of acheivements, such as the Land's End to John o'Groats, the Fred Whitton Challenge, the Raid des Alpes, Raid Pyrénéen and Raid Corsica.

Now in his mid sixties, Mike still has a youthful enthusiasm for speaking to our customer and is highly skilled in the art of identifying the customers needs and making sure that they leave the shop smiling, even after they have parted with their hard earned cash!

Helen

Mother to Mark and wife to Mike, Helen is the real boss of the business. She is responsible for the accounts and administration and works tirelessly to bring order from the chaos that is left in the wake of Mark and Mike.

One of Helen's most important roles is checking the orders to ensure that Mark hasn't ordered one of everything!

Jackie

Jackie is Mark's partner and mother to their two girls. She takes care of the clothing racks and product displays, and packs and dispatches any online or mail order sales.

Jackie has been a keen cyclist since meting Mark many years ago and she developed a competetive streak several years ago and started competing in sportives and triathlons. A diagnosis of breast cancer and her subsequent treatment for the disease forced her to take some time out. We are pleased to say that she is through the treatment and in remission and a training programme is back on the horizon, so watch this space!

Arron

Our youngest member of staff, Arron came to us to do his work experience and continued to work on holidays and weekends. He happily beavers away all day in the workshop and makes endless cups of tea for the staff and customers.

Arron is a dab hand with a spanner and, being the only team member that would qualify as a member of the facebook generation, is very useful for showing Mark which button to press on the computer.