The My Whoosh Big Ride Challenge can be anything you want to be, and for Stephe Fletcher it’s a great motivation to get out and ride his bike.
While some riders comfortably hit the 5,000 mile target, for Stephe joining Cycling Weekly’s challenge for its first year back in 2020 is what gave him the motivation to up his mileage. And since then he’s hit the target every year except 2023, when a crash on a slick bike path left him with a broken leg.
“It is an extra motivation to just do it,” Stephe tells us from his home in Cumbria a few weeks after clocking up 5,000 miles for 2025 and adding his name to the finishers list. “Apart from ’23, I’ve always done the CW5000, and four of the years, have [gone on to do] 10,000. I was a bit disappointed I only got the 3,000 in the year of the [broken] leg. But even then, I thought that’s pretty good, to be quite honest.”
Stephe’s first two-wheeled memory dates back longer than he cares to admit, riding on a triple tandem with his family as a very young child. A bike promised for passing his 11+ school exam only arrived when he was 15 and the family moved to Peterborough, but his relationship with cycling was more utilitarian, using it mainly for commuting rather than sport.
A club runner of a good standard, Stephe had to find another outlet for his exercise after a hip replacement due to the onset of arthritis. ““I could still do a bit of running,” Stephe explains. “But I thought it was more sensible, and the surgeon said that the best thing was to take up cycling, so I thought, why not? I got a Trek Domane did a few sportives and then it progressed from there.”
Though he’s moved around the country over the years, his home close to Penrith in Cumbria gives Stephe a multitude of riding options, from the relative flat of the Eden Valley to the Fells and Lakes, some of England’s steepest and highest climbs are all close by.
(Image credit: Stephe Fletcher)
“I do quite a lot of cycling in that area,” he says of the Eden Valley. “I cycle up to Brampton, and then from Brampton into what I call the Empty Quarter, which is a bit north of Brampton, there’s virtually nobody there, it’s very, very quiet, very nice. Sometimes foray into Scotland, but that means getting through Carlisle, which is not the most bike friendly city.
“We’ve also got the Solway coast, from Carlisle and goes right round to Maryport, the flattest areas are all out that way, and you get views across to Scotland. I also go over to Norfolk a couple of times a year. My partner was from Norfolk, and my son lives in Norfolk.
Norfolk is also the scene of Stephe’s longest ride, a 247 mile circumnavigation of the county ridden in 2022. “I did that ride in her memory, and also to raise a bit of money for one of the Alzheimer’s charities.
“I started about three in the morning and I finished at 11 o’clock at night. This was in June, so there was plenty of daylight. If you take the stops out, i, I averaged round about 15.3mph.
“It was my partner that got me into the fitness stuff, and it did me the power of good. I’ll always thank her for it.”
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