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Pro team mechanic rides 6,600km around British coastline and visits all the lighthouses

Sam Hayes of Madison Genesis was raising money for male suicide awareness charity

A mechanic for a professional cycling team has completed a 6,600-kilometre ride around the coastline of Great Britain – and visited all 181 of the lighthouses that are located on the mainland.

Sam Hayes, who works for the UCI Continental outfit Madison Genesis, undertook the trip to raise money for the male suicide awareness charity, the Campaign Against Living Miserably.

To date, he has raised almost £2,000 through the website Just Giving, against an initial target of £1,200 – enough to enable CALM, which receives around 200 calls daily, to run its helpline for 24 hours.

Hayes’ Twitter feed is well worth a look – who knew that selfiestaking by a bloke in a cycle helmet in front of lighthouses could be such a compelling genre of photography?

Simon joined road.cc as news editor in 2009 and is now the site’s community editor, acting as a link between the team producing the content and our readers. A law and languages graduate, published translator and former retail analyst, he has reported on issues as diverse as cycling-related court cases, anti-doping investigations, the latest developments in the bike industry and the sport’s biggest races. Now back in London full-time after 15 years living in Oxford and Cambridge, he loves cycling along the Thames but misses having his former riding buddy, Elodie the miniature schnauzer, in the basket in front of him.

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hawkinspeter | 6 years ago
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I bet he didn't do Lundy. Highest lighthouse in the UK, though they had to stop using it when they realised it couldn't be seen when there was heavy fog.

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df280 replied to hawkinspeter | 6 years ago
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hawkinspeter wrote:

I bet he didn't do Lundy. Highest lighthouse in the UK, though they had to stop using it when they realised it couldn't be seen when there was heavy fog.

It does say the mainland so doubt he did Lundy, plus not sure you'd even get a mountain bike up there, hiking it is difficult enough!

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hawkinspeter replied to df280 | 6 years ago
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df280 wrote:
hawkinspeter wrote:

I bet he didn't do Lundy. Highest lighthouse in the UK, though they had to stop using it when they realised it couldn't be seen when there was heavy fog.

It does say the mainland so doubt he did Lundy, plus not sure you'd even get a mountain bike up there, hiking it is difficult enough!

I don't think bikes are allowed on there anyway. It's not that difficult a walk to the Old Lighthouse, just a lot of sheep shit (I've stayed in the Old Lighthouse properties a few times).

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McHackety | 6 years ago
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Fantastic achievement that.

Can't believe Genesis didn't give him a bike to do it on though...

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the infamous grouse | 6 years ago
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i'll be quite surprised if he included cape wrath lighthouse, on that bike.

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Simon E replied to the infamous grouse | 6 years ago
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the infamous grouse wrote:

i'll be quite surprised if he included cape wrath lighthouse, on that bike.

He had intended to but was defeated by the weather:

https://twitter.com/sqhayes/status/910584414102532096

It looks like quite a tough ride, clocking up a good number of 100+ km days on terrain that was often far from easy.

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Another David | 6 years ago
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Hope you enjoyed Mumbles lighthouse.

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