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Video: Thomas Voeckler helps Yorkshire Bank Bike Libraries mark 5,000th bike milestone

Initiative launched as Tour de France Grand Depart legacy helped 36,000 kids get cycling last year

Ahead of the Tour de Yorkshire starting today, defending champion Thomas Voeckler helped Yorkshire Bank Bike Libraries mark a milestone as he handed over the 5,000th bike to the initiative.

Launched after Yorkshire hosted the Grand Départ of the Tour de France in 2014, last year alone 36,000 children were able to ride a bike thanks to the Yorkshire Bank Bike Libraries.

Voeckler said: “When they asked me to come and give the 5,000th bike to the Yorkshire Bank Bike Libraries I said yes immediately because it’s something that stays after the events like the Tour de Yorkshire or the Grand Depart of the Tour de France in 2014.

“This is something for the kids because not all parents can afford to buy a bike for their kids, and I’m really impressed by 36,000 kids riding bikes thanks to the Yorkshire Bank Bike Libraries, it’s a really great project and I think it’s a really good thing.

“For young children riding a bike should be a right. It is like swimming, everybody should be able to ride a bike. We can see that’s not the case, so these kinds of schemes like the Yorkshire Bank Bike Libraries are really a great thing.”

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Aged 37, the Direct Energie rider will retire after this summer’s Tour de France, a race in which he has twice had memorable stints in the yellow jersey, including coming within two days of taking it all the way to Paris in 2011.

Today’s opening stage of the Tour de Yorkshire finishes in Scarborough, where the race ended last year with Voeckler beating Nicolas Roche, then with Team Sky, in a two-up sprint to the line as he clinched the title.

> Video: 2017 Tour de Yorkshire route unveiled (+ stage maps)

Thomas Voeckler was speaking at Richmond Hill Primary School, a Yorkshire Bank Bike Library in Leeds. For more information on Yorkshire Bank Bike Libraries please visit www.ybonline.co.uk/bikelibraries.

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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HarrogateSpa | 6 years ago
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Some of the legacy promised from the Tour de France in Yorkshire didn't happen, or has been patchy, but the Tour de Yorkshire and these Bike Libraries are a great thing. Well done, and well done TV.

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