LIKE most people, I needed a reason to get on a bike. I hadn’t ridden for a good 30 years or more - a teenager delivering newspapers in my home village near Grimsby.

For some reason I had never had the need nor felt the desire.

Despite covering cycling while working as a sports reporter in Bermuda for the best part of a decade, no one had suggested that I might want to try it for myself.

I’d had dinner with George Hincapie, shared drinks with Tyler Hamilton and become friends with the likes of Kris Hedges and triathletes Tyler Butterfield and Flora Duffy.

But getting on two wheels myself had never crossed my mind.

It took a family tragedy to provide me with the incentive.

A young relative died suddenly from a brain tumour and, needing something positive to focus on, her father took to cycling.

A way of escaping the grief for a few hours became an opportunity to raise funds in her name and that’s where my current obsession was borne.

If he can do it, so can I.

My first bike cost just over £100, but I hadn’t done my homework. Technology advances at light speed in the world of cycling and it turns out I’d bought a relative museum piece.

Three bikes later and I am now able to hold my head up at gatherings of like-minded folk.

It’s not all been plain sailing, or should I say, cycling. I have come off a number of times, including one very nasty argument with a road sign that resulted in a broken shoulder, several months on the sidelines and warnings from my wife to act my age.

The whole thing was caught on my GoPro headcam, a permanent reminder that I am perhaps not as invincible as I sometimes think I am.

But if you haven’t fallen off, then in my book at least, you’re not a proper cyclist.

So, having popped that particular cherry, I am now looking for challenges.

Just going out for a relaxing ride is not enough anymore, something I am sure fellow ‘amateur’ riders will attest to.

Having done my first ‘100’ event, I am now signed up for a Coast to Coast and there’s talk of London to Brighton. The world, or Britain at least, is my oyster.

At 45 and with a heart operation already in the bag, cycling has given me a new lease of life, something I can do to escape the pressures of the rat-race.

If that sounds like you too then I hope this monthly column will be of interest.

I want to know about your rides, your club, your challenges and in turn I’ll tell you what’s happening throughout the North-East, test the latest in gear and gadgets and speak with some well-known faces in the cycling world.

Email me at matt.westcott@nne.co.uk , call 01325-505064 or follow me on Twitter @mattwecho.