The Original Bicycle Festival in Dumfries and Galloway will feature as one of its many events the Stepping Stanes Mini Festival, a free family fun day with bike coaching, a bike clinic, celebrity appearances, cycle challenges and bike races for all ages and abilities.

The family event takes place on 16 May from 10am to 3.30pm, as is organised by the Stepping Stanes Youth Cycle Development Club. The mornings activities will focus on coaching and having fun, and is ideal for absolute beginners or keen racers looking to hone their skills.

Moving into the afternoon, there’ll be informal fun races for all ages and abilities, giving those new found skills the chance to shine. Categories include under 10’s, under 12’s, under 14’s and under 16’s. The emphasis will be on having fun with like minded people with great podium prizes as well as spot prizes for surprise categories.

“This will be a fantastic family friendly event in a safe, traffic free environment run by top quality coaches,” says Steve McCreadie, Chair of Stepping Stanes. “Biking is great fun for all the family and Dumfries and Galloway is the best place for biking in Scotland. We hope to see a big turn out during the festival and that many more young people and families can enjoy the benefits that biking can bring all year round.”

As if all that didn’t sound great enough already, Graeme Obree, otherwise known as ‘The Flying Scot’ (twice World Hour record holder in 1993 and 1994 and double World Pursuit Champion), will be making an appearance at the Stepping Stanes Mini Festival to answer any questions you might have.

As a Scottish Cycling accredited Go ride Club the Stepping Stanes project was set up more than a year ago to encourage young people and their families into cycling as sport and for recreation. Now with a solid base of well qualified and experienced coaches it has a steady summer and winter programme of coaching, fun rides and competitions.

Registration forms for and details of the Stepping Stanes Mini Festival can be found on www.steppingstanes.co.uk.