In our 50th year it is with tremendous sadness that we hear that the gentleman who resurrected Belper Bicycle Club, 'The doyen' of national and local cycling, the inimitable Dave Orford passed away on 31st July 2022.
Close friend and our Life President Derrick Woodings writes:
He had been getting weaker whilst in a rest home in Belper. Dave came up to this area whilst a young man in wartime as a war refugee from the Essex area and remained local. He was very well known as a rider and promoter of races in the Derby area. I rode many of his events. The events he promoted were criteriums and road races. He was an employee at the Carriage & Wagon works in Derby. He and I used to have a chase on our bikes into Derby from Belper (I was working at Rolls Royce and he then lived in Ambergate). I do remember him putting on one event inside one of the carriage workshops. He also promoted events in the Belper area at Heage and several in south Derbyshire lower peak district. It was always a great pleasure to meet him in Belper where he regaled myself and my wife of local occurrences, always starting with " Did I tell you about...." He was a real gentleman and a pleasure to talk to. I'll certainly miss him,.
RIP Dave you will be missed.
The Milk Race…did you know…a semi-professional cyclist from Derby, Dave Orford, asked the MMB to pay for "Drink more milk" to be embroidered on the jersey of every semi-professional, or independent, rider in the country. The MMB could then advertise that races had been won because of the properties of milk and the winner would receive a £10 bonus as a result. Dave met the MMB's publicity officer, Reg Pugh, at the board's headquarters in Thames Ditton, west of London. Orford said: "At the end of the discussion he stated that the MMB would prefer to sponsor a major international marathon. So the Milk Race, the Tour of Britain, was born, starting in 1958 and lasting for 35 years, the longest…
Dave regularly popped into our shop, Cyclone in Belper, for a chat over tea & biscuits. He shared many great cycling tales, and was a joy to meet. If anyone is available to cycle up to Swanwick, to pay our respects, then I would like to do so 👍
A true legend of the sport who will be sadly missed. Our thoughts and prayers are with his family and friends. Bill and Maggie