Meet Team Safe Ride

I started riding at an early age, around 7 or 8 yrs old, and passed my test in the 1970’s.

I started teaching as a canoeing instructor then went on to scuba diving, I became a master scuba diving instructor. Within my dive centre I taught RYA advanced powerboat courses, and passed my Yacht Master offshore.

I have been riding continuously throughout the years, also passing my IAM advanced rider qualification. I started teaching for Saferide in 2015 and took my CBT and DAS assessments. In January 2018 I bought, with the help of the team, Saferide Motorcycle Training. Since taking over we have raised our bike stock, bought all new equipment and increased both our instructors and student numbers.

My hobbies are still riding bikes, travel, metal and woodworking.

I’m the team member who you’ll most likely speak with on the phone and the one that keeps all the plates perfectly spinning behind the scenes!

I've been around bikes and biking for over 20 years, thanks to my bike mad husband Alex, but am new to riding and really should find the time to complete my CBT sometime soon, having started it almost a year ago!

When I’m not keeping this lively bunch of instructors in check and seamlessly managing their work diaries, you’ll most likely find me behind a camera (I’ve been a professional photographer for 10 years) out on long walks, practising yoga and skiing with my family over the winter months.

I’ve always loved bikes, my earliest memory (I probably shouldn’t tell you this!) is of overtaking my stepdad on a mate’s Lambretta on Bexhill seafront😳 I was thirteen at the time - 🤭oops!

I started teaching in the early eighties for a while, that was when the motorcycle test was split into two parts. I joined Saferide two years ago.

I now mainly instruct DAS, Back to Biking, and confidence building when people have had an accident.

I use my bikes all year round and with my other job I quite regularly do 300 to 400 mile days in all weathers. I do quite a bit of yoga. I'm interested in flying, I’ve had a PPL for 20 years, although I haven’t been up in a few years. I took up sailing just over a year ago, I’m looking to do some more when the weather gets warmer.

I started riding as a teenager because it was a cheap form of transport. I then got involved with cars, mechanics and motorsport in my late teens.

I couldn’t afford to get back into motorcycling until the mid 80’s, at which point I switched to motorcycle mechanics and became an instructor.

I taught CBT and DAS (when it was first introduced), advanced motorcycling and a number of instructor courses. After doing this for many years - sometimes 6-7 days a week! - it started to spoil my personal riding enjoyment so I went back on the spanners!

I retired in August 2017 and went back to teaching part time. I find it interesting and fun again now that I can do it because I want to, not because I have to.

In my spare time I like riding bikes and spending time with my daughter, repairing bikes, drinking tea at the bikers cafe in Brighton and I love music.

I got into biking as a way of commuting to central London without using public transport. I discovered I really liked it and passed my DAS course for a full licence 1st Oct 1999. A motorcycling friend was a part time CBT instructor in the Portsmouth area. He suggested I might consider the same. That put the idea in my head. I approached my local MTB in 2004 and have been instructing ever since then. I became full time almost immediately. I qualified for CBT and DAS instruction quite quickly. I obtained RoSPA Gold soon thereafter and joined RoSPA Advanced Drivers and Riders Association (RoADaR). I was already advanced instructing when DVSA launched the Enhanced Riders Scheme (ERS) so applied and qualified to instruct that soon after. I was one of the first instructors to join the DVSA's Register of Post Test Motorcycle Trainers (RPMT). RPMT is DVSA's voluntary register for anyone wishing to instruct post test training ERS, Back to Biking, advanced, refresher etc.

I have worked with the Metropolitan Police's motorcycle tasking team to develop and train large event support riders and also helped the police to film promotional material for their Bikesafe courses. I attended an early First Bike On Scene Course (FBOS). I could probably use a refresher!

Outside of motorcycling my hobbies are camping, travelling and other outdoor pursuits.

``Having to Ride Motorbikes and talk about motorbikes all day is a terrible job but somebody has to do it.``

Biking runs in my family, both my father and grandfather had bikes when they were younger, so I always had an interest in it. Also when I was at school most of the lads got mopeds at 16, so there was a peer thing going on. I have always found biking far more involving and enjoyable than driving a car.

I started teaching in 2016 and I now instruct on CBT and the A1 licence.

When I finished in my last job I was not ready to retire and the idea of combining my love of motorcycling with earning a few quid seemed the perfect way forward. I knew Tony Iles through the Royal British Legion Riders Branch and he suggested coming along to Saferide. I have always done things in a calm and considered way and this has translated pretty well into teaching people who are new to motorcycling.

As a husband, father and grandfather there is a fair amount of family stuff to deal with and enjoy. I enjoy watching most sports, it has to be watching these days rather than taking part, though I still do a bit of rowing and sailing and a bit of fitness work. I also dance, less now my knees are dodgy; salsa, argentine tango that sort of thing, plus of course classic dad dancing. Other than that, history, current affairs, art, you know the typical renaissance man stuff 😉

I got into riding bikes age 9 as I lived next to the South Downs. Both myself and a few friends used to spend all our spare time working on and fixing up bikes to ride on the Downs. This lead to me owning many, many different bikes and becoming a good off road rider and on the road from age 16.

I have been an instructor for 15 years plus.

In my spare time I ride bikes, especially abroad, all over Europe and North Africa I also like to go to the odd gig as I like music. I used to do a fair amount of martial arts and target shooting.

I have my Dad to thank for getting me onto two wheels over 40 years ago. He built me my first motorbike, and my obsession with motorcycling began at the age of 4. I learned to ride off-road at the chalk pits alongside the old A23 just north of Brighton, raced motocross until I was 18, and then took to the road.

I started teaching in 2018, and have the privilege of instructing our new riders on geared and automatic machines prior to them taking their CBT course.

Away from work, I enjoy running, skiing, playing the guitar and following the fortunes of Brighton and Hove Albion. I also love watching all forms of motorcycle sport.