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Spin London urban bike show comes to central London

New venue brings bikes, art, food & coffee combination to heart of capital

The next edition of the Spin London urban cycle show moves from its previous venues in the east of the capital to bang in the centre at The Sorting Office, New Oxford St, WC1 on May 8-11.

It'll be a festival of cycling for all kinds of riders, say organisers, with something for everyone.

New features include the UK’s largest indoor pop-up test track; pro rider talks; live music; café; art-hub; and art and illustration workshops, plus the Hall of Frame, Makers’ Lounge and more.

There will be roller racing from Rollapaluza and cycling-themed talks from stunt rider turned video producer Martyn Ashton and 1950s professional rider Eileen Sheridan.

If you haven't got someone to come to Spin London with, you can join in Cycle Speed Dating for a chance to meet that special someone.

Cycle Speed Dating founder Margriet says: "Speed dating is a great way to meet new people, offline. The short dates are a good opportunity to find out if you would like to see someone again. We do the matchmaking and email everyone their matches so you don’t have to worry about taking the first step or telling someone you like them.

"I don’t have to tell you cyclists are a lovely bunch so we usually have a room full of like-minded people."

If your tastes are less amorous and more artistic, you can learn how to screen-print with Eliza Southwood and take home a two-colours cycling-themed print.

There'll be a Coffee Peloton workshop too where you can have a go at drawing with coffee, combining art, coffee and cycling. You'll be stamping wheels on to paper with coffee mugs and then Eliza will show you how to draw the cyclists. 

The Design Museum, Cycle Hack, Nuffield Health, Jack Thurston and the Department of Small Works (bicycle printing press) will also host activities. The Guardian will host a discussion on road safety and policy in association with RoadPeace and the London Cycling Campaign.

Bars, DJs, street food and gourmet coffee will all fuel a festival atmosphere through the weekend to bring together cyclists of all kinds.

Tickets are on sale now with limited tickets available on the door.

John has been writing about bikes and cycling for over 30 years since discovering that people were mug enough to pay him for it rather than expecting him to do an honest day's work.

He was heavily involved in the mountain bike boom of the late 1980s as a racer, team manager and race promoter, and that led to writing for Mountain Biking UK magazine shortly after its inception. He got the gig by phoning up the editor and telling him the magazine was rubbish and he could do better. Rather than telling him to get lost, MBUK editor Tym Manley called John’s bluff and the rest is history.

Since then he has worked on MTB Pro magazine and was editor of Maximum Mountain Bike and Australian Mountain Bike magazines, before switching to the web in 2000 to work for CyclingNews.com. Along with road.cc founder Tony Farrelly, John was on the launch team for BikeRadar.com and subsequently became editor in chief of Future Publishing’s group of cycling magazines and websites, including Cycling Plus, MBUK, What Mountain Bike and Procycling.

John has also written for Cyclist magazine, edited the BikeMagic website and was founding editor of TotalWomensCycling.com before handing over to someone far more representative of the site's main audience.

He joined road.cc in 2013. He lives in Cambridge where the lack of hills is more than made up for by the headwinds.

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