Haddenham Bucks

Cycling for Autism

Home » News » Cycling for Autism
Cycling Ladies

Two Haddenham residents Rachael Barnard and Natalie Giles and others from Quainton, Weedon and Buckingham have formed a women's road cycling team, intent on raising autism awareness and funds for a Bucks early years autism charity called the Puzzle Centre.

Their ambition is to complete L'Etape du Tour, a mountain stage of the Tour de France and road cycling's toughest sportive, to promote autism awareness and fundraise for ground-breaking early years autism charity, the Puzzle Centre. Each of the riders either has a child on the autism spectrum or works at the charity's early intervention centre.

Just days before the peloton passes by, these five amateur female cyclists — none of whom had ever ridden a road bike until a few months ago — will tackle a tough mountain stage of the Tour de France covering 142km, climbing around 60km over four mountains at an average gradient of 6.5%.

With the support of the cycling industry and autism community (see our sponsors), the rookie team has received donations of bikes, kit, nutrition and training support and has learnt the skills of road biking in readiness for this gruelling endurance event.

Rachael said: "When I first visited Puzzle Centre, all I could think was that I wish a place like this had existed when our son was young so that the whole family could have accessed their support and knowledge during those difficult early years and diagnosis process. Ordinary families deserve access to ground-breaking services like Puzzle — that's why we decided to form Puzzle5 and take on the L'Etape challenge. By the time we complete the race on 19 July 2015, we hope to have made more people aware of the needs of very young children with autism and raised funds to help extend the vital services provided by Puzzle Centre.'

Puzzle Centre is a place of hope and joy for these very young children and their families.
If you are interested in learning more about the Puzzle5Etape and the work at Puzzle Centre, please contact rider Rachael Barnard on 07792 635192

If you would like to help these ladies to realise their ambition and make autism more widely understood and the Puzzle Centre's service more easily accessible by following them on Facebook and on twitter @Puzzle5Etape or visit their website.

To donate, please visit their JustGiving page.

popular recent storiesAlso in the news

Open Gardens This Summer
Haddenham Webteam: Tue 30 May 4:00pm

There will be a number of opportunities to take a peek at some lovely local gardens this Summer.The first time will be as part of the village fete, which takes place during the afternoon on Saturday 10th June. The details will be in the fete programmeThose kind enough to throw open their gardens to visitors include:Karen and Jon Pawsey at No 4 Flint StreetRos Welch at No. 5 Flint...

Cutting the Cake
Haddenham Webteam: Sun 28 May 7:00pm

The Haddenham Fish Scheme celebrated its 50th Anniversary for all its current and previous volunteers with a tea Party held in the hall at Haddenham Community Infant School on Sunday 28th May.Leaders Jeanne Watt and Alison Green gave the large group of guests a potted history of the Scheme and some of the notable benefits that it has provided to the Haddenham community since its inception in...

Fete Volunteer
Haddenham Webteam: Sun 28 May 5:30pm

Help is needed for our traditional village fete, which takes place on the afternoon of Saturday 10th June! So there are just over two weeks to go and we are looking forward to welcoming you the fete at Church End, Flint Street and on Manor Farm.One of the main aims of the Fete is to raise money for local good causes and organisations. Community events like this rely heavily on adult...