When did the bike bug bite?

We were and very thrilling it all was too. Whether you’re into two wheels and drop handlebars or not, there’s no denying the verve and dedication of those amazing people at Welcome to Yorkshire whose sole reason for living appears to be to keep God’s Own County on the world stage.

But it set me wondering about how the cycling bug well and truly bit the thrill-givers who enthralled the thousands of us who lined the route. Did they push on their first trike pedals when they were barely out of nappies?

Or career around their back garden or in the park, recklessly taking corners with their stabilisers pointing giddily skywards?

Did they get a wobble on when the stabilisers came off and the parental hand stopped hovering at the rear of the saddle as they took their first foray on two wheels without a safety net?

Was a bike their mechanical childhood companion of choice as they belted around their neighbourhood, jumping off their trusty steed and throwing it to the ground before thundering through the door to eat their tea then thundering out again?

The joy and freedom a bike gives kids as they’re growing up was something I craved when I was a speccy-four-eyed brat with pudding basin haircut. I can see where they were coming from now, but my folks didn’t let me have a bike until I was 11 and had therefore supposedly gained a modicum of common sense.

So never one to be thwarted by the mere absence of two wheels I begged, stole and borrowed from my mates. I think give us a go of your bike was the only sentence I was capable of stringing together with any sense of enthusiasm when I was hovering around the age of six-and-three-quarters.

Back in the day though, we didn’t have bikes with stabilisers. They were three wheeler jobs with a curvy metal bin on the back complete with lid, in which you carted around your dolls (if you were girly), your footie, marbles, catapult, skipping rope and jumper or cardie if you got a bit hot while careening around.

My first run in with one of those was when I filched it from a pal and tried to ride it up a steep driveway. It did a spectacular somersault backwards with me still on it when my six-and-three-quarter year-old legs forgot how to push the pedals round.

A couple of years later I found a new best friend called Shirley Wilkins, but I only liked her for her bike. It was dark green with white mudguards and was a bit ancient, but no matter, because she got a new one for her birthday, so I could ride her old steed whenever I liked.

Or so I thought. Her mum and dad asked my mum and dad if they wanted to buy it for me for five bob, but as I wasn’t 11 yet and therefore still without any common sense they said no.

I was utterly bereft that my two-wheeler dream remained unfilled. For how could I explain that in the mornings I’d wake up and lie in bed willing a bike to be parked at the bottom of the stairs with my name on it just waiting for me to jump on and ride it away.

There was many a time I’d steel myself to creep along the landing and go and have a look, thinking that surely, this time, my dream would come true. But every time I plucked up courage to do so my hopes were dashed. Which meant I just had to nick Shirley’s old bike yet again…

I did it one time too often though and took off on a country lane adventure for miles without telling anyone where I was going so desperate was I to escape into the freedom of a two-wheeler world. Small wonder I was banned from going anywhere near Shirley’s bike, or anyone else’s for that matter.

Then suddenly I was 11 and somehow I’d got common sense for my birthday. My dad took me to Russell’s bike shop in York’s Clifford Street – now some chain Italian restaurant joint - and I became the overjoyed owner of a brand new metallic blue Rudge pedal cycle. It even had Sturmey Archer gears!

At last I felt I could fly. I was so happy I was unstoppable. So much so that if the Tour de Yorkshire had happened then, Team Sky wouldn’t have stood a chance…