Somehow, another Bike the UK for MS season has come and gone.
The bikes have been packed away, the support vehicles have stopped criss-crossing the country and our final teams have made their way home.
And when we look back at everything that happened in 2026, there is plenty worth celebrating.
Across four very different cycling adventures, our teams filled 40 rider places and collectively covered 15,215 miles on roads, gravel tracks, mountain passes and everything in between.
Along the way, our riders raised an incredible £48,500 for Bike the UK for MS. But, as ever, the numbers only tell a small part of the story.
Four Very Different Adventures
Our season began with the biggest challenges we offer: John O’Groats to Land’s End.
More than 1,000 miles from the very north of Scotland to the south-west tip of England is a pretty serious way to spend two weeks, and our small JOGLE team took it all in their stride.
From there came the North Coast 500, with another team heading into the Scottish Highlands for 548 miles of dramatic scenery, big climbs and plenty of familiar Bike the UK for MS faces.
One of the things we particularly loved about this year’s NC500 was seeing so many returning riders, including alumni from both Bike the UK for MS and Bike the US for MS.
Later in the summer, Lôn Las Cymru took another team down the length of Wales before we finished with something rather different. Four days of gravel and off-road riding on the Royal Chilterns Way.
Four rides. Four very different challenges. And proof that there are plenty of ways to Bike the UK for MS.
A Slightly Warmer British Summer Than Expected
Of course, not everything went exactly as planned. We normally spend quite a lot of time preparing riders for rain.
In 2026, several of our teams instead found themselves dealing with some of the hottest temperatures of the British summer.
Long days in the saddle became a little more challenging, water stops became even more important and our Route Leaders once again had to adapt plans as conditions changed.
Whether it’s Scottish rain, Welsh mountains or unexpected summer heat, one thing we’ve learnt over the years is that the weather rarely seems interested in what we planned.
Thankfully, our teams are pretty good at adapting too.
A Growing DofE Community
One of the developments we’re most excited about from 2026 has been the continued growth of our Duke of Edinburgh’s Award Gold Residential programme.
This year, 16 young people completed their Gold Residential with Bike the UK for MS, including a particularly large group on the Royal Chilterns Way.
For many of them, it meant arriving at the start of a cycling trip without knowing any of the people they would spend the next few days alongside.
By the finish, they’d shared long days on the bike, rest stops, evenings together, plenty of hills and probably more discussions about snacks than anybody expected.
That’s exactly what a residential experience should be. We love seeing DofE participants become part of the wider Bike the UK for MS community, and we’re excited to continue developing that side of the programme.
Cycling Beyond Our Tours
Our work on bikes wasn’t limited to the four main rides either. Thanks to grant funding from Sport England and the National Lottery Community Fund, we were able to continue developing our Accessible Cycling programme.
During the year, we delivered seven Accessible Cycling sessions across Bath, Swindon, Portsmouth and the Forest of Dean, helping create opportunities for people to experience cycling in a way that works for them.
It’s an area of our work that we’re particularly keen to keep building.
Our big cycling challenges will always be an important part of Bike the UK for MS, but accessible and inclusive cycling gives us another way of using bikes to bring people together and make a difference much closer to home.
Some Brilliant Fundraising
Behind every trip is a huge amount of work by riders before they ever reach the start line. Fundraising can sometimes feel every bit as daunting as the cycling itself, so it has been brilliant to see what our riders achieved this year.
On JOGLE, Glynn Alner raised £3,250, making him our highest individual fundraiser of the 2026 season and bringing in more than double the expected fundraising target.
On the Royal Chilterns Way, Michael Butland raised £1,180 – more than four times his required minimum.
Those are two standout examples, but they sit alongside dozens of fundraising pages, donations, conversations with friends and family, workplace collections and all the other little efforts that combined to make up that £48,500 total.
And our alumni community continued to play a huge part too. Away from the trip fundraising itself, alumni raised or donated another remarkable £12,700 during the year.
A particular thank you has to go to Paul Campbell and Adam Williams for their continued generosity and support of Bike the UK for MS every year. Seeing people stay involved long after their own ride finishes means a huge amount to us.
The Team Behind the Teams
There are four people who deserve a particularly big thank you when we look back at 2026.
Aimee, Amelia, Niamh and Ava joined us as placement students and, for much of the year, were our only physical staff presence here in the UK. Calling them placement students sometimes doesn’t quite explain how much responsibility that actually involves.
They helped prepare trips, communicate with riders, organise equipment, manage vehicles, work behind the scenes and then head out onto the road to help deliver the rides themselves.
When something needed sorting, more often than not one of them was involved. They were asked to take on a lot, and the season simply wouldn’t have happened in the same way without them.
Thank you to all four of you for everything you put into Bike the UK for MS. And there’s something quite fitting about where our placement programme is taking us next.
From Placement Student to Programme Coordinator
Two years ago, Charlotte Austin joined Bike the UK for MS through that same university placement programme.
Since then, she has route led six UK trips, spent two summers helping lead cross-country adventures with Bike the US for MS, graduated from Loughborough University and apparently decided that she still hasn’t had enough of us.
This autumn, Charlotte returned to join the permanent team as our Programme Coordinator.
Having somebody who understands the organisation behind the scenes, knows our trips firsthand and has now experienced both the UK and US programmes feels like a really exciting step for us.
Charlotte will help with trip planning and delivery, work with riders as they prepare for their adventures and help us continue sharing the best ideas and experiences between Bike the UK for MS and Bike the US for MS.
We’re incredibly excited to have her back.
Making the Fundraising Matter
Of course, everything our riders raise ultimately comes back to why we do this in the first place. Alongside our Accessible Cycling work, the Board has committed further charitable support from this year’s fundraising.
We’re currently speaking with existing and potential partners about where that support can have the greatest impact, including local MS organisations we’ve worked with previously and some of the new relationships we’ve developed over the last year.
We don’t want to announce those partnerships before those conversations have happened properly, but we’re looking forward to sharing much more about where the 2026 fundraising is going in the months ahead.
For us, that connection between the cycling and people living with MS remains the most important part.
On to 2027
And now attention begins to turn towards another season. In 2027, we’re planning to bring back the four adventures that made up this year’s calendar: John O’Groats to Land’s End, the North Coast 500, Lôn Las Cymru and the Royal Chilterns Way.
We’re excited to continue growing the DofE side of our programme, welcoming more new riders into the community and, hopefully, seeing plenty of familiar faces returning for another adventure.
We also head into the year with Charlotte joining the permanent team and a new group of placement students taking up the baton from those who helped make 2026 possible.
There is plenty we want to keep improving. But there is also plenty from this year that we are incredibly proud of.
Thank You
So, once again, thank you.
To every rider who decided that cycling across Britain, around the Highlands, down Wales or through the Chilterns sounded like a sensible way to spend their holiday.
To our Route Leaders and placement students who made those rides possible.
To every donor who supported a rider.
To our hosts who gave teams somewhere to sleep.
To our DofE participants, Accessible Cycling partners and local MS communities.
And to every alumnus who continues to support us long after their own ride has finished.
£48,500 raised including Gift Aid. 15,215 rider-miles. 16 DofE Gold Residential participants. Seven Accessible Cycling sessions. Four very different adventures.
Thank you for being part of 2026. We can’t wait to see where 2027 takes us.
