 |  |  |
Dale who lives in Sherburn, is one of the original members of the mini bike club and the picture top left shows him riding at a club meeting on the parade square at Police HQ, Aykley Heads, Durham in March 2007 when he was twelve years old.
The picture on the right shows Dale meeting star HM Plant Honda riders Cal Crutchlow, Leon Haslam & Steve Brogan at Croft racing circuit in 2008 when the Mini Bike Club where invited to meet the stars by HM Plant chief executive Mr John Jones.
In June 2010 (picture left), Dale took to the roads with his first bike, courtesy of ACE motorcycle training proprietor Jim Rimmer who provided Dale with with a days CBT Training and Dale used his moped travelling to and from college for a year before progressing onto his current Honda CBR 400 on which he passed his motorcycle test earlier this year. Dale is now studying IT at the University of Sunderland and regularly uses his motorcycle to travel there.In May of this year Dale received the DCC Chairman's medal from Councillor Dennis Morgan on behalf of the BWMBC : http://bit.ly/KBNBcX
Dale then undertook a days BikeWise Training before joining the Durham Advanced Motorcyclists group and completing his training with a test conducted by retired Motorcycle Sgt and IAM Examiner Bob Brown on Friday.
Bob said “ I am really proud of what Dale has achieved in such a short time. When we first started the Mini Bike Club in 2007 Dale was just a young 12 yr old who came along to our first meeting with his grandparents. Dale and his grandad Dave have attended virtually every meeting of the club to date and it has been a pleasure to watch him grow into a fine motorcyclist. The ‘dream’ when we started the mini bike club was to give young local riders the opportunity to ride motorcycles lawfully and watch them progress onto the roads of County Durham. Dale has now attained one of the highest standards a civilian motorcyclist can achieve and he is only eighteen…. Hopefully Dale will be the first of many from the club to progress to this level. All this wouldn't have happened without the support of Durham County Council (Albert Nugent & Dennis Morgan), Durham Police (Jon Stoddart, Mike Barton & Michael Banks) , DAAC , HM Plant Ltd , ACE Motorcycle Training and Durham Advanced Motorcyclists who all believed in the mini bike club from its early days in 2007. It gave me a real buzz to follow Dale around on Friday and see the standard he has achieved and to tell him that he’d passed his advanced riding test”