Sunday 30th July, High Wycombe, Team Buzz was granted an audience with BBC TV & Radio presenter, sports officianado and all round top chap John Inverdale. John is a patron of C.R.Y. and has given his valuable support to the charity for the last three years. Despite his busy schedule and very little notice he agreed to meet up with us, and so Nick and Mark Dee-Shapland along with Nick Branch loaded up the Buzz wagon with the bicycletes and made their way to Wycombe for the meet.
Seemingly like everyone involved with the charity, John Inverdale became aware of it’s work through a personal tragedy. “A friend of mine died on the Rugby field, he suffered anunexpected heart failure. His son died of the same condition 10 years later.” As with the majority of those whose loss is attributed to Sudden Adult Death Syndrome, a simple heart scan could have identified the problem, and it is for this reason that C.R.Y. and its patrons, such as John Inverdale, promote such testing, “Long Term it should become mandatory for young sportsmen and women.”
John’s career in television and radio has given him the opportunity to meet some of the world’s top athletes, and with Sunday being no exception, he had this message of support for us – “I wish the guys the very best of luck, especially as one of the bikes looks like the one I had at university in the 70’s.”
As if giving up his personal time on a Sunday was not enough, John has also offered to sponsor Team Buzz personally, though he did have some words of warning for the boys “The hardest part of the trip would be passing the thousands of fantastic french bars and not stopping at any of them.” Wise words from Mr Inverdale, which may perhaps be most relevant to the team’s Irish contingent.
