British touring

an Anglophile's
dream come true

The NCU, founded in 1878, was Britain's first cycling association for regulating bike races. It banned open road racing (think: alleycats) in 1890. The British League of Racing Cyclists, which opposed the ban, eventually merged with the NCU in 1959, creating today's British Cycling Federation.


Cycling was Britain's premier magazine for much of the early and mid 20th Century.

This elevations chart comes from Bartholomew's Touring Atlas of the British Isles, 1923.