Background to Pedal 2002Here is some background to "Pedal" - one of the biggest charity fund-raisers in Hong Kong "Old Faithful" is one and the same steel chassised kart which goes back to 1989! It has outlived several others. The joints are a little loose, the brakes are - well, shall we say not 100%, the chain is still made up of 2 1/2 racing chains - and it still makes just the same noise! We entered it as an extra this year - it wasn't in any of the prize categories - it was just there for any students/staff to take out and pedal for old times sake. The Old Girl (I hope no feminists are reading!) did us proud and covered 130 laps!You may have noticed on the pics that we have two lightweight "Karbyks". They looked good when we bought them last year with PTA funds, but they are not really up to 24 hour marathons. The bearings and the gears (21 - 3 chainrings x 7 rear sprocket! - completely unnecessary for Pedal Kart) gave us a lot of trouble. They did have the advantage that they were ready made and did not require the 100s of hours in the CDT Dept that was put in by students, some staff and especially parents, whose contributions were always much appreciated. The quality of the engineering is not very good for HK$22,000! We bought them last year from an Italian Company (www.karbyk.com). Several teams have purchased them, and there is now a special class for them in the race. We won the new "Karbyk Class" last year, but West Island School, who bought two this year, snatched it from us at the weekend. You can see the results on http://www.hkhpva.org/ - no doubt you'll be interested The event was held at what was the old Tamar basin - which has now been filled in and is used for exhibitions etc. The site will not be available next year - construction starts later this year on yet another office block -(stop press - I have just heard that it will be available for next year!). The Hong Kong Human Powered Vehicle Association, which now organizes the event in conjunction with the Round Table, will have to look for another site after next year. The Government Dept that now oversees Victoria Park is not very sympathetic to Charity Events so Pedal has not been there since 2000. They are much more interested in Flower Shows! The event was a fairly emotional one for me - and for Rosalie who has done a sterling job over the years keeping the pedallers fed and watered. It was of course our last, and to make matters worse, I wasn't able to participate as much a I would have liked to have done - I am recovering from a hernia operation at the moment. However, not to worry - We have lots of happy memories of such SIS events.
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