VeloUK

Welcome to VeloUK! – Serving the sport of cycling in Britain | By Larry Hickmott

Back in March 2011, the third chapter of my work serving the sport of cycling began with VeloUK.net

The first thing I must do is thank everyone at the time who made this possible. From Mary Gill and Jonathan Beckett who helped me through the early stages of learning how to create a Word Press website, to the sponsors many of whom are still with me, to all those who have encouraged me to do this and the well wishers on Twitter and Facebook (far to numerous to mention all by name!).

Since the late 90s, I have been covering the sport of cycle racing in Britain. It all started by accident with me wanting to learn HTML programming for the software company Digita who I worked for at the time. That was EchelonVelo. Those who have been round long enough, remind me that there was a printed version as well! I was then headhunted, always a nice thing for the CV that, by Peter Cossins (former editor of ProCycling and writes books) who at the time in 2011 worked for Rivals.net and EchelonVelo went commercial along with another website inspired by Peter, the Daily Peloton. There, I worked hard and was rewarded by meeting lots of people and built up a large and loyal following, many of whom I am lucky enough to still know today.

Rivals though, for whatever reason, decided to get rid of a lot of niche sports and that included cycling. Before I could really worry about what was going to happen to EchelonVelo though, I was headhunted again, this time, by Stuart Hallam, then a member of the board of British Cycling. A meeting took place at Luton airport, all very grand I thought at the time, and I was soon working for British Cycling part time.

At the time of joining, the following appeared in the UK Sport Magazine (May 2002) which shows the value that British Cycling placed on my arrival at that time. “Another site well worth a visit is the excellent www.britishcycling.org.uk, recently relaunched by British Cycling, which contains a wealth of the up-to-date news from the sport, including a comprehensive results service, photo galleries and interviews.”

So, between 2001 and 2011, I was doing that for the governing body of the sport, British Cycling. However, that organisation changed the moment that Sky became involved and in order to get back to the grass roots and closer to the sport I have the same passion for now that I did when I was 14, I resigned when they wanted to change my contract and take me away from the sport. So many of you had been in touch to say how much they missed the old EchelonVelo and thus, VeloUK was born.

A shorter, snappier name which is quick to type out was given to the site (IE, VeloUK) and after my last job for British Cycling, the Para-Cycling Worlds in Italy 2011 (could not have wanted for a better send off!), I got to work on the website that now sits before you. Since then, I have covered upwards of 50 to 90 race days a year, taking pictures, getting interviews and seeing people who have over the last two decades became friends. The website combined with the  VeloUK social media, sees updates seven days a week, 364 days a year concentrating on the domestic sport but also not forgetting the international racing as well.

Welcome to my world. Enjoy! 

HOW TO ADVERTISE ON VELOUK
CONTACT: email larryhickmott@hotmail.com
Be part of a winning team, a leading website in the UK  with 16.5 million page views,  1.6 million visits annually

** The artwork to be provided by the advertiser. In some cases, this can be done by VeloUK but may incur a charge depending on the time required to produce said artwork.

*** Payment per month at the time of booking.

Example Stats (monthly, peak months)

Unique Visitors 77,142 | Total Visitors per month 203,979 |  Page Views: 677,003 | Most visits in a day: 12,160

SOCIAL MEDIA
Facebook 27,000 | TwitterX (2 accounts) 41,000 plus  | Instagram 6,100 | Youtube: approaching 1,000 subscribers

Banners & Cost

RIGHT HAND SIDE MENU 24/7

— SMALL: 300 pixel wide, 125 high (JPG/PNG/Gif (multi frame)) £100 per month.

— MEDIUM: 300 pixel wide, 250 pixel high (JPG/PNG/Gif (multi frame)) £150 per month.

— LARGE: 300 pixel wide x 500 pixels high, (JPG/PNG/Gif (multi frame)) £200 per month

— MID-STORY: Mid story adverts, ie, a 480 pixel wide x 250 pixel high (negotiable) advert which will sit within each story added (every posting) – £200 per month

Discounts available for bookings of six months or longer.

UNAVAILABLE AT THE MOMENT
— WRAP (Skin, area left and right of the website background) £150 per month – Currently un-available on all pages .

When a user displays the front page, the contracted Ribble Cycles wrap will be shown and all others, Santini is shown.

— Website Banner: £600 per month Under contract at the moment with Brother UK.

FOC EXTRAS for ADVERTISERS

Advertorial: Those choosing to advertise can supplement their adverts with advertorial features (max of one per week) supplied by the advertiser where readers can get interesting and useful information on an advertiser’s products or maybe you have a racing team that you support that you would like to submit a feature on.

Facebook: When I see suitable posts on Facebook from advertisers, I share them on my Facebook page

Twitter: The account for the advertiser will be monitored and tweets from said advertiser will be retweeted as and when possible.

PHONE: 0788 756 7879 (no signal here in the office so message and I can call back)

Twitter Accounts:  | VeloUK – 28.5k | AussieLarry – 13.4k |  Facebook – 27K followers | Instagram 6.1K

Write for Us/Your Blog

VeloUK is a website that belongs to the cycling community, is here to serve that community, and we encourage everyone who has something to contribute, to do so for the greater good of the sport. VeloUK is the hub of cyclesport in the UK and whether it’s a few pictures from a race, a personal blog of what it was like to attend a bike race or a report or set of results. VeloUK would like your help in bringing that to everyone in cycling.

CONTACT: email larryhickmott@hotmail.com

Stay in touch with VeloUK on the Twitter or Facebook

PHOTOGRAPHS
The high resolution digital files equivalent to the low resolution ones which appear on Flickr (VeloShooter)/Facebook/Instagram can be used to print from and can be purchased from VeloUK. All I ask is for a donation of your choosing. To purchase a digital file, please use the DONATE button at the bottom of your VeloUK website (left hand side) to pay for the items required and then email  me your order. Please send the CONFIRMATION number that will be emailed to you from PayPal with your order.

Commercial Use of Photographs
The high resolution digital files equivalent to the low resolution ones which appear on Flickr (VeloShooter)/Facebook/Instagram can be purchased from VeloUK for commercial use such as advertising etc. Cost is £50 per image. Payment as above.

Email: larryhickmott@hotmail.com | Phone 0788 756 7879