CYCLING is at the hub of everyday life for a Barnton family who have been brought together by the sport for generations.

The Fearon family, including dad Dave, mum Caroline, sons Jack and Connor and daughter Katie, would not exist were it not for the passion for cycling that is in their blood.

Caroline’s mum and dad were brought together through the sport and it was cycling that brought Caroline and Dave together.

“I’m from a cycling family – my parents met through cycling. I’m one of five and four of us race,” Caroline said.

“We grew up with mum and dad racing and being dragged out on a Sunday morning all over the place.

“I went on club runs from an early age, was racing in my early teens and did a lot of tandem racing with my dad and time trials.

“There was a group of us who went out to evening events and Dave was one of the crowd, so we met through cycling.”

Dave, time trial secretary for Weaver Valley Cycling Club, started cycling when he was 13 with a friend whose dad was in a cycling club.

“We used to go out on Sunday mornings and got battered,” he said.

“We met another couple of lads. We were 13 and these two were 18 or 19 years old.

“They would batter it off into the hills of north Manchester and go off and leave us.

“We had these big heavy steel bikes and no waterproofs or money.”

Caroline took a break from cycling in her 20s, when she and Dave started a family, and Dave stopped for about 12 years in 1995, when his job involved a lot of travelling.

Dave said: “We got into running, marathon running and half marathons, but then got fed up of getting so many injuries.”

Caroline said: “With Dave getting back into cycling, I got back on a bike, too, and we started going to the velodrome.”

It was track cycling at the velodrome, in Manchester, that inspired Jack, 19, and Connor, 16, to get into cycling about four years ago, along with their sister Katie, although she has not been bitten by the same cycling bug as the rest of the family.

The brothers, also members of Weaver Valley Cycling Club along with Dave and Caroline, enjoy competitive racing at weekends and take part in 10, 25 and 50 mile time trial events.

Caroline said: “We all time trial. Dave is the fastest but Jack could be if he trained.

“Both of the boys have got a lot of natural ability, but they only go out on bikes to race.

“It’s nice that we enjoy cycling as a family, because we can all enter an event and go out together.

“And there’s also the competitive side – I’m catching Jack and Connor up now,” she joked.