What lasts long finally becomes good.
It's not as easy as it seems. Especially not when an international stages- race has to be organised. The organisation team is working flat out to organise the traditional event at the end of August.
As the organisational director of the kids-tour for many years, I also try to act in the best interests of the children. Those who know me know that I am an honest person. In Berlin and in German cycling, the political intrigues that often seem to be more important do not determine my actions, and they certainly don't make me deviate from my path. If that was attempted, then I also said goodbye to a coaching position that was so important to me and went other and now successful ways with my racers and the national cycling league Wheel Devils.
For more than a decade, I have organised the International kids-tour with a small organisational team outside the Berlin Cycling Federation, most recently in 2019. Anyone who looked behind the scenes saw that the BRV only played a financial role here. With the kids-tour, too, I want to go new ways, successful ways, free of political influences and also with former companions.
"A new start in 2022 is particularly important after the Corona crisis and for the promotion of young cyclists." For months I have therefore been trying to reach a consensus with the board of the Berlin Cycling Federation on the organisation. The conditions imposed on me during talks are completely unsuitable for my work, also and especially in the spirit of the founder Jens- Holger Mey and his wife. The letter of intent I submitted was rejected by the BRV. A cooperation is not favoured by the BRV, the chance for a new beginning in favour of children's and junior racing in Berlin is obviously interpreted differently. In short, my efforts after many negotiations and even more correspondence with the BRV did not work out as hoped in the end, and now it is time to act.
"Because young cyclists get a good chance to promote themselves through such a unique tour. "
In order to organise an international kids tour, to restructure it and to set it up in a more modern way, it is above all important to have reliable and proven partners. Thus, doers, specialists, clubs, sponsors, the women's national cycling league team Wheel Divas and the national cycling league team Juniors Wheel Devils joined forces to form ARGE kids-tour under my leadership. We are united by the goal of making the tour an experience in the spirit of Jens-Holger.
My organisation team of the ARGE kids tour is in full swing with the preparations. Competition and event planning, traffic safety, marketing, finances such as funding applications, the crowd-funding launched in 2019 - everything has to be covered. The traditional routes are clear, small details are being revised and then it's time to apply for funding.
A new website had to be set up overnight. The previous one was, for whatever reason, neither accessible for the supervisor nor for me. It has been permanently switched off for months. With it, important historical data was lost. Here, too, the challenge is to procure, collect, sift and process the lost material and put it online. Another new feature will be a digital registration tool, which will go online in the next few days. But there is already a lot to find on the site.
Soon there will be more news in the blog.
M. Lemke