For the second time in 2014 Ride UK BMX has been instrumental in recovering stolen bikes which BMX’ers have had nicked! First Billy Prendergast got his back thanks to this post and subsequent communication with allies in France. Then just last week a lad called Tom Thickett of Harrogate had his set up stolen from outside Evans in Leeds. Thanks to our FB group and a sharp eyed member called Ronan it’s now back in safe hands. Here’s the full story…

“So basically yesterday at like 5 o’clock me, and two mates Henry and Ollie were in B&Q for some reason… And I got tagged in the post about my stolen bike on the RideUK FB Group from a guy called Ronan. He uploaded a photo of my bike in a Onestop in Armley, Leeds! So had a little chat with him and got the address so we were like fuck it, let’s go have a look. Dropped their bikes at mine and shot off to Armley, went into the Onestop and just asked Ronan (who works there) about the kid that had my bike and if he knew him etc. After that we went and got a pizza from some questionable take away and sat in the car and just watched that area for a while like some crap American cop show stake out. We chucked the pizza boxes and went for a little cruise around the lovely Estate near the shop and by chance I saw some little scragg head hanging out a door on the first street we went down stood over my bike out the corner of my eye. So we drove abit further up the street. Henry got out had a fag and a wander past the house and we picked him up around the corner, didn’t hear or see anything so we went back and parked next the shop and literally just as we were about to leave back for Harrogate, we went for another quick look past the kids house and just before it we saw him and he wandered over to the car and told us he’d dropped the bike off at the shop. He was as sound as a massive chav could be tbh, so went back to the shop and Ronan just presented me my bike fully intact which was fucking rad! Basically turns out the kid that had it, his mate stole it just to ride back from town on and sold it to him for £20. So Ronan paid him £20 for it then I gave him the money back and I went home in shock with my fucking bike back!” – Tom Thickett

The power of social media prevails! If you get your bike stolen hit us up in our Facebook group and we’ll always do what we can to help get them back. Lets try and double the return rate for 2015.