The BBC came down to the workshop on Tuesday to film a segment for a programme about the National Lottery Awards.
They told us that they were filming such segments for each of the finalists and that it was nothing to get excited about.
Cameras duly arrived, volunteers duly gathered, and we all tinkered about fixing bikes in the background while Jem rabbited on about our work to camera.
Then the camera crew slapped on some loud pop music (‘for background,’ they said) as Jem and Ali fiddled about with the brakes on a knackered old Raleigh.
The song ended and, weirdly, was back-announced by Roman Kemp (pictured above) from the Capital Breakfast Show.
This is very strange, we all thought – it’s 1 o’clock in the afternoon – but carried on fulfilling our role as background artistes.
Then Roman on the radio said something extremely weird: ‘And the winners are… The Bike Project!’
Cameras still rolling, we look at one another, utterly confused. ‘Is this real?’
Finally, Roman himself bounds in, all smiles and handshakes, and the penny drops.
The Bike Project, your Bike Project, have really really won the National Lottery Award for Best Charity project!
‘Was that a surprise?’ Roman gleams. For everyone (apart from our cunning Marketing Manager) the answer was a resounding HELL YES, swiftly followed by DO WE HAVE ANY CHAMPAGNE?
But, of course, winning this award wasn’t a total surprise. After all, we already knew that we had the greatest platoon of volunteers in the history of volunteering, as well as an awesome staff team. Now it’s just confirmed.
THANK YOU.
If you’d like to get involved with volunteering for The Bike Project, we’ve got a fancy new system that makes sure you get the skills you need to fix bikes like a pro. Awesome.
