It was a glorious St Martin’s summer that year, and it seemed to me, pedalling under the near-cloudless sky, with insects still buzzing and only the relative breeze of the still air hitting my freewheeling hands and face, that there could be nowhere better to enjoy such weather than Norfolk. As the patchwork of arable fields passed beside me, it was almost as though the ride were an end in itself, as if the football were incidental to the true pleasures of the open road and the countryside. But there was nothing quite like visiting a new ground, and the thought of our arrival at Carrow Road began to fill me with excitement too. And then I felt thirsty.

“When’s the next pint due, Sid?” I asked.

“Not for a good forty minutes, Gonby,” answered the chairman of the Chapel Ash Non-Motorized Mechanical Touring Party (CANMMTP), Sidney Dawes. “I’ll let you know.”

“And I’ll let you know right now,” said Tom McClarty, of Rupert Street, “That I’m thirsty, and so are the rest of ‘em.”

“Won’t be long, Tommy,” said the balding chairman. I was impressed at his stamina, able as he was to out-pedal younger and much slimmer men, but I was as annoyed as the others about his timetable. Licensing laws were pretty effective at limiting your intake in those days, even without Sid’s restrictive scheduling.

The previous day’s ride had been pretty dry, too, but there was some logic to that, as we needed to get to Shouldham Thorpe in time to pick up the the key to the windmill whose grainstore we would be sleeping in. Now we were making comfortable time and as a pub came into view on the horizon, the clamour for refreshment intensified, but the calls went unacknowledged but for a shake of Sid’s bald head.

I continued pedalling, though the beauty of the day, if beauty really is in the eye of the beholder, was quickly waning. Why had I chosen to come with the CANMMTP? It wasn’t as though Sid Dawes’ autocratic leadership came as any surprise: at the start of the season he had banned tandems from the Touring Party an hour into a ride to Ninian Park, insisting that the ban take immediate effect and forcing Peter and Erasmus Bowers to take a different route (the Bowers got lost and ended up watching a random match at Penydarren Park, Merthyr Tydfill while Wolves thrashed Cardiff 4-1). He had also tried to enforce a “horns-only, no-bells” policy (ultimately failing but expelling ten members in the attempt) and forwarded a motion to replace the modern CANMMTP rock’n’roll anthem, “Free-wheelin’”, with a waltz. “Free-wheelin’” had persisted, though, and these days was, sung, more often than not, as a call to resistance, a protest against Dawes’ dictatorial style.

I had originally planned to travel with the Flying Squadron, but the still weather forced them to cancel. The train was just too expensive. And so I’d accepted Tom McClarty’s invitation over dominos at the Noah’s Ark that Wednesay.

McClarty, incidentally, had formed the CANMMTP after becoming frustrated with the lack of organization within the Gallant and Admirable Pedallers, whose end-of-season forays had turned into interminable pub-crawls leading in some cases to emigration and disappearance. He’d approved, at first, of Sid’s desire to put furlongs ahead of firkins, but, as he himself put it, “even moderation has to be taken in moderation.”

Alas, Sid was not one to listen to advice. His quest to reach the horizon was uncompromising,. He insisted on being the only map-carrier, and, after slow progress on a trip to Nottingham in ‘63, caused by the CANMMTP stopping at one pub only to decide that a previous one looked better, he brought in a “no U-turns” rule by which turning back for any reason would result in immediate expulsion from the group. “Whatever you do,” McClarty had said to me that Wednesday evening, between mushroom clouds of Woodbine smoke, “Don’t look back – not even to talk. It simply isn’t worth it.”

One more, and then we’ll stay…

The grumbling continued, and the renditions of “Free Wheelin’” got more biting, until finally, on our way out of Briston, Sid finally gave a “slowing down or stopping” hand signal and we turned into a place called the Green Man. Following the sound of fifty cycles being all but hurled to the ground, the clamour to the bar gave the barmaid, a pretty young red-head (and the landlord’s daughter, as we were soon sternly advised) quite a start, and she was still shaking as she poured the first pint, which was passed along to Tom, who finished it before another could be pulled. Halfway down his next one, he pulled me to one side, as a group at the bar argued over the team’s change to gold shorts. “Finish that, get another one, and get Sid one an’all.”

“Sid’s got a full pint.”

“Get him another one.”

I did what Tom had told me and joined him at a window seat where he offered me a Woodbine.

“You have to know how to do it,” he said, taking a long draw on his cigarette, “After a pint, he’d be nagging us to get on. Get him a second, and we’re all right for a while.”

And so it was. We got onto our machines again at around half past one, feeling fine but also aware that we needed to make good progress to see the kick-off. Surprisingly, it was Sid Dawes that began belting out “Free-wheelin’”, and we followed him in a rather serpentine pattern along the pretty country lane.

A clearly-signalled, but nevertheless surprising left turn took us up a smaller lane some fifteen minutes later.

“Are you sure about this, Sid? It said ‘Heydon’ on the sign…”

“Who’s the map-carrier, Tom?”

“Don’t you think we should look at the map?”

“No need, Tommy, no need.”

Within a few minutes, the hedges gave out onto a picturesque village, with a well-house , an impressive church, the inevitable pub, and… a gate.

Jonny Farnebrook of Clifton Street tried it.

“It’s locked, he said.”

A middle-aged man in Wellington boots emerged from the Earle Arms and approached us. “Thar’s no through road, I’m afraid, gentlemarn,” he explained, “That’s the path to Heydon Hall.”

“No through road at all?” asked Tom.

“None. You’ll have to turn back.”

“But we don’t turn back,” said Sid Dawes, a little flushed. “There must be some path out of this place?”

“There is: the warn you came in on.”

“Come on, Sid,” said McClarty, “We ought to get a move on.”

“No U-turns, that’s the rule!” shouted Sid, impatiently.

“No U-turns, that’s the rule!” shouted Sid, impatiently.

“You’ve no choice, this time!”

“We don’t turn back!”

“We do!” said Tom, emphasizing the first word, “If you want to stay here there rest of your life, well, it’s not a bad little place…”

And with that, we mounted our cycles and pedalled away; by the time we hit Norwich there was already a new song, courtesy of Alfie Shears of Larches Lane.

And so the Swinging Pedals were born, bringing a fresh, young outlook to cycling to Wolves’ away games. It was assumed that the line about “Ronnie Allen’s stars” would have to be changed in time, but in fact by the time Bill McGarry took the helm, Tom McClarty had left to form the more conservative Lady Wulfrun’s Devoted Mounters, and the Swinging Pedals withered on their once-bountiful Norfolk bush. Sid Dawes stayed overnight at the Earle Arms and left in the morning (which didn’t count as turning back, apparently), and rejoined the ranks of the Gallant and Admirable Pedallers.

As for the Wolves, they secured the first of five consecutive victories against the Canaries, with a comfortable 3-0 victory. Come on me babbies!