Interview with Allen Millyard

We took a road trip down to the Forest of Dean to meet up with Allen Millyard and his sons Stephen and Sam and check out their latest creation, the Hyper Ride Suspension system.

It was a baking hot day in the midst of a heatwave when we rolled up to Pedalabikeaway in the Forest of Dean to meet up with the Millyards. Hot as hell, humid like a jungle, but dusty dry on the trails, it hardly seemed the ideal conditions for riding mountain bikes or motor bikes. A float down the river Wye seemed much more inviting. But since they’d made the hour and a half trip – Allen on a motorbike, his sons in their pickup truck – we were committed. Some obligatory mechanical faffing later, and we sweated our way up the fire road in the Forest of Dean for a quick descent down before catching up with Allen for a chat.

It was a hairy ride down for our US rider Fahzure as he borrowed Stephen’s bike – brakes still in UK orientation – and followed Sam blind down trails that might have been called Sheepskull and Ski Run, but on the tail of Sam went by in such a blur that it’s hard to be sure. Drops, ruts, turns and enough roots to make us glad of the dry conditions, we emerged at the bottom to find Allen and sit down for a chat in the shade before he headed home to cool off. As well as making things in his shed (oh how we wish we had arranged to see in there) he’s busy shooting a series of ‘Find It Fix It Flog It’ so this was his second day out in the heatwave in a row. Maybe he really was tired, or maybe he had a plan for whipping up some super efficient new cooling system and he was eager to get home to the lathe?

Quietly spoken, with his reading glasses on his head, he looks more like a sound engineer at a Stones gig than he does a mad inventor. And while he might not set much store by technical drawings, elaborate plans and mathematics, he’s no madman. He turns the idea that he has in his head into a finished creation using his hands rather than any computer model, but there’s plenty of thought going on in that head. With his sons riding the suspension systems he’s created, he’s safety conscious and has built them to withstand all the pressure that their construction – and the riding they’re out through – can throw at them. Watch the video to learn all about how Allen made the system and what he’s planning to do next.

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