I turned 80 this year. I remember at 30 I felt that having left my youth behind I would soon be too old for demanding efforts such as running and cycling.

At every subsequent decade this sentiment became stronger, although physical evidence for my decline remained surprisingly elusive.

Having grown up in the Netherlands where, due to the absence of hills and ubiquitous cycle paths, cycling is a way of life which meant that the thought of having to let go of this healthy and pleasurable activity has become a growing concern.

Particularly when on my retirement I moved to south Shropshire where Housman’s ‘blue remembered hills’ increasingly became a cause for blue remembered language, when punishing gradients became too much of a challenge.

This is why my partner and I, three years ago, decided to switch to electric bikes. We opted for a British built model, equipped with long range 16Ah batteries.