Kigali Rides has embarked on a journey to help people make sports part of their lives, particularly for cycling fans and others who would wish to exercise in a fun way. Kigali Rides is an initiative that promotes cycling sports in the community as well as aiming at promoting NMT (non-motorized transport) in long-term. Riding a bicycle has been associated with additional health benefits besides just the physical part that comes along with it. According to Yves Mutsinzi, the founder of the initiative, their main target is seeing Rwandans adopt cycling in their daily life and taking adventure in visiting various places around. “Cycling is one of the best sports, we believe that it’s by riding a bicycle that one gets to know better the contours of the country, since you have to sweat up the hills and coast them down,” he says. As an initiative that promotes cycling in the community, Mutsinzi says they do this by making it fun to ride for everyone so that it becomes a hobby. Kigali Rides offer many services including; Bike Tours, which takes place every Sunday, bike training classes, bike rentals, and bike repair services. Yves Mutsinzi, the founder of Kigali Rides. The group started operations in August 2020. Speaking to Weekend Sport on Wednesday, Mutsinzi noted that the ongoing lockdown in Kigali halted the activities, but hopes they will resume soon as the movement restrictions are lifted. Besides, he says another idea as to why they are focusing on bike riding is to ensure Rwandans are ready by 2025 as the country is bidding to host the world International Cycling Union (UCI) Road World Championships – the biggest cycling event in the world. “The UCI World Road Championship is a huge competition that will attract a big number of tourists. Having many Rwandans with cycling as a hobby will boost not only the sport and cycling tourism activities in Rwanda, but also promote non-motorized transport”. How did Kigali rides come into existence? Kigali Rides officially started operations five months ago with the main goal of promoting both cycling tourism and healthy lifestyles in Rwanda. Mutsinzi revealed that the idea was inspired by the City of Kigali’s initiative of ‘Car-Free Day’ where select main roads in the capital are vacated for a few (four) hours for mass exercises twice a month. “I looked into this and realized that although participants are allowed to run, ride or do any other activities of their choice, when it comes to biking, not everyone has or owns a bike yet some of them would love to take part in bike riding,” he pointed out. Because of this, Mutsinzi says, they sought to facilitate such individuals with bicycles for rent and use them to do sports. From there, that is where other activities came into existence. As of today, the initiative has so far done 15 bike tours and 11 members have joined the bike classes. The initiative so far has 3 routes; the Car-Free Day, Tour to the North, and Tour to the East. “We are seeing many people embracing the sport, and this has been a great motivation for us. For the riding classes, it’s also picking up and people are more eager to add a new skill or item to their list of hobbies,” he adds. “In the long-term, we want to see Rwandans adopt cycling in their everyday lives; be it adventure, sports, or transport.”
