Two proud Aberdonians, two world‑class résumés and one slightly hair‑brained idea. One of us spent two decades staring down the barrel of a rifle for Team Scotland and Great Britain, winning medals at four different Commonwealth Games. In Melbourne 2006, NS took silver in the 50 m rifle prone pairs, followed by a golden prone‑pairs in Delhi four years later plus bronze in the three‑positions pairs, and eventually an individual silver in the Gold Coast in 2018. Along the way, a British record by shooting 599/600 at a World Cup in Munich and, according to Wikiwand, Neil has more shooting records than a cowboy saloon ;)

Yet somehow he agreed to swap a rifle butt for handlebars and pilot a tandem – despite never having sat on one before. If you think hitting a 10‑ring at 50m is tough, wait until he tries to avoid Glasgow potholes for 90 km!

The other half of this double‑act is Paralympic legend and class act, Neil Fachie. Born in Aberdeen with retinitis pigmentosa, he originally sprinted for Great Britain but switched to para‑cycling after the Beijing 2008 Paralympics. Within a year he was smashing world records in tandem sprint and kilo events with pilots Barney Storey and Craig MacLean (another crazy Scot) and in London 2012 he and Storey set yet another world record before winning Paralympic gold. Fachie has since collected more titles than a second‑hand bookshop: double gold at the 2014 Glasgow Commonwealth Games and again at the Gold Coast in 2018 (matching the Scottish record of four Commonwealth golds), a world‑record‑breaking kilometre in Mexico, and time‑trial gold at Tokyo 2020.

The honours list even had to upgrade him – from MBE in 2013 to OBE in 2022. On the track he’s used to professional pilots; on our charity ride he’ll have a shooter who thinks cadence is a type of rifle bolt.

We’ve known each other for years through Aberdeen Sports Personality of the Year events going back 20+years, and of course as part of the wonderful family that is "Team Scotland", so the banter comes naturally. Expect plenty of “are we nearly there yet?”, “watch out for that pothole!” and jokes about how the only “target” we’re chasing now is the finish line. Neil F. might wonder why his pilot keeps checking the wind like he’s on a range, and Neil S. will find out that a tandem sprint involves a bit more pedalling than squeezing a trigger. Rest assured though, the competitiveness is still there – if there’s a Strava segment on the route we’ll probably go for it!

All jokes aside, we’ll be mounting the saddles together for the first time, with no joint training, and riding Sir Chris Hoy’s Tour de 4 red route (90 km) to help contribute towards the fantastic goal of £1 million for cancer charities.

Each rider has to enter themselves and not sure how many will be doing it on tandem other than Neil's phenomenal wife, Lora Fachie and her equally talented former International pilot, Fiona Duncan.

I have personally chosen to support Prostate Scotland. It’s a serious issue, and we’re hoping our madcap switch from rifles and velodromes to a wobbly tandem will make you smile and dig deep. Please sponsor us – whether you’re supporting a friend who once shot 599/600 or a Paralympic icon with more medals than sense, your donation will help people facing prostate cancer get the support they need. In return we promise plenty of laughs, a few sore legs and, hopefully, no need for stabilisers.

Thank you!