On a short cobbled hill in south London in mid-summer, there appeared a sign. Taped underneath the Lewisham road name was a second, painted in brown and white, reading: ‘Mûr de Ned’.
Though the mysterious sign-erector still remains anonymous (unknown even to its namesake), it inspired the commentator and writer, Ned Boulting, to put on his own race, at the scene of the sign - the Never Strays Far (NSF) Hill Climb.
“Somebody's done a bit of sleuthing on my behalf and has stumbled across a post on Reddit, from somebody who's claiming to have done it but as far as that it's a bit of a mystery,” Boulting told Cycling Weekly this week.
“I'm kind of hoping that they out themselves at the hill climb and actually come and say it was me.”
For the mystery sign-maker, their action has had pretty creative consequences, with the Mûr de Ned Hill Climb set to take place up the short, cobbled hill on 18 October 2025.
“It's 40,000 millimetres long, or thereabouts,” Boulting said. “(I like to measure it in millimetres, because when you measure it in metres, it's too embarrassing).
“But you have to see this little stretch of pathway to understand why it shouts “hill”.
“So, for a start, it's not a road, it's just a little bit of footpath. But also, it's cobbled, it's quite steep, and it's got this railing that runs up the middle, which is basically sort of a natural grandstand to hold the thousands of people back who are going to be attending,” Bolting laughed.
Though this isn’t - for many reasons - your typical hill-climb. There will be three categories racers can enter into: walking, cycling and running.
“The walking, I can tell you, will be very, very strictly commissaire-d by me, according to Olympic rules. I'm going to be running alongside the walkers with a whistle and a yellow card just in case there's any infringements. And I will mete out time penalties and possibly just excuse people for persistent cheating.”
And for those who want to compete on-bike? They will choose from an array of bikes restored by XO Bikes, a charity who train ex-offenders in the art of bike mechanics. The event will also be raising money for the charity.
“They're giving people a lifeline when they get out of prison that simply wouldn't be there otherwise. So it's unimaginably good work. And the object of the hill climb is to raise a bit of money for XO Bikes, but it's also to spread the word - to get it out there in the London community what XO Bikes is all about.”
Boulting, the soon-to-be ferocious race official, will also be lining up at the start line.
“I think I'm going to do the walking,” he mused. “I might give everything a go…well, I might take a look at the weather first - I don’t really fancy riding up it in the wet.”
I ask him whether he might have an edge over his competitors, as they prepare to race up his home-hill.
“I will have an edge. It's all about local knowledge, but I'm perfectly happy to exploit that to my advantage. I think that's totally legitimate."
Game on.
The 50 available race entries sold out in 48 hours, but Boulting still encourages people to turn up to watch, or to come to compete when entries open up after some “inevitable no-shows.”
“In theory there are 50 entrants, but I might stretch it a bit, because the great thing is, I can do what I want.
“There will be trophies. There will be a podium - I've drawn a bit of inspiration from the Vuelta podium - it’ll be a lot of fun.”
You can find out more about the race here.
