Remembering Craig Perry

One of ABC Centreville’s founder members, renowned cheeky bon viveur and lover of orange Craig Perry sadly died in August 2020, after battling health issues for some time. His brother Stuart wrote this celebration of Craig. If you have any memories of Craig to share, cycling or otherwise, please use the comment section below.

“We really didn’t know how to start this tribute to Craig, so we’ll pinch a line from Prince, ‘Dearly beloved, we have gathered here today to celebrate this thing called life’. Today isn’t a sad day, today is the day to celebrate the life of our Craig. He wouldn’t have wanted to look down to see his family and friends mourning his passing! He would have wanted us to party, smile and rejoice in a life well lived. As well as seeing you all wearing Orange.

Craig was many things to many people. He was the eldest son of Margaret and Gordon, and as we used to say, their favourite son! Unfortunately our parents are not here on the advice of the medical experts. Craig was our eldest brother, one who we both respected and looked up to at different times in our lives and for different reasons.

He was a loving Uncle and Godfather to Dermot, and Uncle to Calum.

Nephew to Catherine and cousin to Robert and Ian.

Brother in Law to Nicola, Heather and previously Carmel

He became the adopted foster brother to Oggy, Nigel, Andy and Nutty,

Craig was a friend, partner, training colleague and confidant to many.

Growing up with Craig was very colourful and eye-opening, especially for two impressionable younger brothers. His hair, the peroxide blonde mohican which became his trademark in the 80’s and he tried to maintain this look all through his life. His taste in clothes was often way out there, but then it was the post punk and new romantic era! Whatever clothes he bought, Ian and I always borrowed. We never looked as good as he did, but we didn’t care – we were emulating our big brother. He didn’t mind us borrowing his clothes, even the ones he’d bought that day, hung up ready to hit the clubs of Manchester. It wasn’t ‘first up best dressed’ in our house, it was ‘first back from training, best dressed’.

Craig’s taste in music influenced us and so many of our friends. His love of local bands like The Chameleons, The Buzzcocks and The Smiths to name but a few influenced many of us and he revelled in the delights of the Madchester scene.

Craig and cycling

He was an avid cyclist (he had to be – he was born into a cycling family), being both a participant and spectator. I think it was his only one regret as he got older, that due to his health he couldn’t ride his bike and experience the craic again.

It’s fair to say that Craig enjoyed the touring, training and social aspects of cycling more than the racing, There are plenty tales we could regale you with of him ripping the legs off Spanish pros in Majorca, then them looking at him in dismay whilst he drank several wines and ate fish and chips. Or here reducing the local ‘big hitters’ to tears on the evening Chaingangs, then after a quick shower he would be dancing the night away at Pips or Legends with beer in hand. He would go to the Isle of Man cycling week every year, where he would become a legend – not for his cycling we hasten to add.

Along with our parents he was a founding member of ABC Centreville. He became a father figure to lots of the younger riders and often took them under his wing, many of them went on to represent England or turn professional. This generosity of his time and passion for cycling carried on in later life, donating one of his bikes to the club only a few months before his death, so that someone less fortunate than him was able to go out and experience the pleasure of riding a bike.

A few of his proudest moments, which he felt part of as he’d been there training in the wind and the rain with them, were brother Ian winning his first road race – I’ve never seen a smile as big, you’d have thought he had come first; and when (our) Nigel Bishop wore the yellow jersey in the Milk Race.

Craig had many friends in cycling, across the country and from abroad, this is borne out by the number of messages of condolence posted on social media. Craig loved to travel, in fact it’s in the Perry blood. So back in the early 90’s it was no surprise that after I’d returned from satisfying my own wanderlust he decided to go off around the world.

World travel

He didn’t get far, he arrived in Thailand and straightaway met up with Jan (Atkinson), from New Zealand. Jan was later to become his long term partner, soul mate and business partner. I think they travelled together in Thailand for 8 weeks before Jan had to return to NZ for work. Craig being Craig said he’d carry on and would meet up later. Later wasn’t long, I remember him telling me she’d only been gone a few days, he was desperately missing her and was flying out of Thailand to NZ so he could be with her. One week later he was in NZ and living with Jan. He was with Jan for 15 years and during that time he saw and did things that I could only dream of – jealous no, envious maybe! Pictures of him at the Taj Mahal, camping at Everest Base camp or some obscure South Pacific island, how could we not be.

Craig ran and owned backpacker hostels in NZ and he loved the place, he’d found his Nirvana. He had the boy’s toys – fast car, fast boat, ski’s and kayaks – he was the outdoor junkie. Craig and Jan even opened a Father Christmas photographing business in Finland – we never really understood how that worked!!

At some point Craig and Jan separated but remained exceptionally good friends and business partners, so Craig went off and experienced the hedonism of the West Coast of America.

More recently

And so to the present, Craig was torn between the adopted country he loved, his parents who needed care and his willingness to help out Ian and I in supporting my mum and dad. At this point he met Hayley who became his partner and he lived with her for a few years. He loved Hayley and enjoyed being a family, but NZ was always calling. The last time I spoke to him he planned to go back to NZ, and I actively encouraged him, but with Covid there were barriers!

As I write this I’ve come to realise that as brothers we’ve spent as much time apart as we have together, which happens! Do we have regrets – many, did we tell him we loved him, probably not enough – but then I think he knew. Will we get used to the fact that he’s not around? Definitely not.

Since his death Ian and I have received so many messages of condolence from far and wide, from friends known and unknown, and one common thread from all of these messages is that they were so proud to have called our Craig a friend. Once he was your friend, he was your friend forever. There will never be anyone like Craig, he was a force of nature, a one-off, a party animal. He may have died at the young-ish age of 60, but we think he crammed another 10 years in there somewhere.

To finish with, we will use the the words of one of our dear friends Mr Greg ‘Boomer’ Bamford, which he posted on Facebook, ‘We were a band of brothers and we have just lost one of the great ones.’

Fly high big bro and ride in that great big echelon in the sky.

Till we meet again.

Stuart Perry