The "Knowing how to ride a bicycle" operation has been gradually launched in recent days during the Tour de France.

These workshops for primary school students should gradually become widespread, with the goal of 800,000 children made aware of safety and cohabitation on the road in 2022.

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They may be the future champions of tomorrow.

On the occasion of the Tour de France, the "Knowing how to ride a bicycle" operation was launched in several schools in France.

For primary school students, this involves obtaining a sort of bicycle license within the school framework.

The system is being implemented gradually and should (normally) be generalized within two years, for pupils at the end of primary school.

Several establishments have already tested it, such as the Lamoricière school in Paris.

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The goal is to get the basic rules in mind.

“Look at the front wheel, it brakes. Does that mean that my left hand is the wheel…?” Asks the instructor, “Before!”, The students answer in chorus.

They also learn to ride the bicycle in the schoolyard, learn some traffic rules and the basics of bicycle safety.

"I didn't brake well so I hurt my foot a bit"

For example, why do you have to brake with both brakes and not just one?

"If you brake with the front wheel, you can fall. If you brake with the rear wheel, you will skid," replied a student.

Another paid to learn.

“I didn't brake well so I hurt my foot a bit,” she smiles.

For now, these students are the lucky ones.

They are leaving the rare primary school children to have had bicycle workshops.

But they should all pass the diploma from 2022. "The idea is that when they finish this training in CM2, they are autonomous in order to take their bikes to go to college in sixth," explains Téo Bartuccio is a militant cyclist and the main architect of the school bicycle plan.

"These children are going to be motorists, or cyclists, and they are going to have these reflexes"

His fixed idea: "Work on a future generation. Because these children will be motorists, or cyclists, and they will have these reflexes that we will teach them, and that will remain with them", specifies Téo Bartuccio.  

So far, only a few hundred students have been trained as the plan is just getting started.

It would take significant leverage to train monitors and why not municipal officers, and reach the goal of 800,000 children per year, from 2022.