The first bicycle racing at Ettington Hall was a meeting of Stratford-upon-Avon Bicycle Club on June 29th 1878. There was just one race, a one mile handicap which was run with two heats and a final. There were two falls in the second heat and another in the final. T Birch beat JB Page by eight yards to win the event, the first prize was a silver medal, with bronze medals for second and third, all donated by WB Gibbins. There were "a good number of spectators" which included the Gibbins family.
Stratford-upon-Avon BC held a sports meeting at the ground on October 16th 1880. In the five miles handicap for the Club Challenge Cup, F Hurston held off the scratch man W Tattersfield to win by half a lap. Hurston would have been victorious again in the one mile handicap race, if he had not lost one of his ‘treadles' allowing Tattersfield through to win. There was a consolation race and a slow bicycle race which caused much amusement. This was the first time that the club had promoted a race meeting and the Stratford-upon-Avon Herald was full of praise for their efforts.
In the summer of 1883, there was a series of races promoted by Stratford-upon-Avon BC on the cricket field at Eatington**.
Stratford-upon-Avon BC held their annual sports on June 29th 1884 and included running and bicycle races. The event was well supported with numerous entries and "a large concourse of spectators." In the one mile bicycle handicap race Harry Bailey beat Whitehouse by less than a length in a "ding-dong battle". The Stratford-upon-Avon drum and fife band played spirited music throughout the afternoon. There was no further bicycle racing in Ettington for eighteen years.
To celebrate the crowning of King Edward VII, there was a Coronation sports meeting on August 9th 1902, which included bicycle races for ladies and gentlemen. This was the last bicycle racing to be held in Ettington.
** When the railway came in 1873, E P Shirley, a local land owner, fixed the spelling of the village name as Ettington. It had been written as Eatington on maps for the previous two centuries.
