A POPULAR event which sees thousands of motorbikers ride through a village has made a spectacular return.

Cassington Bike Night has been running for 30 years, but was forced to cancel during the coronavirus pandemic.

Martin Ritchie, one of organisers of the charitable event, estimates £20,000 has been raised for the village this year.

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He said: “Returning this year for the first time in two years was good, it was a fantastic turnout.

“We think there was 10,000 in total, although it didn’t feel like our biggest, but the air shots showed the size of the numbers.

“There’s seven of us on our core committee and we’ll start planning in the middle of February for this, to plan ahead and get everything in place.

“The indication of a good event for me is that the stewards enjoy themselves and the feedback from them and the bikers show it’s been great.

“It was a lovely event, with the perfect weather as there was no rain.”

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Mr Ritchie, who moved to Cassington in 2010, said of the thousands of bikers who roared through the village between 4pm and 11pm on Monday, the furthest they knew of was a regular who comes from the Isle of Wight every year.

The event raised funds for St Peter’s Church of England Primary School, in addition to the village hall, sports and social club, and church.

“It’s fantastic that the village always supports us too, that’s brilliant,” said Mr Ritchie.

“One of the key reasons we get so much support is because we support charities in the village.

“We won’t know how much we’ve raised in total just yet because all the sums from different groups need adding up, but almost £4,000 has been raised by the committee.”

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This story was written by Liam Rice, he joined the team in 2019 as a multimedia reporter.

Liam covers politics, travel and transport. He occasionally covers Oxford United.

Get in touch with him by emailing: Liam.rice@newsquest.co.uk

Follow him on Twitter @OxMailLiamRice