First of all a big thank you to everyone that either attended the run or made a donation of some sort, be it eggs or cash. We managed to raise over £5100 for the Magic Million Appeal which aims to raise £1m for a new ICU/HDU unit at the Royal Hospital for Sick Children in Yorkhill. We also collected screeds of easter eggs for the kids.

This event just gets bigger and bigger! Last year we had about 750 - 800 bikes and we were hoping for around 1,000 this time but the turnout well exceeded our expectations with around 1500 showing up. Kelvin Way, our meeting point, was packed to the gunnels with an impressive variety of bikes (from classic Trumpets to modern plastic fantastics and all points in between), trikes, outfits and scooters. Is there any truth in the rumour that some of the Goldwing owners brought the kitchen sink too?

With it being an Easter run it was a real family affair with many riders bringing their children as pillions or as passengers in sidecars and one rider bringing along his collie dog which sat in his open-topped sidecar during the run. One non-biking father came with his Downs Syndrome son who wanted a shot on the back of a bike (he'd even brought his own lid), prompting a search by us for a suitable steed. Enter the man with the Goldwing trike. I have no idea who he was but he agreed to take the boy as a pillion on the run and I'm sure he made his day. What a star!

Talking of stars, we were lucky to be joined this year by BBC Scotland's football presenter Chick Young for whom the run was rather poignant as it would have been the birthday of his son who was tragically killed in a bike accident just over a year ago. We really appreciate Chick coming along on such a day.

The run got off to a sudden start with many people - me included! - not even on their bikes when the front group of bikes moved off. I had to run to my bike whilst pulling on my lid, gloves and marshalling jacket. This sudden start caused huge gaps in the run and, as a result, it ended up spread out over a long distance at the beginning. This meant we ran out of marshals and the police had to slow the run down to let us catch up. Cue a couple of overheated engines with coolant getting dumped all over the road. Hope it doesn't put them off coming again.

For those of you who have never been on a run with that amount of bikes in it, it's an amazing feeling which really has to be experienced to be appreciated. One of the good things is the attention it attracts from the public as we go by - cheerful waves from the pedestrians, the same from some cage drivers and also some strong words from others who were caught in traffic jams caused by the run - but unfortunately for the people who were stopped at the start of Great Western Road, the attentions of a drag queen in a bright pink dress were a bit much! You get all sorts. We brought parts of Glasgow to a standstill for a good 15 minutes and I think our marshals will have to take chill pills with them next time to give to the stressed-out drivers. Someone in a 4x4-type car took it upon themselves to be the back-marker for the run which was great cos he had a flashing amber light making it really easy for our marshals to see the end of the run. So thanks to whoever it was - can you do the same again next year?

When we finally made it to Yorkhill we were greeted by loads of kids and the staff of Yorkhill Hospital. The kids that couldn't come outside looked out the windows and if proof were ever needed of how much the kids in the hospitals love "The Bikers" visiting them at Easter we were presented with a card made by the children in one of the wards. See the pictures below.

All in all it was a very successful run. We do have improvements to make, especially the marshalling side of things to prevent the crawls and stops, and we will address them for next year's run. (11th April)

Special mention must be made of Motherwell MCC\The Burns Tavern who raised over £1000, Central MCC who raised £500 and the staff at B&Q(Bishopbriggs) who collected over 80 eggs.