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Everyone my age remembers Raleigh for the Chopper and Grifter. One girl I know still owns a 70s Shopper and rides it into work every day. Anoraks also remember the TI Raleigh race team and the company's Tour de France success.

For years, Raleigh was the world's biggest cycle-maker with a huge factory in Nottingham. But that was then, and this is now. Raleigh's latest return comes at an opportune time, with cycling's popularity on a huge upswing. However, serious cyclists have a bewildering choice at the top end of the market. Leisure cyclists are well served by behemoths such as Specialized, while children can get any style of bike they want.

Bike-tarts like me would love Raleigh to make technically interesting, innovative and refined bicycles, as its Special Projects division used to do. By using niche, high-end products to support volume production it may well succeed in returning to something like its former glory, but the competition is more serious than it was in its golden age.

Also, they're not really made in England any more. Still, if they're good bikes, who cares?