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BRITAIN’S Olympic-inspired cycling boom has sparked a bike theft crimewave – with record numbers being stolen in Birmingham and the West Midlands.

More than 30,000 bicycles have been stolen across the region over the last ten years, new figures have revealed.

But the Olympic year of 2012 saw the highest number of thefts on record, with 3,500 snatched by crooks.

The crimewave took place after Team GB cyclists, including new knight Sir Bradley Wiggins and Victoria Pendleton, inspired a generation to take up cycling by winning golds in London.

A Freedom of Information request revealed West Midlands Police received 31,013 bike theft reports in 10 years, including 11,491 in Birmingham.

The figures include 50 stolen police bikes, although officers say some were “decoy bikes” left in public places for sting operations.

The new statistics also show just 2,366 of the 31,000 cycles were eventually returned to their owners by police, who made a total of 2,086 arrests.

Chris Lowe, chairman of Birmingham cycling group Push Bikes, said: “The police are human, just like the rest of us. They use regular-looking bikes.

‘‘I think it shows that if you don’t want your bike to be stolen, you need a bicycle that people don’t want to buy.

“For instance, if someone tried to sell you one of the bikes from the London bike hire scheme, you’d laugh at them.”

The Mail recently told how bike thieves swooped on Christmas Day to steal a little Birmingham boy’s new BMX.

A relative later replaced the cycle for devastated seven-year-old Ryan Rose.

Mr Lowe, who has been a victim of bike theft three times in seven years, said police “bait bikes” were the way to deter crooks.

“If people start to get scared about whether or not they’re taking a decoy bike, that’s a good deterrent,’’ he said.

“If we want to have a green environment and encourage green, active transport we’ve got to encourage safer cycles.”