Hamlyn, of Newton Abbot, Devon, was signed off sick with a viral chest infection and stress-related illness in October 2007. Three weeks later Hamlyn took part in the Dartmoor Devil — a cycling event through the exposed and hilly Devon countryside — with 200 other men and women.
Organisers described the event as "no ordinary bicycle ride, where a horde of cyclists ride 60-plus miles across the dizzy heights of Dartmoor, riding through the mists, along lanes strewn with the debris of recent storms, battling the wind on the exposed road".
Hamlyn is a veteran of the extreme race, having completed it six times, and his name appears on the event website's hall of fame. During the 2007 event a Lycra-clad Hamlyn was pictured on his bike sporting a helmet and sunglasses.
An employment tribunal in Exeter, heard that he competed in the Dartmoor Devil 21 days after a doctor signed him off sick from his work with the council.
