He was killed while travelling on the 6.31pm service from Shrewsbury to Aberystwyth, and 15 others were injured in the smash before both trains were safely evacuated.
Friend Iestyn Leyshon said Tudor, from Aberystwyth, west Wales, was a keen mountain biker, adding that he was ‘extremely saddened’ he would ‘never see him on his bike’ again.
They had known each other for about 20 years but had grown closer in the last four years due to their passion for biking.
He told MailOnline that Tudor and his wife Rachel had ‘just began to travel after many years of work’ before tragedy struck.
He was on his way home from a holiday in Italy when the crash happened.
The victim’s family thanked well-wishers for their ‘kind messages and support’ as they asked for privacy.
A driver of one of the trains was also ‘quite badly injured’ in the crash and taken to hospital in Shrewsbury, while a conductor suffered a fracture, Transport for Wales’ chief operating officer Jan Chaudhry-Van Der Velde told the BBC.
He added that both the injured driver and conductor have received medical care and ‘are on the road to recovery’.
The Cambrian line between Machynlleth and Shrewsbury has been closed as investigators try to piece together how the two trains collided in the head on crash in Mid Wales.
The closure is expected to remain until at least the end of the day on Friday.
Several lines across the Transport for Wales network have been disrupted all week due to slippery rails caused by leaves falling.
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