Cycling Tour of Britain to start in Rochdale

Photo: Jan Harwood

Rochdale Cycling Grand Prix

The route of the 2010 Tour of Britain cycling race has been revealed, with Rochdale to be the first leg, with 96 cyclists and 16 teams scheduled to take part.

The tour will take place over eight days from 11 September and finishing in London on 18 September. On the final day riders will face a circuit of the London borough of Newham, site of the 2012 Olympic Games.

"On the way from the Grand Depart to the final stage in London, riders will face tough routes and intense competition, while taking in some breathtaking views of our wonderful country," Michael Bennett, the Tour's technical director, said.

The Tour of Britain is the UK's biggest professional bicycle race and a centrepiece of the British sporting calendar, attracting over a million spectators to the roadside in 2008, and hundreds of thousands more on television and via the internet.

The Tour returned after a five-year absence in 2004, quickly re-establishing itself as the main event in the British cycling calendar. Ranked at the 2.1 category by the UCI and initially held over five days, by 2008 The Tour of Britain had grown to become an eight-day event, allowing it to visit more parts of the UK than ever before.

2010 Tour of Britain stages

• Stage 1 Rochdale to Blackpool (126km)
• Stage 2 Stoke-on-Trent (160km)
• Stage 3 Newton to Swansea (150km)
• Stage 4 Minehead to Teignmouth (171km)
• Stage 5 Tavistock to Glastonbury (176km)
• Stage 6 King's Lynn to Great Yarmouth (189km)
• Stage 7 Bury St Edmunds to Colchester (151km)
• Stage 8 London (100km) 
  
  www.tourofbritain.co.uk/_ns_race/