Organisers
of cycle race Tour of Britain have
announced it will pass through
Leicestershire.
It will
last six days and start in Glasgow and
finish in London, with 120 miles of the
route running through the East Midlands.
The
riders will race for six days, beginning
in Glasgow city centre on 30 August and
finishing in the heart of London’s
Westminster on 4 September.
They
will pass through Leicestershire areas
Ashby de la Zouch, Loughborough,
Leicester, Melton Mowbray, Upper
Broughton and Ab Kettleby on 2
September.
Sixteen
teams will battle it out and the winner
will be the rider who has covered all
six stages the quickest.
The
riders will also be competing to win the
individual stages, the overall points
competition, and the titles of the best
climber and the best sprinter.
Hundreds of thousands of people lined
the route of the 2004 Tour of Britain
and over a million tuned into the BBC’s
television coverage.
The BBC
will cover the 2005 and 2006 Tour of
Britain.
Richard
Caborn, Government minister for sport
and tourism, says the event should
encourage more people to take up
cycling.
He
said: “I am confident that we will see
more and more people taking up cycling –
some to keep fit some hopefully to
produce the next generation of Olympic
champions – and Tour winners.” |
