PRUDENTIAL RIDE LONDON

From its launch in 2013 as a legacy of the London Olympics and with designs on being ‘the London Marathon for bikes’, RideLondon looked a solid gold winner. The pro race, the RideLondon-Surrey Classic, has applied for WorldTour status from 2017, which would make it one of the select races on the international calendar.

Like the Marathon, the family-friendly Freecycle shuts out the throng of Central London traffic, allowing tens of thousands to enjoy the capital on closed roads. There’s also the women’s Grand Prix, won by Laura Trott in its first year, and even a ‘world championship’ for Brompton riders. Arguably the main show is the 100, the closed-road sportive in London and Surrey, which is open to 25,000 riders but easily attracts treble the applicants. Among their number this year will be our Team Cycling Plus trio, the readers you’ll have seen in the magazine as we cover their training towards the event.

New for 2016 is a shorter 46-mile event, which starts and finishes in the same place as the full route (the Olympic Park and The Mall, respectively), but skips the toughest challenges – the climbs of Newlands Corner, Leith Hill and Box Hill.

Sir Bradley Wiggins helped launch the new distance in March, calling it “a fantastic event for new and young riders. Forty six miles is still a challenge but it’s also a great introduction to cycling on traffic-free roads and it’s a wonderful way to ride your first sportive.” While entry to this year’s 100 has closed, there is still an opportunity to get a place by riding for one of the event’s charity partners ( tinyurl.com/ cp-ridelondon). And if you’re reading this before 5pm on 28 April, you can still enter the ballot for the 46 – if 15,000 riders haven’t already got there.

The Prudential RideLondon will be held on the weekend of 30 & 31 July. For further information, visit www. prudentialridelondon.co.uk