Dragon Ride Wales is a cyclosportive event based in South Wales, UK.
The event is a non competitive cycling marathon run over the hills of South Wales and the Brecon Beacons National Park. The ride takes in the challenging climbs of the Bwlch and Rhigos mountain roads which are long with relatively constant gradients. The event has different courses to suit riders ability, these are typically around 200KM (120 Miles), 125KM (80 miles) and more recently 40KM (25 miles). The longer "Gran Fondo" route has climbs totaling 3000 metres.
The Dragon Ride is held annually in June. Entries are available from late December via the event website. Traditionally the event sells out within weeks on the entries becoming available. Cyclosportives are a recent addition to the UK, although these types of events have been very popular in Italy, France and Spain. In 2004 the first Dragon Ride was held, this being at the time one of only a handful of such events in Great Britain. The format of the Dragon Ride was based on an Italian Gran Fondo although unlike Italian events it was not held on closed roads. Event Organiser Mr Lou Lusardi, whose family originated from the Parma area of Italy had taken part in several Gran Fondo and saw an opportunity to bring this type of event to South Wales, an organising team of friends and relatives was set up under the BreakAway Cycling banner. Based in Bridgend, the first "Dragon" had 280 entrants.
In 2005 the Dragon Ride became the first UK cyclosportive to be included into the UCI calendar. The popularity of the inaugural event and the demand for this type of cycling challenge rides saw the Dragon Ride more than double in size each year between 2004 and 2006; a continual growth over the following years saw the 2010 event with 3700 entrants, the largest for any UK open road sportive. In 2007 the Dragon Ride linked up with the Cape Argus Pick n Pay Cycletour in Cape Town South Africa and the Lake Taupo Cycle Challenge in New Zealand to cross promote and share resources. Pencoed, situated a few miles east of Bridgend became the venue for the start and finish of the ride from 2008, the new location provided more space and was ideally situated only a mile from junction 35 of the M4 Motorway.
Various innovations set the Dragon Ride apart from other UK sportives, the event was the first to use online entries, unlike other cyclosportive riders do not have to register prior to the ride as their numbers and timing transponders are posted out in the weeks prior to the event. For 2010 a totally disposable timing chip was introduced eliminating the need for riders to hand back their transponder at the end of the ride. The Dragon Ride has been voted Britain’s favorite Cyclosportive by readers of Cycling Weekly magazine for the past two years.
For 2010 the Dragon Ride signed a three year title sponsorship deal with the UK's largest online cycle retailer Wiggle via their own brand of sportive bikes named Verenti, the top of the range Verenti bike is named Rhigos after one of the Dragon Rides signature climbs.
The 2011 Verenti Dragon Ride will be held on Sunday 5 June, online entries go live at midnight on the 29th December 2009.
http://www.verentidragonride.com/index.php Dragon Ride Website