Last updated at 15:45, Monday, 07 September 2009

Title
Author
Copyright

Description

THE Tour de Furness is expected to boost local charities by up to £30,000.

More than 400 cyclists – some as young as four – started out from Roose Cons Club in Barrow on Sunday morning and the vast majority returned there before the early afternoon rain set in.

The annual event – run by Furness Rotary Club – offered three choices of route: a family fun ride of five miles, a 13-mile route and the Furness 50 which covered Coniston and back in a figure of eight.

One regular Furness 50 entrant, 52-year-old Martin Leslie, of Barrow, raised one of the top individual amounts – around £1,700 – as part of the Centrica Energy team.

He said: “I go round all the companies at the (Rampside) gas terminal and pester them.

“It is a really enjoyable event to take part in.”

Tour de Furness organiser Bill Nickson said it was the first time people had been offered the chance to enter the event online – and 180 of the 430 participants had used that facility.

It is estimated the cyclists will have raised around £18,000, with 68 per cent pledged to St Mary’s Hospice in Ulverston, 24 per cent to the charity chosen by each individual and eight percent to the Rotary Club charities.

Mr Nickson added that BAE Systems also matches the amount raised for the hospice as part of its Charity Challenge.

First published at 11:43, Monday, 07 September 2009
Published by http://www.nwemail.co.uk