Cyclists challenged by hardest climbs after Tour of Britain success in Aberdeenshire

Cyclists who love a challenge are being urged to visit Aberdeenshire and take on some of Britain’s hardest climbs.

A new list encourages riders to bag the likes of Lecht, Gairnshiel and the Sui before posting their images online.

VisitAberdeenshire wants to attract more cyclists after hosting a leg of the Tour of Britain race last year.

Chris Foy, from the tourism body, said: “We started the Aberdeen Ascent project out of an ambition to encourage more people to come here and ride their bikes.

“[We want] more people to come and explore the region and go home and tell their friends all about what a great experience we have in the north east of Scotland.”

Two of the top ten climbs, Cairn o Mount and Queen’s View, have attracted international attention and the others will feature when the Tour of Britain returns to the region for the Grand Depart in September.

Colin Allanach, of Scottish Cycling Grampian, said television coverage of last year’s race had attracted increasing numbers of tourists and their bikes.

He said: “It showed Aberdeen off in all its glory. It’s a great initiative to promote cycling tourism in the north east. It will bring in many people from all over to try some of the climbs local cyclists know and love.

“We want people to be inspired from what they see on the television and make a decision to come to Aberdeenshire to ride a bike as opposed to somewhere else in the country.”

Organisers hope highlighting the north east as an emerging cycling destination will help boost the tourism industry’s recover after covid.

Aberdeenshire Council chief executive Jim Savage said: “There’s a lot of investment going on with adventure tourism.

“We have everything you could really wish for in terms of a place to come and do lots of great sports and activities and we want people to come and enjoy it some more.”