VELO South survived a legal challenge by objectors to lengthy road closures but has come to a grinding halt due to a Yellow Weather Warning.

The 100-mile closed road charity ride for 15,000 cyclists has been cancledd by CSM and will not be taking place this Sunday, September 23.

The Met Office Yellow Weather Warning for strong winds in the area during the hours of the event remains in place as more storms cross the UK this weekend. In addition to the Met Office, several other weather platforms have been consulted and the following summarises Sunday’s outlook across those sources:

Te forecast warns of constant wind speed as high as 38mph, wind gusts as high as 53mph and heavy rain throughout the event.

volunteers/event staff to adverse conditions for long periods

A Vélo South spokesperson said: “Based on the advice of our third-party health and safety company and our medical team, we have concluded that it would be unsafe for us to attempt to deliver an event of this scale in the forecasted conditions. We would be unable to guarantee the safety of our participants, spectators, volunteers, contractors and event staff across the 100-mile route and that is not a risk we are prepared to take.

“All the advice tells us that with less than 60 hours to go until the event starts, the forecast is unlikely to change significantly before Sunday and so we have opted to make the decision to cancel the event now in order to prevent cyclists travelling to West Sussex and incurring further costs, and to start the process of informing the vast number of people affected by this decision.

“We are determined to re-schedule the event for 2019 and we will work with our local authority and agency partners to try and identify an alternative date as quickly as we can. In the meantime, all participants will be entitled to a full refund of their event entry fees and car-parking fees. We will be in touch very soon with participants to communicate the exact process for this.

“The entire Vélo South team are devastated that the event will not take place on Sunday and we know this is extremely disappointing news for all of our cyclists, stakeholders and supporters but the weather forecasts have left us with no alternative.”

Participants with any queries are encouraged to email [email protected]