THE famous pudding basin top of Rivington Pike will not be included in the course when Commonwealth Games mountain biking comes to Bolton next summer.

Fears about erosion from local people led the organisers to alter the course.

The course for men and women will now be entirely on the lower slopes of Rivington from Georges Lane downwards.

But the good news is that Bolton's best known landmark - the rounded top of The Pike with its stone beacon perched on the summit - will still be an impressive backdrop to BBC TV coverage beamed round the world.

"After months of delays because of the foot and mouth restrictions, we now know where the course will go," Tournament organiser Brian Whitfield told the BEN.

The headquarters will be Rivington and Blackrod High School and the action zone will be between the school and Georges Lane. It will include Georges Lane itself, the terraces of the Chinese gardens and part of Wilderswood.

But precise details of where the course will run will not be publicised until just before the games to deter mountain bikers from riding round it.

Concerns

The men will ride four laps of the 4.5 mile circuit and the women will ride three laps.

Concerns had been expressed by local people that years of efforts to halt severe erosion on the Pike summit could be reversed if the Commonwealth action was staged there. Some were worried the Pike top would become a mountain bikers' mecca because of the publicity it would receive.

Mr Whitfield claimed the course would be just as challenging without including the top of the Pike. He said it was a course "to really test riders' bike handling skills as well as their stamina" and had been plotted to include much of the United Utilities water catchment land that is already popular with mountain bikers.

It is the first time that mountain biking has ever been included in a Commonwealth Games programme. The decision to include it was made after the success of a trial competition at the 1996 Olympic Games.

The mountain biking at Rivington will take place on the second day of the Games (Friday July 26) with the women's race in the morning and men's in the afternoon.

And the cycling road races and time trials, which will also be in the Rivington area, will be on Saturday July 27 and Saturday August 3.