The 2008 Tour de Qinghai Lake International Road Cycling Race, the largest international sports event held in China before the Beijing Olympics, is to start on Friday in northwest China's Qinghai Province.

Founded in 2002, Tour de Qinghai Lake has recognized as the top of its kind in Asia, attracting more than 240 cyclists and officials from 17 countries and regions this year.

The 2008 Tour de Qinghai Lake will last from July 11 to 20, covering 10 stages and an overall distance of 1,399.2 kilometers, including 1,354.2 kilometers in racing.

A total of 20 teams will participate in the race, including six UCI (International Cycling Union) continental pro teams like Czech PSK, Ireland CSF, and Netherlands COS.

Originally 21 teams were chosen through application, but Kazakhstan Olympic team missed the race for visa problems.

Several athletes from the Olympic teams from Denmark, Poland, Ukraine, Uzbekistan, China and Chinese Hong Kong will attend the August Beijing Olympics. They regard this year's race as a great opportunity for the preparation.

"Participating in such a race held at plateau would benefit the team a lot, and it's a part of our team's preparation for the Beijing Olympics," said Wong Kam-po, the 35-year-old Asian cycling star from Hong Kong.

Wong will probably compete in the track races in Beijing, but he believed Tour de Qinghai Lake would be a good warming-up for him.

"If we don't attend this race, we'll also have some training on other plateau areas like Kunming. Moreover, track racers also need to train on roads," said he.

"I hope to win good places in stages where most parts of the route are on flat roads," he added.

Tour de Qinghai Lake is an international road cycling race held on the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau, known as "the Third Arctic Terrain", and most of its stages are above 3,000 meters (nearly 10 thousand feet) above the sea level. In 2004, it rose to the top road cycling race in Asia.

(Xinhua News Agency July 11, 2008)