A HISTORIC Merseyside bike riding event has announced an update to participants with a "heavy heart".

The Liverpool Chester Liverpool (LCL) Bike Ride announced that its operator Pennine Events Ltd had ceased trading with “immediate effect” and that organisers were now looking for new ways to keep the event going.

The annual event is a non-competitive bike ride experience for all ages and abilities and covers a range of distances from five miles to 100 miles across Liverpool, Wirral and Chester.

A statement from the LCL Bike Ride Team said: “It is with a heavy heart that we have to update you on the news that LCL Bike Ride’s operator, Pennine Events Ltd has ceased trading with immediate effect.

“Over the past decades, the team have delivered so many world class events across sport & mass participation. From their most recent and award-winning work on Cycling World Championships through Le Tour de France, and of course the LCL Bike Ride over the past 30 years.

“Throughout this, the company has overcome countless challenges and taken everything in our stride along the years to make sure the event could continuously go ahead and raise much needed funds for all our local charity partners, estimated at approx. £1m.

“However, the accumulative nature of those immense challenges - such as the devastating legacy from Covid and subsequently, have finally been too much to bear.

“Ultimately, after exploring every avenue to continue over the past months, we have had to reluctantly admit we are beaten, and have no option but to close the doors on Pennine Events Ltd.

“This therefore also affects the historic and much loved LCL Bike Ride.

“We are exploring every possible avenue to try and make sure the LCL Bike Ride can still go ahead this year through partners and hope to be able to update you as soon as we are able to.

“This will likely be at least a couple weeks from now, so we would ask you to please bear with us in the meantime whilst we are trying everything we can to try and save the event. Unfortunately, we cannot promise anything, but we are trying everything we can.

“In the meantime, we have paused registration, and an email with this message will go out to all our registered participants.

“Thank you for your immense support over the years, and we will update everyone as soon as we can.”