THOUSANDS of riders from all over the country descended on the New Forest for the opening day of a popular cycling event.

Roads around the National Park are expected to be busy throughout the weekend.

The Wiggle New Forest 100 Sportive, which also runs in spring, was greeted with perfect weather as cyclists gathered bright and early at the Somerley Estate, near Ringwood.

The event features three different courses of varying length and difficulty.

Riders on the longest of the routes - entitled Epic - set off on the 100 mile journey from 7.20am this morning.

Cyclists will travel as far south as Hurn, before travelling west to Brockenhurst, then to the north of the Forest and back towards Ringwood through Fordingbridge.

Start times for the other distances were staggered throughout the morning, with all participants due to set off by 10.40am.

Along their way around the New Forest cyclists are able to take a break at designated feed stops in Ringwood, New Milton, Romsey and Fordingbridge.

Events logistics manager Jo Pickering, who ran the event, said: "We have got just under 4,000 people taking part over the whole weekend.

"We've had a great today apart from the downpour of rain we had this afternoon.

"It's been fantastic and a lot of riders have given really good feedback about the route and cycling in the New Forest, which is what we want to hear from our point of view.

"There has been a few calls about incidents on the roads but not for our riders.

"We still sent first aid support teams out and ambulances attended. We gave these injured cyclists who were not directly involved in today's event the same care and attention.

"This ride is our most local event. We work about 10 minutes from the start and we really like to show people what the New Forest has to offer.

"The forest is a lovely place to cycle with the open roads and gives people a chance to see the animals roaming around on the land throughout the area."

The event continues on Sunday across the same three routes.