A new champion will be crowned on Sunday in the Bermuda Bicycle Association’s 62-mile Presidents Cup Road Race, with Matthew Oliveira, the champion, now away in school at Loughborough University.

Dominique Mayho, who won the first three races in 2014, 2015 and 2016 before Oliveira ended his dominance last year, will be the favourite in the gruelling race which takes the riders to both ends of the island before finishing on Harbour Road just west of Chapel Road in Paget.

Also missing because of school commitments overseas are Kaden Hopkins and Alyssa Rowse, who graduated from Warwick Academy this year with Oliveira. Rowse is also in the UK and Hopkins at Fort Lewis College in Dorango, Colorado.

Peter Dunne, president of the Bermuda Bicycle Association, says it will be a chance for the next generation of up-and-coming cyclists to show their potential.

“Dominique is still super strong while Connor White, who is in his second year at university in Canada, is coming home because we are taking him to the Elite Caribbean Championships the following weekend in Dominican Republic,” Dunne said.

“He’s very young for the Elite Championships, but Dominique is going as well and will hopefully help lead him through that process of learning how to race in the Caribbean Championships. We’re also taking Caitlin Conyers to the Caribbean so she will be racing on Sunday as well.”

The women’s race on Sunday promises to be close with Ashley Couper and Rose-Anna Hoey also competing in the race which starts at Lindo’s Family Foods in Warwick at 7.30am and takes the riders to St George’s, via Harbour Road, East Broadway, Pitts Bay Road and St John’s Road before heading east on North Shore Road.

After St George’s, the riders will travel onto St David’s Road and then to Cooper’s Island. Leaving St David’s, the route takes the riders on to Wilkinson Avenue and along Harrington Sound Road and to South Road all the way to Somerset and then Dockyard, before returning through Middle Road and then Harbour Road via Burnt House Hill to the finish line.

“It will be a good, hard race. I’m looking forward to it,” Dunne said. “For me, it’s a pipeline, with those guys in college and new guys coming in,” Dunne stated. “My focus has always been on the high school age group where we have some good guys coming up.

“The juniors will be the next stars and then we get another bunch of stars, that’s the way it goes. This race is for riders 15 years and older because it is very long. We’ll end up having a really competitive race.”

Dunne, a race organiser along with Fiona Miller, explained that the first five or so miles will be considered “neutral”, “before everyone lets loose, typically once they clear Blackwatch Pass”.

The first riders will complete the course in about 2 hour, 45 minutes.

• Bermuda’s four-member team for Dominican Republic will compete in a time trial and road race on October 13 and 14. Connor white and Caitlin Conyers will do both the time trial on the Saturday and the road race on the Sunday while Mayho and Gabby Arnold will compete in the road race on the Sunday. Arnold, who is studying at Marian University in Indiana, will meet the team in the Caribbean.

• The inaugural Bicycle Works Stage Race scheduled for next weekend has been cancelled. Organisers are hoping to arrange a road race in its place on October 14, using the same course approved for the Bicycle Works event.

The course will take in South Road to St Paul’s Lane and then Middle Road to Barnes Corner and back along South Road. The proposed start and finish will be near Warwick Long Bay. Organisers are looking to establish the stage race in the 2019 season.