TEAM Rwanda will ride in this week’s Abergavenny Festival of Cycling with the expectation that they could become a major player in the sport in future years.

Cycling has taken off in a big way in the African country. The national team made their debut in an international stage race, under the auspices of global governing body the UCI, last month when they competed in the Tour of Columbia.

And Team Rwanda will be making their road race debut at the Olympic Games in Rio next month, when Adrien Niyonshuti, who rides for Team Dimension Data, the same team as British star Mark Cavendish, and who competed in the mountain bike discipline in London 2012, takes on riders who will have just completed the Tour de France.

The Under-23 tour to Britain is aimed at giving the Rwandans racing experience, said the team’s UK Ambassador Jeremy Ford,

The team will be riding in all three of the Abergavenny Festival of Cycling’s featured events - the Chepstow Grand Prix on Wednesday July 13, the Welsh Open Criterium around the streets of Abergavenny on Friday July 15 and the big showpiece, the MotorPoint Grand Prix/Grand Prix of Wales road race on Sunday July 17.

But as Rwanda is known as the ’Land of a Thousand Hills’, with altitudes up to six thousand feet, climbing on a bike up the often stiff gradients of Monmouthshire will present no problems for the African aces.

Ford said, "They are incredible climbers. They just fly up the hills. and part of this trip is to train them on going downhill and racing in groups.

"Our guys are higher up on the UCI level than those who they will be riding against in the UK."

Ford added, "The team was started in 2006 when some incredible raw talent was discovered at a race for wooden bikes.

"Tom Ritchey (a legendary American rider and bike frame pioneer) was invited to be a judge and saw the talent and took it on from there."

The team has American pro cyclist Sterling Magnell as their Head of Performance, who said, "We are heading to the UK to face the challenge of turning our best young Rwandan talent, who possess world class pedal power, into cornering and close quarters racing masters.

"This is the biggest gap in our riders’ cycling education and I hope that the skills gained in the UKwill translate into their power being better utilised in the high level international events where they can prove their panache to the world and get on the radar of professional teams.”