The 2009 Tour de Qinghai Lake International Road Cycling Race is set to last 12 days by adding three news stages, making the Asia-top event more challenging, the organizers said on Friday.

For the first time, the 2.HC-category tour will pedal into the Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture of Huangnan and the Xunhua Sala Autonomous County of Qinghai Province, said Feng Jianping, deputy chief of the organizing committee based in the provincial capital Xining.

The three new stages are Huzhu-Xining, Xining-Tongren and Tongren-Xunhua. Two of this year's nine stages will be cut and the2009 event will cover 10 stages plus prologue.

Tongren County, capital of Huangnan Prefecture, means "golden valley" in Tibetan language and is famous for its Rebgong culture. Xunhua is the sole Sala autonomous county in China.

The race distance will thus increase from this year's 1,356.4kmto more than 1,500km. The event in July will be conducted over 12 days, including a one-day break.

"The 2009 tour will be divided into two phases by the break. The newly-added stages, which are in comparatively low-altitude areas, will be put on the first phase to help athletes adjust to the plateau environment and be able to complete the arduous race," said Zhang Hongquan, an expert of the committee.

"This measure underlines the upgrading efforts by the Tour of Qinghai Lake, as defined by the UCI (International Cycling Union)," said Feng, "We are trying to lift this event into a world-top one in 10 years."

This year's event spanned over 10 days by adding an individual time trial as prologue. It attracted a total of 147 riders from 21teams, including UCI pro-continental teams, UCI continental teams and national Olympic teams.

Founded in 2002, the annual Tour of Qinghai Lake is the largest and top of its kind in Asia. Held on "roof of the world" the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau, it is the "highest" international road cycling race.

(Xinhua News Agency December 29, 2008)