The city’s largest ever Tour de Yorkshire ‘yellow bike’ was officially unveiled by Sir Gary Verity today ahead of the start of Thursday’s event – the eye-catching, 31 metre-wide bike adorns the glass dome of Trinity Leeds.
Following weeks of planning, the artwork took five days of painstaking construction to complete, involving a complex, 80-piece jigsaw of yellow vinyl which measures 720 sq metres.
The bike was officially unveiled today by Welcome to Yorkshire’s Chief Executive Sir Gary Verity, alongside Christian Prudhomme, general director of the Tour de France, and former cycling star Thomas Voeckler.
David Maddison, General Manager at Trinity Leeds, said: “The Tour de Yorkshire is fabulous event which puts the county on the international map. We wanted to show our support for the race and give it a spectacular welcome to the city.
“It’s taken a lot of planning and staff hours to construct but we’re delighted with the result. It’s the biggest graphic we’ve ever created – in fact it’s so big we’ve been told it can probably be seen from space.”
Sir Gary Verity, Chief Executive of Welcome to Yorkshire, said: “It really is inspiring to see the huge efforts people are going to get into the spirit of the Tour de Yorkshire – and talking of huge efforts, this yellow bike is enormous!
“The race is a fantastic way to showcase Yorkshire across the world – and now we can showcase our magnificent county out of this world too, as incredibly, the bike could even be seen from space! It’s a great achievement from the team at Trinity Leeds.”
Tour de Yorkshire selfie spots have been created in Trinity Leeds so the public can snap the best pictures of the bike.
The yellow bike graphic was created by Halifax-based events company Sand in Your Eye and was fitted by abseilers from Trinity Leeds’ window cleaning company PLA Window Cleaning Services, who are based in Leeds.
