Gloucestershire's world-famous May Bank Holiday cheese rolling races have been halted - by an earthquake in Algeria.

The county's craziest sporting event - and one of the weirdest anywhere in the world - takes place at Cooper's Hill, near Gloucester.

We are very disappointed to have to cancel at the last minute. It's a one in two slope and casualties do happen. Unfortunately without the medical cover the event cannot take place.

Cheese rolling race organiser Tony Tizard

Every year scores of men and women flock to hurtle 200 yards down the county's steepest hill in pursuit of a seven-pound Double Gloucester cheese.

Competitors come from all over the world to join in the May mayhem - the 2002 event included one from Korea.

But the 2003 event has been halted just days before it was due to go ahead - because of the earthquake that struck Algeria this week.

Watch teenager Sam Piper, from Brockworth, cycle down Cooper's Hill, even though the event was cancelled

Race organisers have to provide safety cover at the event - which regularly sees competitors injured, some of them seriously - and had to cancel at short notice after a rescue team from Rapid UK who would have been on hand on Monday were sent to Algiers.

Tony Tizard, chairman of the cheese rolling race organising committee said: "We are very disappointed to have to cancel at the last minute.

Casualties

"The Rapid UK team who would provide safety cover on the hillside itself at the event have all been called out to Algeria to deal with the emergency there, and now the St John's Ambulance have had to withdraw their services as well."

A St John's team usually provides medical support at the foot of the hill but their insurance does not cover them to rescue casualties off the hillside.

Mr Tizard said it was impossible to find alternative safety cover at short notice.

"It's just unfortunate that nature has come in and caused this earthquake in Algiers. Rapid UK's job is to step in to respond to that situation," he said.

Craig Brown won the 2000 cheese rolling races at Cooper's Hill (above) but retired after being hurt in the 2002 event (below)

"It's a one in two slope and casualties do happen. Unfortunately without the medical cover the event cannot take place."

It is not the first time the cheese rolling races have been cancelled.

Safety fears also halted the 1998 event after the previous year's event ended in mayhem with 18 competitors and several onlookers injured.

It was after this that organisers installed safety barriers, employed a security firm to control the crowds and paid for Rapid UK to provide emergency safety and medical cover at the races.

The foot and mouth crisis halted the event in 2001.

Past cancellations have resulted in die-hard cheese-rollers staging impromptu cheese races without any safety cover.

Mr Tizard said: "We can't stop that - we are just the organisation that does the official one but we do it to the full safety cover.

"I wouldn't encourage people to do it without the safety back-up."

>>More about cheese rolling including picture gallery and video of 2002 event

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