THOUSANDS of people have rated Hadleigh Country Park as the best Olympic venue to travel to during the Games.

The park, which hosted the London 2012 mountain bike competition last month, came out top in a poll of 95,000 fans who travelled to venues.

The figures released by the Olympic Delivery Authority show 89 per cent of travellers had an extremely good experience travelling to the Salvation Army and Essex County Council venue for the event, beating the Olympic Stadium by 3 per cent.

About 40,000 sports fans descended on Hadleigh Farm for the two-day competition, with 9,500 visitors using park-and-ride sites at Barleylands Farm, in Billericay , Case New Holland tractor plant, in Basildon , and Sandon, in Chelmsford.

A further 10,000 people used rail- and-ride facilities from Leigh train station and nearly 700 people each day chose to use the cycle parking scheme at Hadleigh Farm.

Stephen Castle , county councillor responsible for the 2012 Games, said: “With about 40,000 spectators travelling to Hadleigh Farm during that weekend, this is a great result for all those involved in the travel planning for the event and testament to all the hard work that went into it.

“The park-and-ride and rail-and-ride services were faultless and hundreds of people took the opportunity to walk or cycle to the event along the beautiful Thames estuary.”

Lee Valley White Water Centre in Hertfordshire was just behind Hadleigh with 88 per cent.

The news comes despite travel arrangements to Hadleigh Farm being placed in jeopardy just nine days before the event, when the park- and-ride site at Waterside Farm leisure centre, on Canvey , was scrapped at the 11th hour due to poor weather conditions.

Roadworks at Sadlers Farm, in Benfleet , also had to be suspended during the Games, in case of traffic problems.

Pam Challis , leader of Castle Point Council, said: “I am so pleased such a high number of spectators visiting Hadleigh Farm were satisfied with the travel arrangements.

“Tens of thousands of visitors enjoyed the Olympic events over the two days in the spectacular natural scenery of Hadleigh Farm and I am delighted all the hard work that went into travel planning resulted in such a memorable experience for so many people.”

About 1.4million spectators used park-and-ride facilities, bus and coach services, and walking and cycling routes to access Olympic and Paralympic events across the country.