Classic gran fondos?

The Nine Hammers Tavern - General Chat
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Does anyone have a good web site or reference to classic gran fondos? I’m in the USA, but open to travel to classic gran fondos in Europe if they are “bucket list”.

I haven’t been able to find a good resource for a lot of gran fondos all in one place. Inspired by the “great divide” video, but not quite ready to go back to multi day rides again (yet).

Martin

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I’m not sure what qualifies as a “classic gran fondo”; my involvement in cycling until about October of last year was watching the Tour de France. Then I got on SUF and started getting edu-ma-cated. In any case, have you checked out the Gran Fondo National Series in the US? I’m personally targeting the one in Maryland in the Fall; I’ve checked out some of the sections of the route and while it probably doesn’t compare to some of the crazy mountains in Europe, it seemed plenty challenging to me.

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If you are looking for European Gran Fondos https://www.radmarathon.at/termine/index.php?rmlang=en would be a site to look at. It lists pretty everything, I guess. Though it may be hard to spot the bucket list events.

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There isn’t really a “classic gran fondo” list in the way that there is a Spring Classics Race series. If I was putting one together, I would include these events:

  • Any/ all of the Spring Classic or Monument Sportives (Milan-Sanremo, Paris-Roubaix, Liege-Bastogne-Liege, Ronde van Vlaanderen, Il Lombardia, Strade Bianche etc etc).
  • I’d specially call out Strade Bianche as that actually started as a Sportive before becoming a pro-race.
  • La Marmotte - and any of those series, if you like your mountains big.
  • Maratona dles Dolomites, if you like your mountains big and Italian.
  • L’etape de Tour - is the Tour de France sportive, and normally does the Queen stage from that year’s race.
  • Haute Route; if you want to do it over several days!

This website seems to have a good selection for you to look at (in English):

1 Like
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Thank you. Great question about “classic”. It probably means different things to different people. To me, it just means great scenery and a well run event. That probably means it has bigger attendance, and might even mean it’s an “event” for the whole town it is run in.

Great web sites so far! Can’t believe they didn’t come up when I was searching.

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@Fezzek In the US try searching for events on bikereg.com.

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Race The Lake (Fond du Lac WI), Bike Benzie, Michigan Mountain Mayhem all have timed events.

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Not sure it’s still running but Quebrantaheusos starting in Sabinanigo Spain was wonderful!