Tuesday, September 1, 2009

Stelvio Bike Day


Stelvio Bike Day was Saturday, August 29th. Many cyclists consider the Stelvio pass scenically the most beautiful of all the Alpine passes.

It is possible to climb the Stelvio from three different sides: from Bormio and from Prato, both in Italy, and from Santa Maria, Switzerland. The toughest and the most spectacular climbing is the one from Prato ,with 48 hairpins. Starting from Prato, the Stelvio Pass is 24.3 km long with an average 0f 7.4%.

All three sides on August 29th were closed to traffic from 8.00 a.m to 4 p.m.

We had a brief message from Pietro since his last report indicating that he did some suffering on the Stelvio and "more to come".

Saturday wasn't a glorious, sunny, day on the Stelvio. One rider, who took the photo (click to enlarge) above, said "80 degrees at bottom, 40 degrees at top. Got rained on and then hailed on. Air is thin at 9100'."

Stories, including cycling trip stories, for the Italian Cycling Journal welcome; contact veronaman@gmail

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