Basque Country Tour

The Basque Country Tour (Spanish Vuelta ciclista al País Vasco ; Basque Euskal Herriko txirrindulari itzulia ) is a stage race in the Spanish Basque Country .

The tour, which is held annually in April, has been part of the newly created UCI ProTour since 2005 and from 2011 to the successor series UCI WorldTour , a series of the most important road bike races of the year. The organizer is OCETA , which also organizes the Clásica San Sebastián .

The Tour of the Basque Country was first held in 1924 and has been taking place regularly since 1952. The profile of the race is considered to be extremely demanding, as a large part of the route is driven in the mountains.

The record winner of the race, which was dominated almost exclusively by Spaniards (or Basques) until the 1980s, is José Antonio González with four successes in the 1970s. With Andreas Klöden (2000 and 2011) only one German has won the tour so far.

The 2020 event was canceled due to the COVID-19 pandemic .

Not to be confused with the Basque Country Tour is the Euskal Bizikleta , another Basque Tour, which was held until 2008 and, after increasing financial problems, merged with the Basque Country Tour in 2009.

history

The tour was founded on an initiative of the then editor-in-chief of the magazine "Excelsior" - Jacinto Miquelarena - who was also the president of the cycling club Athletics Club Bilbao . He formed an organizing committee in which important actors from business and politics at the time were involved and sought contact with Henri Desgrange and his newspaper "L`Auto". Here he mainly found organizational support and Desgranges established the connection to Automoto (one of the most important bike companies at the time with its own professional racing team). On this basis, well-known drivers from France were hired for the first edition of the race , so that the hoped-for media attention arose.

precursor

The first stage race in the Basque Country took place in 1909 under the name "Irun-Pamplona-Irun" in the organization of the two cycling clubs Racing Club de Irun and Pamplona FC as a joint race for professional and amateur riders and was won by the professional Jesus Cuesta from Gijon .

The first tour in 1924

Three months before the start, 67 drivers had registered to take part, including six French and one Swiss and one Belgian. At the start there were actually 38 drivers u. a. from the French teams Automoto and Christophe . The majority of the starters were Basques, but also some Catalans. The tour led over three stages from Bilbao via Pamplona , San Sebastian back to Bilbao and started under the name Gran Premio Excelsior. The route length was 623 kilometers. In addition to the overall ranking, there was another ranking for the best national drivers. The winners of the three stages were the French Francis Pelissier (who later became the overall winner), Henri Pelissier and Simon Tequi. The race organization had awarded 2,000 pesetas to the winner and 1,000 pesetas to the best in the national ranking. 29 drivers crossed the finish line in Bilbao. The separate ranking for the best national driver was won by Teodoro Monteys from the Unio Sportivas de Sans team , who finished 7th in the overall ranking.