Muro di Sormano

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Upper section of the Muro di Sormano at 1075  m slm

The Muro di Sormano ( Italian : Wall of Sormano ) is a section of road west of the Lombard municipality of Sormano in Italy . The road is a shorter side branch of the east ramp, which leads north of the village of Asso to the 1124 meter high Colma di Sormano mountain pass. The ascent to the pass has been part of the Lombardy Tour for several years and, due to its extreme profile, is one of the steepest sections in a professional cycling race.

description

The course of the Muro di Sormano, north of it the alternative ramp of Strada provinciale number 44

North of the location Sormano branches to 820  m of the Muro di Sormano in western direction from the Strada Provinciale point 44 (SP44) from about which one in two switchback reaches the Colma di Sormano. This junction is marked with a large arrow on the side of the road, which shows next to the name "Muro di Sormano" a steeply upright bicycle. The course of the route has real switchbacks in only two places and is otherwise slightly winding, sometimes straight. After about 1.9 kilometers, the Muro di Sormano meets the SP44 again at 1116  m , which, however, requires 4.2 kilometers to overcome the same incline, and is thus a shortcut in terms of distance. A few meters after the two pass roads meet you will find the Colma di Sormano.

The narrow road thus has an average gradient of 15.8% and incline maxima of up to 27%. The road, which runs mainly through wooded area, is completely paved. The profile rises continuously without any flat passages; only the percentages vary.

Since the road surface was renovated and reopened in 2006, the section has been closed to motorized traffic. The street is painted with various quotes from cyclists as motivational slogans. At the same time, every meter of altitude on the asphalt is labeled - on the steepest sections, the altitude markings are reduced to less than four meters. One of the quotes comes from the Italian racing cyclist Gino Bartali and reads:

“Un passista non ha alternative. Deve arrivare ai piedi del muro con almeno dieci minuti di vantaggio so poi, se lo fa a piedi impiegando un quarto d'ora di più di quelli che lo faranno in bici, arriverà in cima con cinque o sei minuti di ritardo e potrà ancora sperare . "

“A rouleur has no alternative. When he arrives at the foot of the wall he has to have at least ten minutes ahead, because if he has to cope with it on foot and needs a quarter of an hour more than those who stay in the saddle, he arrives at the top five or six minutes late, so that he can still may hope. "

The design of the road surface with the quotes, best times, altitude markings and other graphic elements is also known as the "Open Air Museum of Historic Cycling" and was designed by a Spanish architecture firm.

The west ramp, which is significantly more moderate in terms of the gradient, connects the pass with the village of Nesso on Lake Como .

Importance in cycling

The Muro di Sormano was part of the one-day race and cycling classic Lombardy Tour for the first time between 1960 and 1962 . The then race director Vicente Torriani had planned the change in the route plan at short notice in order to counteract the sprint finishes that had become the norm in previous years and to make the race more selective. Despite multiple threats of boycott, the race with all of the favorites at the time took place on October 16, 1960.

In 1960 Arnaldo Pambianco managed the climb in 11 minutes 20 seconds, a year later Imerio Massignan in 10 minutes 9 seconds, who won the race in 1961. During this time, the cyclist Ercole Baldini dominated this climb, which in 1962 became the record holder of the climb with 9 minutes 24 seconds. Baldini himself described the rise as "bestial". Because of the enormous incline of the then not asphalted road and because many cyclists were brought down by the fans, this section was deleted from the tour. After the road surface was renovated for 150,000 euros and the section was reopened in 2006, the Muro di Sormano was reopened in 2012 due to the demands of many cycling enthusiasts. That year Joaquim Rodríguez managed the Muro di Sormano in 9 minutes 2 seconds.

Even professional cyclists choose a gear ratio close to a 1: 1 ratio for the races in which the Muro di Sormano is part of the route . So was Alberto Contador on a translation of 36 to 28 or even to choose the 30th His then team boss Bjarne Riis even criticized the climb as too difficult and excessive to be built into a race of this importance.

The record for the fastest ascent of the Muro di Sormano is held by the Italian amateur cyclist Matteo Cappè, who mastered the ramp in an individual mountain time trial on September 26, 2009 in a time of 7 minutes 38 seconds, and thus an average speed of 13, 3 km / h reached.

On May 26, 2019, the 15th stage led from Ivrea to Como of the Giro d'Italia 2019 over the Colma di Sormano, but remaining on the SP44 via the easier variant.

literature

  • Daniel Friebe, Pete Goding: Mountain High: Europe's 50 Greatest Cycle Climbs , Quercus, 2011, ISBN 978-0-85738-625-0 , pp. 42-45.
  • Daniel Friebe, Pete Goding: Mountain stages: 50 classic climbs from the Tour de France, Giro d'Italia and Vuelta a España , Delius Klasing, Bielefeld 2012, ISBN 978-3-7688-3530-5 , pp. 42–45.
  • Peter Cossins: The Monuments. The grit and the glory of cycling's greatest one-day races . Bloomsburg, 2014, ISBN 978-1-4088-4682-7 .

Web links

Commons : Muro di Sormano  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c Friebe, Goding: Mountain High: Europe's 50 Greatest Cycle Climbs . P. 42
  2. ↑ We are still in the process of comforting those who have been relegated ... , article January 24, 2018, accessed October 14, 2019
  3. ^ Project description for the street design of Muro di Sormano , accessed on October 14, 2019
  4. ↑ Lombardy Tour in: Udo Witte: Campionissimo, Monsieur Chrono, Kanibale & Co. Professional road bike races after 1945. (Volume 2) Books on Demand, Norderstedt 2015, ISBN 978-3-7392-7824-7 .
  5. ↑ Procycling : Wall of Terror , December 2012 article, accessed October 14, 2019
  6. ↑ ilombardia.it: The Muro Di Sormanon: Two Kilometers for bike heroes , article from August 24, 2017, accessed October 5, 2019
  7. ↑ radsport-news.com: Contador at 36/30 for Muro di Sormano , accessed on October 14, 2019
  8. ↑ Carica dei 101, Muro di Somano
  9. ^ Friebe, Goding: Mountain High: Europe's 50 Greatest Cycle Climbs. P. 44

Coordinates: 45 ° 52 ′ 57 ″  N , 9 ° 14 ′ 12 ″  E