Giro d'Italia

Giro d’Italia 2020 route includes high mountains, three time trials, and a return to Stelvio

Giro organizers have unveiled the route for 2020, with a three-stage spell in both Hungary and Sicily, almost 60km of time trials, and a brutal final week all on the menu.

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Photo: Emilio Andreoli/Getty Images

The 2020 Giro d’Italia is set to be an epic.

Next year’s race will include 10 stages over 200 kilometers, five mountaintop finishes, and a brutal final week. Despite the race including three individual time trials, the average stage length weighs in at over 170km.

High altitude climbs are back, despite the race not making it over the 2630m Passo Gavia in 2019 due to snow. The final week includes the Passo Stelvio, the race’s highest climb at 2758m, as well as three 2000m+ ascents in the penultimate stage.

Giro director Mauro Vegni unveiled the route for the Italian grand tour, which runs from May 9 to May 31, at a presentation in Milan on Thursday.

The 2020 Giro will open up with three days in Hungary. The opening 8.6km individual time trial will take place in Hungary’s capital Budapest, with two sprint stages coming afterward. The race then transfers to Sicily for three stages. The spell on the Italian island includes a summit finish on Mount Etna on stage 5.

The race transfers to mainland town Mileto for stage 7 for three sprint or breakaway stages all nearing or above 200km in length as the race winds north up the west coast. The first rest day falls after stage 9.

Two rolling stages follow for stage 10 and 11 before the Giro’s tribute to the Nove Colli gran fondo, which is based in Cesenatico, former home of Marco Pantani. Another sprinter stage follows before the longest time trial of the race, a 33.7km test through the vinyards of Prosecco-country. Stage 15 features another summit finish, atop of the 1290m Piancavallo climb.

After the second rest day comes one of the toughest final weeks in memory, with a long hilly 16th stage followed by two consecutive 200km stages featuring four major mountains. Stage 18 includes a passage of the 2,758m Stelvio.

The riders are given some respite in stage 19 with a flat stage – though as if that was too easy, it is 250km in length.

An epic penultimate stage ends the climbing with bang. The 200km mountain marathon includes the high-altitude climbs of Colle dell’Agnello, Col d’Izoard, and Col de Montgenèvre before a summit finish at Sestiere.

The race wraps up with a 16.5km time trial in Milan.

Peter Sagan announced during the presentation that he would race the Giro for the first time in 2020, along with his regular quest for the Tour de France green jersey.

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