Vegni presents route of 'the most important one-week race in the world'
Tadej Pogacar en route to victory at the 2023 Tirreno-Adriatico(Image credit: Getty Images Sport)
The 2023 Tirreno-Adriatico will feature a summit finish at Sarnano-Sassotetto on stage 5, while the race will once again get underway with an individual time trial in Lido di Camaiore. The weeklong event will take in some 13,800 metres of total climbing as its traverses central Italy en route to the Adriatic coast.
Like last year, Tirreno-Adriatico will again overlap entirely with Paris-Nice, getting underway on Monday, March 6 and finishing on Sunday, March 12, six days before Milan-San Remo. F
or the second year in succession, RCS Sport has also opted for an individual time trial rather than a team test on the opening day, with riders facing a flat, 11.5km course in Lido di Camaiore.
Two opportunities for the fast men follow, with stage 2 taking the race from Camaiore to Follonica, while stage 3 is a 216km trek from Tuscany into Umbria for a finish in Foligno.
The terrain grows more rugged on stage 4, a 219km leg from Greccio to Tortoreto. The finale sees the gruppo tackle three laps of a 17km circuit around Tortoreto, where the 3km climb to the finish has an average gradient of 7%.
The most obvious setpiece stage comes the next day, which brings the race 1,465m above sea level for a summit finish at Sarnano-Sassotetto.
A version of the ascent in the Marche featured on Tirreno-Adriatico in 2017 and 2020, but this time the climb is two kilometres longer than when Mikel Landa and Simon Yates claimed their stage victories.
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(Image credit: RCS Sport)
The stage profiles of Tirreno-Adriatico 2023(Image credit: RCS Sport)
Perhaps the toughest stage comes on the penultimate day, as the race tackles the steep 'walls' characteristic of the area - the so-called ‘muri marchigiani’ - on the road from Osimo Stazione to Osimo. There are over 3,000m of total climbing on stage 6, while the finishing circuit features gradients that touch 20%.
For the 57th time in Tirreno-Adriatico’s 58-year history, the race will conclude in the coastal town of San Benedetto del Tronto. Like last year, the once traditional final time trial has been dispensed with, and the sprinters should instead enjoy another opportunity on the seafront at the end of the 154km stage.
Tadej Pogacar won his second successive Tirreno-Adriatico in 2022, beating eventual Tour de France winner Jonas Vingegaard into second place. Indeed, the remarkably deep field included the winners of all three Grand Tours in 2022, with Jai Hindley placing 5th overall and Remco Evenepoel placing 11th after being Pogacar’s closet challenger for the first five days.
"We have had the chance to enjoy some extremely spectacular editions of Tirreno-Adriatico thanks to the presence of great stars in cycling, who have made our race the most important one-week race in the world,” director Mauro Vegni said during Thursday’s route presentation in Camaiore.
Barry Ryan is Head of Features at Cyclingnews. He has covered professional cycling since 2010, reporting from the Tour de France, Giro d’Italia and events from Argentina to Japan. His writing has appeared in The Independent, Procycling and Cycling Plus. He is the author of The Ascent: Sean Kelly, Stephen Roche and the Rise of Irish Cycling’s Golden Generation, published by Gill Books.
