New start time of fondo series on Saturdays is 10:00 CET!
Medio fondo “par excellence”. A true fondo style of course traveling around Celje basin, cresting into two distinct river walleys and finishing above Celje city at the picturesque ancient Celje castle.
The course it self is very demanding. With more than 1700vm of climbing in ~100km of distance is the second most hilly course in this 10 week long serié. Climbers will love it. There are five distinct climbs along the course and all are nice climbs with gradients between 5-9%. No extreme gradients here, almost no red colour indicating steep slopes on a profile, just regular nice roads, but with significant climbing volume.
The climbs acording to popular Strava segments runs in following order:
Podmeja, 4.6km (6.7%)
Čeče, 2.8km (8.4%)
Dol pri Hrastniku, 2.2km (4.7%)
Svetina climb, 6.6km (6.7%)
Celje castle climb, 1.9km (7.8%)
The first hour of the fondo is flat and provides many small launch pads for a break away to establish. If a non climber wants to take a win here, he has to go away early, build decend lead before first climb and than still have terribly good day on a bike.
After the hitting the lower slopes of first climb, the bunch will desintegrate into many dispersed one-two-three rider groups that will very likely stay appart for the rest of the fondo. Only the strongest group might stay together until penultimate climb, and if not before, even this group will fall apart on that climb. If, by some strange combination, a small group of two or three riders still come together into the Celje city, than there will be the last climb where the strongest rider will outclimb others. No chance of a sprint clash here. The course is simply too demanding for people to stay together until finish line.
Register to event here