The best amateurs are set for fresh rainbow jersey battles as the UCI Gran Fondo World Championships storm the Great Ocean Road a year after a spectacular 2024 edition in Aalborg, Denmark.
The event heads back Down Under nine years after the inaugural UCI Gran Fondo World Championships were held in Perth, some 3,500 kilometres away from Lorne and Geelong, which hosted the UCI Road World Champions in 2010 and where this week’s action will be packed.
A comprehensive programme over four days (16-19 October) in Australia will see men and women in age categories ranging from 19-34 to 85-89 taking on the time trial, the team relay and the Gran Fondo. No fewer than 45 UCI World Champion titles are up for grabs.
Three varied courses
The action will come thick and fast from Thursday, with the individual time trial (ITT) kicking off the racing. The 22.7km course starts and finishes in Lorne as the riders go back and forth on Victoria’s iconic Great Ocean Road. The turning point is at the Memorial Arch built in honour of the 3,000 returned soldiers who worked on the road and its creation during World War I. The main hill of the course will contribute to most of the 393 metres of elevation gain.
On Friday, the team relay introduced in the 2024 UCI Gran Fondo World Championships returns and takes the riders to Geelong, 70 kilometres north of Lorne. Squads of four riders (one male rider any age, one female rider any age, one male/female rider 40+, one male/female rider 50+) will take over the port city, each of them covering three laps of a 1.9km circuit.
The road races will be held on Sunday. The course kicks off uphill, starting at sea level and rising to 445 metres of altitude after 11km. The field will face another ascent up Mount Sabine to hit 556 metres of altitude (the highest point of the race) just after the halfway mark. Riders will then head back to the Great Ocean Road and Lorne, where UCI Gran Fondo World Champions will be crowned across the day.
At the same time, Amy’s Gran Fondo will be held on the same roads. Held since 2011, it is at the origin of the 2025 UCI Gran Fondo Worlds being held on the Great Ocean Road. Amy’s Foundation was established in 2006 following the tragic death of Australian athlete Amy Gillett.
Returning UCI World Champions plus new contenders
An impressive 2000 riders, representing 54 nations, have registered to participate in the 2025 UCI Gran Fondo World Championships. At home, Australians make for the biggest contingent, with 952 riders across all age categories, ahead of riders from New Zealand (74 riders), Great Britain (67), France (55), Japan (50).
All contenders qualified by finishing in the top 25% of their age group in a UCI Gran Fondo World Series event. The battle to get a ticket for the Great Ocean Road started at the end of 2024, at the Granfondo Matildica (in Italy). A total of 28 events were held across all continents, until the GF Association Española (Uruguay), at the beginning of September.
Several UCI Gran Fondo World Champions crowned last year in Denmark gear up to defend their titles. Great Britain’s Linda Dewhurst ruled both the road race and the ITT. Poland’s Wojciech Szczepanik and Jakub Rucinski were part of the quartet that ruled the team relay. Spain’s Raúl Patiño Delgado (ITT M50-54), Switzerland’s Roman Locher (road race M40-44), Japan’s Akihiro Takaoka (road race M45-49), Norway’s Jørn Fjeldavlie (road race M60-64) and Switzerland’s Anita Klaiber (road race F50-54) are other defending gran fondo UCI World Champions lining up in Australia.
They will face hundreds of rainbow chasers where everyone can dream of glory!