Transcontinental Race 2026, with spoilers

[mjr]

The checkpoints and compulsory parcourses(?) are out and it's a new challenge, from north to south, Trondheim to Kalamata.

Josh Ibbet has published a preview at

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Y8c6xZxJS0


So, some early ferry choices, including whether to take a long ferry from Sweden, or shorter ones to and from Denmark. Could split up early and get very interesting if faster riders pick slower ferries, or suffer delays, and then chase.

 

[matticus]

Thanks! For me this is the most interesting route for years (at least at this stage, further facts may emerge). I love the Race-to-the-Sun* feel, and the views in Norway will be something else, together with the feeling of the sun barely setting during that 1st night ... I'm getting tingles!

It's a long one, innit? And 2,000km between Norway and Slovakia checkpoint - that alone is further than most of us have ridden in a week!

*They should have a Used-Warm-Clothing bring-n-buy at Checkpoint 2.

 

[Ajax Bay]

Larvick-Hirtshals (120km SSW of Oslo - tip of Denmark) seems the front runner to me. Simplifies the route from Flåm SE and the ride through Denmark on better roads to ride on than the coast road SSE from Oslo down to (at least) Helsingborg. Four hour trip should give the rider a 3 hour kip.
A myriad of ferry choices!
A long time ago coming south I changed ferries mid-Sognefjord, alighted at Flåm and took the train up to Myrdal, and camped. The parcours leaving Flåm follows the gravel road alongside the (mountain) railway, to the extent it can (not through tunnels aiui).

Start: 19 July in Trondheim, Norway,
Finish: Kalamata, Greece
Control Points/Parcours are:

• CP1: Flåm, Norway – Riders must climb out of the fjord on the Rallarvegen
• CP2: Tatra Mountains, Slovakia – Praded mountain, then to Chopok mountain
• CP3: Sarajevo, Bosnia & Herzegovina – track beside the 1984 Winter Olympic bobsleigh track on Mt Trebević.
• CP4: Leskovik, Albania - parcours on tracks

 

[yello]

Coincidentally, I was reading only last week a report of the 2025 event written by the fittingly named vainqueur Victor Bisoni. He didnt hang about.