Alta Via Stage Race 2016: Challenge Yourself, Defy Your Limits

We have good news for all MTB enthusiasts. Alta Via Stage Race is back from 18th to 25th of June 2016, packed with even more emotions and more great scenery to ride. A 550 km-long course with 19,000 meters of elevation gain between the Mediterranean sea and the Apennines is an exciting opportunity to experience Liguria region in the saddle of your mountain bike. If you have what it takes to participate in one of the most prestigious and spectacular stage-races around, you should check this out. AVSR is about emotions, difficulties, fatigue, unexpected issues and intense moments of happiness. Registration has been already opened.

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Although the organizers promise to increase the fun factor, making the race course more rideable than in previous editions, the stages are still going to be tough and long so don't expect an easy race though. Already the fifth edition again brings out the urge to accept the challenge, to do your best, not to give up until the end. Not only the race gives you the chance to challenge yourself but get to know the whole region from east to west, in its most intimate details. And that's why the race is loved by many, it's more than a competition, it has the whole Liguria inside.

AVSR is a challenging race and a real endeavor to finish. However, stage after stage, it is able to leave a deep impression in the heart and soul of each participant, leaving a memory, a taste of the territory that is impossible to forget. The AVSR adventure puts a strain on the 'combo' rider/machine, not only from the physical point of view: intelligence and strategy can be critical. Each participant must be prepared to adapt to continuous environmental changes, to early wake-ups in a village with one hundred other people - all in the midst of Nature, night and day. Once in the saddle, it is race time. Pushing hard is essential as much as facing the race with intelligence: staying focused on navigation (with GPS and maps) and on properly managing energy levels.

From the Apennines of the La Spezia region, the race course reaches the pre-alpine domain of the Ligurian Alps in the province of Imperia, passing through places and landscapes of rare beauty between coast and hinterland.

Moving from east to west along the Ligurian mountains the landscape changes: the trails and the way of interpreting them need to change as well. From mule-tracks to long dirt roads, from descents carved into fresh rocks to single-tracks immersed in the Mediterranean scrub...or even higher, on the ridges among green and steep meadows. Liguria has this all and AVSR takes the riders through each one of these environments.

You can register here.

Photos: ©Nicola Damonte / ALTAVIASTAGERACE.COM