The International Cycling Union (UCI) and the organizers of the 2023 World Championships have revealed the routes of the event’s road competitions, which will have Edinburgh and Loch Lomond as the starting points for the elite and under 23 categories, respectively, while the Juniors fair will take place entirely in Glasgow.
The elite men’s route will start in the Scottish capital of Edinburgh, at the dormant Arthur’s Seat volcano, and then progress through the city’s old town before heading to Glasgow and doing 10 laps of the final circuit of the city. In total, they will travel 277.6 km with 3,167 meters of accumulated climb.
The elite women – including the under 23s – will start from Loch Lomond and cover a 62.6km route to Glasgow before doing six laps of the street circuit, with a total race distance of 157.4km and 1,930m of climbing.
The U23 men’s peloton will follow the same route, but will complete seven laps of the Glasgow street circuit (171.8km race distance and 2,123m climb).
Glasgow’s 14.4km technical street circuit features small, sharp climbs in the first kilometer (a total of 193m of climb per lap), followed by a fast, gently descending finish to the finish line at George Square in the city.
The junior long-distance races will take place entirely on the Glasgow street circuit: nine laps (129.6 km) for the junior men and five laps (72 km) for the junior women.
The dates of the road races are as follows
Saturday August 5: Junior men and junior women
Sunday August 6: Elite men
Saturday 12 August: Men under-23
Sunday August 13: Elite women (including sub-23 women).
Venues for long-distance and time trials © UCI
The decision to stage the elite men’s road race on the opening weekend and the elite women’s road race on the closing day was taken to ensure the best possible alignment with the UCI international road calendar, in particular with regarding their respective Tour de France.
The road time trials will take place in the Scottish city of Stirling (Great Britain). Stirling, dominated by Stirling Castle, is located in the center of Scotland, just over 40 km from Glasgow. The 2023 world time trial champions will be crowned there 25 years after Britain’s Chris Boardman won the opening prologue of the 1998 PruTour (now the Tour of Britain) in the same city.
As for the rest of the modalities, the Chris Hoy velodrome in Glasgow will host the finals on the track every day; while fans will be able to witness the downhill mountain bike competitions against the majestic backdrop of the Nevis mountain range.
The cross-country mountain bike (XCO) and cross-country marathon (XCM) competitions will take place at Glentress. One of the country’s best-known mountain bike spots, the Scottish Town Forest is located just over 90km south-east of Glasgow, in the Tweed Valley in the Scottish Borders.
The ‘Supermundial’ will gather in Glasgow and other venues in Scotland the track, road, BTT -descent, cross country and marathon World Championships. BMX -racing, freestyle flatland and park-, trial, indoor cycling, gran fondo and para-cycling -road and track-.
The 2023 Cycling World Championships, which will bring together 13 UCI World Championships in the different cycling disciplines, will be an event never seen before on the world scene. They are expected to host more than 8,000 amateur and elite cyclists from at least 120 countries and crown more than 190 UCI World Champions.
More than one million viewers are expected, with a global television audience that will exceed one billion and that will make it one of the 10 most watched sporting events on the planet.
Source: Ciclo21 y UCI