Which country has the best races?

[Lurkerman]

Here is a poll. Looking at the full season, which country, in your opinion, is the most successful at hosting good, high-level and exciting road cycling races? Who has the best parcours?

 

[rallybanana]

Australia has the hottest racing

 

[YavorD]

My vote goes to Italy.
Tirreno is okay. San Remo is not a great fun (usually) but the views of Italian rivera are beautiful, so credits for that.
The Giro is...just the Giro. Has the potential for many different great routes, coupled with stunningly beautiful places.
And there goes Lombardia, which is fairly boring nowadays, but we can't deny the beauty of lake Como or Bergamo in this year's route.

 

[YavorD]

Also, no respect for Norway?

 

[DJ Sprtsch]

My vote goes to Rwanda.

 

[ingsve]

Seems like a fairly biased time to put this poll up.

 

[Lurkerman]

Also, no respect for Norway?

Obviously you can include only nine countries in the poll when you also need to make room for the Vino-option. I really like Tour of Norway + Arctic Race, I'm just not sure how they rank in terms of forum favoritism. I was mostly going off who has WT-races, but just decided to put Oman up there instead of UAE, Denmark, Canada, or China

 

[red_flanders]

Take your pick.

• Belgium has LBL, Flanders, Fleche, E3, Dwars, GW, and more. But no GT or any top-level stage race.
• France has Roubaix and the Tour.
• Italy has the Giro, MSR, Strade, and Lombardia, with few really good smaller races, plus T-A. Wonderful.

I voted Italy. Anyone voting for a country outside those 3 is drunk.

Spain has some nice races, but let's be honest, it's always been some fairly second-rate stuff, and they completely eliminated themselves with the fiasco at the Vuelta this year.

 

[Lurkerman]

Take your pick.

• Belgium has LBL, Flanders, Fleche, E3, Dwars, GW, and more. But no GT or any top-level stage race.
• France has Roubaix and the Tour.
• Italy has the Giro, MSR, Strade, and Lombardia, with few really good smaller races, plus T-A. Wonderful.

I voted Italy. Anyone voting for a country outside those 3 is drunk.

Spain has some nice races, but let's be honest, it's always been some fairly second-rate stuff, and they completely eliminated themselves with the fiasco at the Vuelta this year.

Good summary in your three-points list. It captures my feeling that maybe France is a bit weak at the top? I do enjoy Paris-Nice, but Dauphine is just a prep race. I still voted France, however, and it's a lot of the smaller races that really does it for me. Tro Bro Leon, those races that Guillaume Martin wins, there's just always good racing on in France, even Paris-Tours soon usually is good, they keep on churning them out

 

[red_flanders]

Good summary in your three-points list. It captures my feeling that maybe France is a bit weak at the top? I do enjoy Paris-Nice, but Dauphine is just a prep race. I still voted France, however, and it's a lot of the smaller races that really does it for me. Tro Bro Leon, those races that Guillaume Martin wins, there's just always good racing on in France, even Paris-Tours soon usually is good, they keep on churning them out

Yeah I missed P-N and the Dauphine, thank you. France is an entirely reasonable and defensible vote. The biggest race in the world and arguably the best one-day race. I mean...one only argues that Roubaix is the best if they're delusional and haven't been to the Ronde, but I'll allow it. 😜

 

[Lurkerman]

Australia has the hottest racing

Good shout. Don't know about the weather but the racing, speaking in metaphors, should be even hotter next year, just heard Patrick Broe explain that all WT teams will now be more-or-less forced to ride Cadel's, and then Surf Coast Classic gets an upgrade and Herald Sun Tour returns. That's a good contribution to cycling. I really like something like "Surf Coast Classic" because "Surf Coast Classics" sounds like a Beach Boys compilation cd, makes me think of Bini and TLA as pretty chill dudes because of how they have this race on their palmares. Perhaps more Belgium one-day races who wish to attract better riders could come up with cooler names, like "#420 Blaze It", then you'd have riders suddenly want it to have it on their palmares, although if the names get too political then maybe some teams will get apprehensive about participating in spite of their riders

 

[Lurkerman]

Also bad that I forgot Portugal in this poll, Volta is a legendary and I like Figueira + Algarve, that's a good contribution also

 

[Logic-is-your-friend]

Belgium has the best races, because without the Belgian races, you could basically pack it up and close shop.

 

[GenericBoonenFan]

France, best monument (most times) and best GT (altough not in the Pogi era).

Don't get me wrong I like Italy but apart from this year San-Remo is a snooze fest, the Giro always fucks up the broadcasting somewhere and by the time Lombardia rolls around I'm more into CycloX.

Can't vote for my own country since we don't have a GT even tho LBL and RVV fill up the other one-day-race podium spots

 

[saunaking]

Even Hitler wouldn't have voted for Germany

 

[Wyndbrook]

France, best monument (most times) and best GT (altough not in the Pogi era).

Don't get me wrong I like Italy but apart from this year San-Remo is a snooze fest, the Giro always fucks up the broadcasting somewhere and by the time Lombardia rolls around I'm more into CycloX.

Can't vote for my own country since we don't have a GT even tho LBL and RVV fill up the other one-day-race podium spots

Well I voted for your country, I could do without July, but not March/ April.

 

[Tim Cahill]

Colombia because they have the narcos camera lens where it looks like they used a grey seethrough quality street wrapper as the filter.