 2024 Volta a Catalunya | |
 | |
| Race details | |
|---|---|
| Date | Late March |
| Region | Catalonia, Spain |
| English name | Tour of Catalonia |
| Local name(s) | Vuelta a Cataluña (in Spanish) Volta a Catalunya (in Catalan) |
| Discipline | Road |
| Competition | UCI World Tour |
| Type | Stage race |
| Organiser | "Volta" Ciclista a Catalunya Associació Esportiva (Unió Esportiva de Sants) |
| Race director | Rubèn Peris |
| Web site | www |
| History | |
| First edition | 1911 |
| Editions | 103 (as of 2024) |
| First winner |  Sebastià Masdeu (ESP) |
| Most wins |  Mariano Cañardo (ESP) (7 wins) |
| Most recent |  Tadej Pogačar (SLO) |
| History (women) | |
| First winner |  Marianne Vos (NED) |
| Most recent | Marianne Vos (NED) |
The Volta a Catalunya (Catalan pronunciation: [ˈvɔltə ə kətəˈluɲə]; Tour of Catalonia, Spanish: Vuelta a Cataluña) is a road bicycle race held annually in Catalonia, Spain.
It is one of three World Tour stage races in Spain, together with the Vuelta a España and the Tour of the Basque Country. The race has had several different calendar dates, having been previously run in September, June and May. Since 2010 it has been on the calendar in late March as part of the UCI World Tour.[1]
Raced over seven days, it covers the autonomous community of Catalonia in Northeast Spain and contains one or more stages in the mountain region of the Pyrenees.[2] The race traditionally finishes with a stage in Barcelona, Catalonia's capital, on a circuit with the famous Montjuïc climb and park.[3]
First held in 1911, the Volta a Catalunya is the fourth-oldest still-existing cycling stage race in the world.[4] Only the Tour de France (1903), the Tour of Belgium (1908) and the Giro d'Italia (1909) are older.[2] It was the second cycling event organized on the Iberian Peninsula, after the amateur and sub-23 race Volta a Tarragona (1908), also held in Catalonia but no longer on the calendar. Catalan cycling icon Mariano Cañardo won the race seven times in the 1920s and 1930s, setting an unsurpassed record.[5]
In 2018, the one-day women's competition reVolta was organised on the same day of the last men's stage. In 2024, the reVolta was replaced by a women's stage race, which is currently a category 2.1 UCI event.
- ^ Wynn, Nigel. "UCI WorldTour calendar 2016". Cycling Weekly. Retrieved 9 December 2015.
- ^ a b Hood, Andrew. "Volta a Catalunya short of big climbs, but not big names". Velo News. Retrieved 10 December 2015.
- ^ Axelgaard, Emil. "Volta a Catalunya stage 7 preview". Cycling Quotes. Retrieved 10 December 2015.
- ^ "100 Años de Historia". voltacatalunya.cat (in Spanish). Retrieved 10 December 2015.
- ^ Cite error: The named reference
100 years of historywas invoked but never defined (see the help page).