1,500 cyclists from 26 countries, up to 12 hours of riding and twice as many participants on Istrian roads than the last year – that is the recap of this year's edition of Istria300, a unique cycling event for passionate cyclists worldwide, held on Saturday, October 8th.
Under the slogan "Ride your Limits!", 1,500 cyclists from different parts of the world competed on courses of 300, 230, and 156 kilometres. They all started and finished in Poreč, but they could have decided what course they wanted to complete during the ride - another feature of this event that makes it unique worldwide.
It was extremely tense in the finals, but the winners on the 300-kilometre course were the same as last year: Hans-Jörg Leopold from Austria in the men's competition with a time of 8:47:46, which was 24 minutes and 26 seconds better than the previous year and Astrid Schartmüller from Germany in the women's competition with a time of 9:47:16, which is 47 minutes and 42 seconds better than the last year. Austrian David Polzer and Slovenian Eva Zorman were the fastest on the 230-kilometre course, while the winners on the shortest course of 155 kilometres were Slovenian Klemen Jančan and Italian Anna Biani.
Famous Croatian pro cyclist Fran Miholjević, former Slovenian biathlete Vasja Rupnik, former ski jumper Robert Kranjec, and the Olympic gold medal winners Nicola Thost from Germany and Martin Koch from Austria are event ambassadors. The 2021 European Champion in road biking, Sonny Colbrelli, was the honourable guest of the 2022 edition and received the starting number 300, a symbolic sign of the Istria300.
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