The leaves are failing, the days are getting shorter and as October begins, the European road racing season is winding down, with a series of one-day races.
While the 2017 UCI WorldTour will officially end with the Tour of Guangxi (Oct 19-24) in China, Saturday's Il Lombardia and Sunday's Paris-Tours symbolically mark the end of the European season. Some minor races continue deeper into October, with the new Tacx Pro Classic in the Netherlands (Oct 14) and the Chrono des Nations (Oct 15) but after eight and a half months of action, all the racing will be done by the time the route of the 2018 Tour de France is presented in Paris on Tuesday October 17.
World champion Peter Sagan, Tour de France winner Chris Froome and WorldTour ranking leader Greg van Avermaet have already ended their seasons but many others will be in action this week in the final races in Italy, Belgium, Germany and France.
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The Grand Tour riders and climbers will enjoy the warm Italian autumn and have headed north to the Lombardy region after riding the Giro dell'Emilia and the Gran Premio Beghelli at the weekend. They will ride the Tre Valli Varesine on Tuesday, Milano-Torino on Thursday and then the big one, Il Lombardia – the final monumental Classic of the season – on Saturday.
The sprinters opt for flatter roads and cooler weather as they chase a final victory of the season. On Tuesday they can choose between the Binche-Chimay-Binche/Mémorial Frank Vandenbroucke in Belgium and the Sparkassen Münsterland Giro in northwest Germany. There is also Paris-Bourges on Thursday before Paris-Tours and the expected sprint finish on the famous Avenue de Grammont on Sunday.
Cyclingnews will have live coverage of the Italian races, plus full race reports, photo galleries and exclusive news and interviews.
Tre Valli Varesine
Binche-Chimay-Binche / Mémorial Frank Vandenbroucke
Sparkassen Münsterland Giro
Milano-Torino
Il Lombardia
Paris-Tours
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