Tro Bro Leon Challenge

The Tro Bro Leon Challenge opens the farm lanes of the Pays de Léon to amateurs the day before the pros race on them, a chance to find out for yourself why this corner of north Finistère earned the nickname 'Hell of the West'. There is no clock and no ranking, just open roads and the ribinoù, ridden at whatever pace suits you.

Ribinoù is the Breton word for any unpaved way, and here it means dirt, gravel and sometimes cobbled tracks between the fields of a rolling, windy landscape caught between land and sea. The gravel routes lean hard into these sectors, and past editions have included a loop named after the Aber Wrac'h, one of the tidal inlets that give the Pays des Abers its name.

The race itself was born in Lannilis in 1984, created by Jean-Paul Mellouët and a group of friends. It started as an amateur event, turned professional in 2000 and has kept its local character, still famous for handing out a piglet as a prize. Riders collect their numbers in the race village in Lannilis, right where it all began.