Jun 7
Ranxo Gravel by The Traka
14 days to go.
Ponts · Lleida · Organised by Klassmark
160 / 100 / 68 km·Race·From 65€·~700 participants
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Same organisation as The Traka, but if Girona's flagship is the Mediterranean - pine, holm oak, sea breeze - Ranxo is the other Catalonia. Drier. Exposed. The Ponts terrain north of Lleida sits at the edge of the Pre-Pyrenees, where the Segre river cuts through limestone canyons and the country opens out into ranch land that looks more like inland Spain than the Empordà plain.
Klassmark built Ranxo to give the Traka regulars a second weekend that doesn't feel like a smaller Traka. Different earth, different light, different demands. The 160 km is one of Catalonia's hardest one-day rides: almost 2,000 m of elevation across exposed ridges and steep ramps out of riverbeds, technical descents on loose limestone gravel that punish inattention, long open sections where the wind has no obstacle for tens of kilometres. The 100 trims the worst of it but keeps the character. The 68 km is a fair introduction to inland Catalan gravel - short enough to ride steady, long enough to understand why the long course commands respect.
UCI Gravel World Series and Gravel Earth Series, so the field is international and serious from the start line. But the rural Ponts setting keeps it intimate - fewer big-brand activations, more local farmers nodding from the side of the road, the kind of finish-line spread that happens when a small town hosts a thousand people for one Saturday a year.
Heat is the single biggest variable. June can range from a civilised 22 °C to a brutal 36 °C, and water is sparser than on coastal events - carry more than you think. Worth arriving the night before; the drive in from Barcelona is two and a half hours, and the start is early.