Founders Leg 5 · Saturday 3 October 2026
The biggest climbing day in Ride25 history, on empty roads through Irpinia and into Basilicata.
The hardest day of the leg. Eat a big breakfast and leave early.
Call the crew for a lift, a mechanical or if you are lost. Everyone is also in the ride WhatsApp group.
Very light all day. Near calm in the morning, 3 to 5 km/h from the east, then a north easterly of 6 to 8 km/h after lunch. The wind will not be the problem today. It starts cool at about 13°C and reaches 22°C, so bring arm warmers or a gilet for the early climbs and the high ground near Potenza.
Forecast from Open-Meteo, taken on 30 September 2026. Check it again on the morning.
The country you ride through
The first hour runs through the Taurasi vineyards. Taurasi is a big red made from Aglianico and is often called the Barolo of the South. Montemarano, above the coffee stop, is known across Campania for the tarantella it dances at carnival time.
Nusco sits on a ridge at over 900 m and calls itself the balcony of Irpinia because of its views across the Apennines. It is the home town of Ciriaco De Mita, prime minister of Italy in 1988 and 1989.
At 19.34 on Sunday 23 November 1980 a magnitude 6.9 earthquake struck this valley. Around 2,900 people died and whole villages fell down. The epicentre was between Teora, Conza della Campania and Castelnuovo di Conza, and today's route goes straight through all three. Old Conza was abandoned and rebuilt lower down, and much of what you see in these villages dates from after 1980. Below Conza lies Lago di Conza, a reservoir on the Ofanto that is now a WWF nature reserve with herons and storks.
The Ofanto rises near Nusco and runs about 170 km east to the Adriatic near Barletta. It is the river beside which Hannibal destroyed a Roman army at Cannae in 216 BC, one of the worst defeats Rome ever suffered.
After Conza you cross into Basilicata, the region the Romans called Lucania. Lunch is at Pescopagano, at a place whose name means Where Eagles Dare. Near Castelgrande, on the summit of Toppo, is an astronomical observatory at 1,258 m. Muro Lucano is stacked in tiers above a deep gorge. In its castle in 1382 Queen Joanna I of Naples was murdered on the orders of her cousin and heir Charles of Durazzo.
Potenza, at about 820 m, is the highest regional capital in Italy. The Roman town of Potentia has been flattened by earthquakes several times, most recently in 1857 and 1980, so the centre is compact and rebuilt. The city is so steep it has one of the longest public escalator systems in Europe. Every 29 May it stages the Parata dei Turchi, a costumed parade for its patron saint, San Gerardo.
Local heroes
Francesco De Sanctis, the father of Italian literary criticism, was born in 1817 in Morra Irpina, a few km from Teora and renamed Morra De Sanctis in his honour. His History of Italian Literature is still the standard work, and he served as the first Minister of Education of united Italy in 1861. The same hills produced Ciriaco De Mita of Nusco, who led the Christian Democrats and became prime minister in 1988.
Potenza's best known son is Emilio Colombo, born there in 1920. He was one of the builders of post war Europe, President of the European Parliament and prime minister of Italy from 1970 to 1972. He served in Parliament for more than 60 years.