Milano-Torino confirmed for 2012

Milano-Torino returns to the cycling calendar in 2012 after a five-year hiatus, with this year’s event confirmed for Wednesday, September 26. The race is owned by RCS Sport, and the Giro d’Italia organiser has reached an agreement which allows the Associazione Ciclistica Arona to organise it for the next three seasons.

Italian cycling’s oldest classic, the first Milano-Torino took place in 1876, and until 1987, the race traditionally took place the week before Milan-San Remo in March. It was subsequently switched to an October date, and along with the Giro del Piemonte and the Tour of Lombardy, it formed part of the “Trittico di Autunno” sequence of season ending races.

RCS returned Milano-Torino to its March slot in 2005, but the experiment lasted for just three years. Although officially Milano-Torino swapped its place on the calendar with the Strade Bianche (then Eroica) in 2008, the race ultimately did not take place that October, and has not been held since. Danilo Di Luca remains the last winner of Milano-Torino, when he outsprinted Juan Mauricio Soler in 2007.

The 2012 edition takes place the day before Gran Piemonte, in the week between the world championships and the Tour of Lombardy.

“Milano-Torino is the oldest race in Italy, its first edition took place in 1876 and we’re delighted to organise it,” AC Arona president Giorgio Sinigaglia told Gazzetta dello Sport. “That first race was won by Paolo Magretti, an engineering student who took part along with seven other riders. They left at 4 in the morning, and Magretti was the first to reach the finish on Via Giulio Cesare in Turin, greeted by a crowd of over 10,000 people.”

The route has yet to be confirmed, although traditionally the race began in Novate Milanese, near Milan, and included the climb of the evocative Colle di Superga before a rapid plunge to the finish at the Fausto Coppi velodrome. The 2007 race finished outside the track on Turin’s Corso Casale.