Passo Gavia at Dawn, Passo Stelvio by Noon: Bormio's Double Legend - TdP Stage 4

Bormio at 6am is a different town. Shutters down, fountains running for nobody, the smell of espresso not yet in the air — just cold Alpine light and two mountain passes waiting. This is Stage 4 of Tour de Pasta 2026, and after Stage 3's brutal double ascent of the Stelvio, today was supposed to be the "easy" one. It wasn't, exactly — but it did deliver two of the most storied climbs in cycling.

First up: Passo Gavia. Legs still heavy from the day before, I rolled out through the still-sleeping streets and into Santa Caterina Valfurva and Ponte dell'Alpe, climbing at a pace best described as "survival." The Gavia doesn't have the fame of its neighbour, but it has the scars — this is the pass where the 1988 Giro d'Italia turned into cycling folklore. A June snowstorm buried the peloton so completely that the Italian press dubbed it "the day the big men cried." Andy Hampsten rode through it to become the first American ever to wear the maglia rosa — and today, even in July, the wind picked up hard near the summit and it felt genuinely wintry. No snow this time, just enough cold to remind you why the Gavia earned its reputation.

After a fast descent back into Bormio and a very necessary second breakfast (cream brioche, obviously), the sun finally broke through — and rather than call it a day, I turned the bike around for Passo Stelvio. This side of Bormio climbs up through the wild Braulio valley, a landscape that's as much a war memorial as it is a cycling road: the valley and the pass above it were a front line in the WWI "Guerra Bianca," fought at altitudes where troops were as likely to die from the bitter cold as from combat. The road itself is a 19th-century engineering feat, cut by Carlo Donegani's crews between 1820 and 1825 to link Habsburg Lombardy with the Tyrol. It didn't see a bicycle race until 1953, when Fausto Coppi crested it first on his way to another Giro title — which is exactly why the Stelvio's summit still carries the name Cima Coppi, the highest point of the modern Giro route. Conquista

By the time I reached the top, the traffic had picked up (it is July, after all) but so had the views — full sweeping shots down the Braulio valley and back toward Bormio. The descent back into town closed out one of the longest, most contrast-filled days of the whole Tour de Pasta: ice and wind on one pass, sunshine and switchbacks on the other.

Stage 4 — Tour de Pasta 2026 📍 Bormio → Passo Gavia → Bormio → Passo Stelvio → Bormio 📅 8th July 2026 ⛰️ Two HC climbs, one recovery day that wasn't

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