Luis León Sánchez debuts at 2024 EPIC Gran Canaria RIU Hotels & Resorts

Just a few months after announcing his retirement as a professional, the Murcian cyclist Luis León Sánchez opened his 2024 season at EPIC Gran Canaria RIU Hotels & Resorts cycle sports race for the first time

Photo: Luis León Sánchez and Haimar Zulbeldia lead a select group up the incredible climb of Pueblo Tirajana at over 800m on Gran Canaria. credit: @photoset_sport

Photo: Luis León Sánchez and Haimar Zulbeldia lead a select group up the incredible climb of Pueblo Tirajana at over 800m on Gran Canaria. credit: @photoset_sport

Determined to crown the peaks of Gran Canaria, Luis León Sánchez began his first season outside of professional road cycling on the island, leading a starting line full of stars.

Luis León Sánchez has been linked to sport his entire life, first with football and as a cycling professional in 2004 within the Liberty Seguros team. Known and recognized as a time trialist, he won his first Spanish Time Trial Championship in 2008, but it would not be the last, since from that moment on he began to accumulate victories as champion of Paris-Nice and a stage of the Tour de France in 2009, the Championship. of Spain Time Trial in 2010, 2011 and 2012, and as champion of the XXX edition of the Clásica San Sebastián,

He won the first stage of the Tropicale Amissa Bongo, which he completed as second on the podium, a stage in the Vuelta a Castilla y León and was on the podium in the Clásica de Ordizia, the Vuelta a Andalucía, and reached the mountain classification in the Back to Spain. With the Spanish team he won the gold medal in the road race at the European Games in Baku, and continued to add to his record with stages in the Tour of the Algarve, the Tour of the Basque Country, the Tour of Murcia, the Tour of the Alps , the Tour of Almaty, the Tour of Switzerland, or the Bruno Beghelli Grand Prix, among other sporting achievements.

After announcing his retirement in September 2023, Luis León Sánchez will faced the EPIC Gran Canaria RIU Hotels & Resorts challenge for the first time, on February 10 and 11, 2024, to start a season full of new challenges for the Murcian with energy , which has already confirmed MTB events for this new stage.

Along for the ride were stars including: Haimar Zulbeldia, Claudio Chiapucci, Mario Cipollini and Igor Astarloa to name a few!

This cycle sports race was sold out with than 500 confirmed entrants representing around twenty nationalities from all over the planet and will be the world headquarters of the Gran Fondo World Championship in 2024, crowning the world champions. In addition, the test has been twinned with several events in Italy, building bridges with the 5 Mila Marche, and the international Prosecco Cycling test in Valdobbiadene, in Veneto.

The EPIC Gran Canaria RIU Hotels & Resorts turned Maspalomas into the epicenter of international cycling with two stages with 115 kilometers and two timed sections, and 75 kilometers and a competitive section. This weekend cycling made the south of Gran Canaria vibrate with excitement with a first stage departing from the RIU Palace Maspalomas hotel and with a circuit that runs through Arteara, Fataga, Tirajana and El Pajar to Pasito Blanco .

The first timed section of this first stage was a challenge of 12.3 kilometers at 470 meters of altitude and with an average inclination of 4.4% between Aqualand and Ayagaures, with the finish line at the Pedro González summit. The second stage time trial challenged athletes to give their best with 45 kilometers and 1,304 meters of altitude, with an average slope of 4.7% between Pasito Blanco on its way up to Ayacata, on a route through Cercados de Espino, Soria, Barranquillo Andrés, the Las Niñas dam to Ayacata.

The second stage was decisive in naming the podium, with 75 kilometers of circuit and a time trial of 22 kilometers at 1,304 meters high, with an average slope of 4.7%. This stage runs through Fataga to Tirajana, to return to the RIU Palace Maspalomas via Santa Lucía, La Era, Vecindario, Doctoral and Bahía Feliz via the GC-65 and the GC-500.

2024 Gran Canaria Results

Offical results and report will be released next week, live results are at https://toptime.live/resultados/epic-gran-canaria-2024/

The EPIC Gran Canaria Hotels & Resorts will crown "New World Champions at the 2024 Gran Fondo World Tour® Championship".

Gran Canaria, the Premier Sports Destination for Cycling

The EPIC Gran Canaria RIU Hotels & Resorts turned Maspalomas into a great sports festival with a weekend full of surprises, a show, a batucada, entertainment during the tour, an expo area, a collective lunch, and an awards ceremony at the foot of the Maspalomas dunes. EPIC Gran Canaria supports the objective with which it was born in 2018, that of showing Gran Canaria as a top-level sports destination and teaching the world through cycling the benefits of the island as a privileged place for tourism and recreation. quality sport, with infrastructure and services, security and a unique, spring-like climate in the middle of winter.

The EPIC Gran Canaria RIU Hotels & Resorts has the support of the Insular Sports Institute of the Cabildo de Gran Canaria, Maspalomas Costa Canaria, RIU Hotels & Resorts, Turismo Gran Canaria, Hospiten, Free Motion, Nektium, Coca-Cola, Aquabona, and Esenat, among others.

This non-competitive stretch is a two-wheeled sports paradise and one of the attractions that attracts thousands of amateur and professional cyclists to the island every year.