The route* follows the Rhine from Basel to Kleve, but doesn’t stick to it: twice it climbs far above the valley, with plains, cities and industry in between. In 2026 it measured about 827 kilometres and 4,627 metres of climbing; for 2027 we re-check it on test rides. The description follows the 2026 line in the direction of travel; supply gaps and time estimates are empirical values from scouting and the 2026 ride.

• Distance: 2026 about 827 km and 4,627 metres of climbing; we re-check the 2027 line on test rides
• Character: two blocks of elevation (Black Forest with the Schauinsland, Hunsrück), with long plains, cities, industry and the Lower Rhine in between
• Challenge: high – fitness, night riding and self-sufficiency over longer gaps
• Bivouac kit is mandatory – as a safety reserve, even with planned hotel nights

The line carries the spirit of 1894 into the present – not as a copy of the old transit route, but over quiet paths that the riders of the time didn’t yet know.

Immerse yourself in a newly designed route that revives the heritage of the first long-distance rides of 1894! With clever line choice between flowing gravel axes, quiet river valleys and long night passages you experience the best of then and now on your gravel bike. Your adventure begins in the heart of Basel: between the Rhine, old town and the edge of the Black Forest. The sounds of the city still echo, and already the open landscape pulls you out – wide Rhine plains, dense forests, first ridges. It is the prelude to an unforgettable journey. Soon the vastness of the route opens up: along the Upper Rhine, past vineyards and cities, through quiet meadows and over historic paths. You roll through the night, find your rhythm on long straights, fight through small climbs and feel every kilometre – carried by the flow of the line, which unfolds as if by itself. At the end awaits Kleve – with the silhouette of the Schwanenburg and the feeling of being part of a history more than a hundred years old. The journey home is easy, but it’s worth lingering: between the Lower Rhine and the Dutch border, in a landscape full of calm, vastness and stories. Here your circle closes – and this distance ride stays not only in your legs, but deep in your memory. Original accounts · sources: You’ll find the full eyewitness accounts by Grüttner, Schweinsmann and Guthknecht here

The Basel–Kleve distance ride of 1894 was not just a race – it was an epic adventure. Days before the start, the riders already battled on the approach with bad weather, impassable roads and improvised ‘ponchos’ made of coffee sacks, which billowed in the wind like balloons and caused a stir in every village. On the morning of 15 September the starting gun fired in St. Ludwig . In strictly ordered groups the riders rolled out, accompanied by thick fog, pouring rain and fierce headwind. Soon the field fell apart – some relied on tandem pacemakers, others fought alone. Crashes, breakdowns and desperate repairs shaped the first hours. Along the way the unpredictable lurked: oxen gone wild forced whole groups to stop, bolting horse-carts threw the race into chaos. At night, fog and wind turned the road into a test of body and nerves. Some even lost their machine in the darkness amid the crush of spectators at the control stations. And yet they held on. In the end, Fritz Opel and Adolf Gutknecht rolled onto the finishing straight almost simultaneously after over 600 kilometres. Only a few seconds decided it – Opel had the edge. Third was Hermann Weiss from Nuremberg.

A public festival in Kleve

What in Kleve followed was a celebration without equal. The small town transformed into a metropolis of sport: houses decorated with garlands and flags, gun salutes announced the arrival of the riders, tens of thousands lined the streets. When Opel shot across the line, the cheering carried him like a hero. In the evening there were garden concerts, fireworks and dancing – a whole city in a state of exception. For a few days Kleve had twice as many inhabitants as usual, inns and halls were overcrowded, and the newspapers even reported a ‘small famine’.

More than a race

Basel–Kleve was a crossing between man and machine, between order and chaos, between sporting seriousness and festive mood. It was:

• a testing ground for technology – from Brennabor and Victoria bicycles to Continental pneumatic tyres, which shone as winners at the finish.
• a Drama on the road – with crashes, breakdowns and tricks that later became myths.
• a a social event – that transformed a small town into a world stage.

Basel–Kleve thus remains an emblem of cycling’s pioneering era: at once a hero’s tale and a public festival, at once innovation and improvisation – and a myth that lives on to this day.

The history of Basel–Kleve

A pioneering feat from Switzerland to the Netherlands The distance ride Basel–Kleve, first held in September 1894 , is regarded as the first great west–east long-distance ride of the German-speaking world. While Vienna–Berlin connected the plains and Milan–Munich conquered the Alps, Basel–Kleve led right through the heart of the Empire – from the High Rhine on the Swiss border to the Lower Rhine.

An adventure of vastness

On 15/16 September 1894 around 40 riders took on the challenge in Basel. The destination lay in Kleve, over 620 kilometres away. The route first led along the High Rhine, then over the Black Forest and Taunus, through the Rhine meadows and on towards the Lower Rhine. The conditions were hard: gravel tracks, muddy forest paths, dusty country roads, cobblestones in the cities. Rain and cold did the rest. Many riders gave up after just a few hours, others fought their way exhausted to the finish – it was a race for the toughest.

The winner: Friedrich Franz ‘Fritz’ Opel 

After 27 hours and 50 minutes the just 19-year-old Fritz Opel reached the finish first. Just behind: A. Gutknecht (Mulhouse in Alsace), only seconds back, and Hermann Weiss (Nuremberg) third. Remarkable: all three rode on the new Continental pneumatic tyres – a technical innovation that brought the company immense advertising success. The victory of an Opel, on Continental tyres, in a race with an imperial prize – that was more than sport, that was symbolic politics and the history of technology at once.

A race of national significance

The distance ride was under high public attention. The prize for the winner was personally donated by the Kaiser, which gave the race special lustre. Basel–Kleve thus became a representative event of the Empire: cycling was no longer merely a leisure pursuit or a sport for a small elite, but a showcase for capability, technology and national modernity.

In the international context

Compared with the classics already established at the time, such as Bordeaux–Paris (1891, over 560 km) or Paris–Brest–Paris (1891, 1,200 km), Basel–Kleve positioned itself as the German answer to the great long-distance rides.

• Vienna–Berlin (1893) proved the power of the plains.
• Milan–Munich (1894) dared the leap over the Alps.
• Basel–Kleve (1894) stretched the line right across the Empire – a symbol of unity and vastness.

The three German-speaking classics thus formed their own triptych of the early long distance, which gained international recognition.

Bicycle and automobile – an intertwined modernity

Basel–Kleve was also a chapter of that era in which the history of the bicycle and the automobile were still closely connected.

• The Opel family ran the largest bicycle factory in Europe around 1900, before entering the automobile business and later experimenting with rocket cars.
• In France, a sports journalist and former cycling record-holder, Henri Desgrange, carried on a similar legacy: he founded the Tour de France as a marketing tool for the automobile newspaper L’Auto.
• What began in bicycle racing found its continuation in motor racing: speed, technology, progress – the same promises, only on new terrain.

This development was not a ‘hostile takeover’ but an organic continuation of the pioneering passion. Tragically, however, the technology that once stood for individual freedom was, in the 20th century, also put into the service of war and propaganda.

From progress to the mobility transition

Basel–Kleve stands in a new light today. The distance ride marks not only the beginning of a German cycling tradition, but also the moment at which the history of technology stood at a crossroads : bicycle and automobile developed from the same roots but later took very different paths. While the car became a German myth – with all its ambivalences – the bicycle today is once again the symbol of a new modernity: sustainable, accessible, boundless. In the age of the mobility transition Basel–Kleve shows that alternatives exist: not the car as a fetish of self-propulsion, but the bicycle as a tool of genuine freedom.

Palmarès – the early winners

• 1894: Fritz Opel (Germany)
• further years: among others Hermann Weiss (Nuremberg), A. Gutknecht (Mulhouse) – winners’ lists fragmentarily preserved.

Continuations and legacy

Basel–Kleve was repeated several more times after 1894 and was regarded in the 1890s as the third pillar of the long-distance rides alongside Vienna–Berlin and Milan–Munich. Later it disappeared from the calendar, displaced by new formats and increasing road traffic. Yet in retrospect Basel–Kleve remains a key event:

• a pioneering piece of German cycling,
• a testimony to technological innovation,
• and an early chapter of modern mobility history.

Basel–Kleve marks a turning point: it shows that cycling conquers not only mountains and borders, but also distance as a dimension . In retrospect it is at the same time a chapter of automobile history. A competition in which the threads of technology, sport and society intersect – and which today, in a new context, makes sense again.

*Note on the route: The line described is the reference route of the last edition. For 2027 we will re-check it on test rides; course, length and elevation gain may change in the process, as well as due to weather, rideability, closures or official requirements. We make sure that the overall effort and riding time stay within the announced range. All participants receive the final track during the event week, together with the route handbook listing supply and checkpoints – deliberately not earlier, because we check the route once more shortly before the start.