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The Lost Dot 101 is a 1200 km race for women, non-binary, and trans riders. The second edition starts in Porto on the Atlantic coast, following a free-route format between a series of controls and parcours across Portugal and Spain, and finishing on the Mediterranean in Málaga.
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The second edition of the Lost Dot 101 will start in Porto. The city takes its name from the ancient Roman settlement Portus Cale, which later gave its name to the entire country of Portugal.
Starting on the wild Atlantic coastline, our riders will make their way up the estuary of the River Douro, tracing the snaking shape of the water as they make their way inland. Leaving the natural contours of the waterway, our riders will begin to ascend into quieter, greener pastures, the urban sprawl of Porto cast behind them as they thread their way along small roads, edging ever higher into the hills that surround the city. Upon reaching the town of Castro Daire, they will be free to make their own choices and determine the best route to the first control of the race in Monsanto.
The unmistakable hilltop village of Monsanto marks the first control point for our riders. With multiple routes available between the end of the start parcours and the volunteers waiting to provide their first brevet card stamp, riders will have the opportunity to play to their strengths, with the mountain roads of Serra de Estrela situated between them and this early marker of progress. Once in Monsanto, they will navigate narrow cobbled streets intertwined with giant boulders balanced above and around the houses.
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From Las Mestas, our riders climb 18.7 km through the Parque Natural de Las Batuecas y Sierra de Francia, leaving Extremadura behind. In Spanish, to be “en las Batuecas” is to be miles away: lost in thought and blissfully unaware of the world. By this point in the race, many riders will know the feeling well. The phrase comes from this valley, once so remote that its name became shorthand for being out of touch. Here, there is little to trouble them but the next hairpin. At 1,252 m, El Portillo, “the little gateway,” divides the valley from the sierras above. Beyond it lie Castilla y León and the stone-and-timber streets of La Alberca.
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High up in the Sierra de Gredos, lies the Puerto de Serranillos, our second parcours. For centuries, this was a frontier. Between the 8th and 10th centuries, these mountains formed a no-man’s land between the Islamic kingdoms of the south and the Christian north, which few crossed. Then came the shepherds: after the Mesta’s tight control over livestock routes ended in the 1800s, flocks began moving over the pass. Their legacy is now apparent in the sparsely vegetated landscape. The Scots pine forests that once covered these slopes were burned and grazed away, leaving the dry broom and juniper our riders now climb through.
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Drawing riders away from the drier landscapes to somewhere inherently more luscious, La Calera is home to the second staffed control point of the race. Nestled within the Geoparque Villuercas-Ibores-Jara, the area is famous for its spectacular "Appalachian-style" landforms, with parallel valleys and ridges shaped by erosion over millions of years.
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Situated to the west of Córdoba, the finish line of the inaugural Lost Dot 101, lies the Parque Natural Sierra de Hornachuelos. Here, on the race’s only gravel parcours, riders will test their mettle as they leave the tarmac behind for rocky tracks through remote country of rolling hills and vast ranches. Holm, cork and gall oaks cover the hillsides, while overhead, the park is home to one of Andalusia’s most important black vulture colonies, sharing the skies with griffon vultures, golden, imperial and Bonelli’s eagles, and black storks.
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Málaga acts as the finish line for the second edition of the Lost Dot 101. After traversing more than 1200km from Porto, our riders will reach the Mediterranean to complete their journey. The final challenge that awaits them is 85km of finish parcours through Andalusian countryside, with quiet, smooth roads through tree lined hillside punctuated by small hamlets, before the edges of the city below lap towards them like the rolling waves on the sandy beaches that await.
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