2023

44th Tour de Hongrie: Levelling up with a historic race

The 44th Tour de Hongrie took place in the spirit of leveling up. A Tour de France winner in the peloton, unprecedented crowds along the roads, an amazing fight for the yellow jersey - the first ProSeries competition in the history of the race gave many reasons to make it memorable.

The first key moment took place in August 2022, when Tour de Hongrie received ProSeries license for the period between 2023 and 2025, based on the decision of the International Cycling Union (Union Cycliste Internationale - UCI). The category represents the second highest class worldwide. We were able to join the division marked by the the Deutschland Tour or Tour of Britain as the only new entrant, and only the second one from our region. 

Egan Bernal, the first Tour de France winner, who took part in Tour de Hongrie

Reaching the top

Leveling up meant not only more available world ranking points, but also a stronger peloton. We are almost used to the fact that the world's best sprinters are preparing for the Tour de France here. Accordingly, the presence of such Grand Tour stage winning superstars as Fabio Jakobsen (Dutch, Soudal Quick-Step), Dylan Groenewegen (Dutch, Jayco AlUla), Caleb Ewan (Australian, Lotto Dstny), Sam Bennett (Irish, BORA - hansgrohe) or Elia Viviani (Italian, INEOS Grenadiers) was no surprise.

At the same time, thanks to the two mountain stages included in the route, world-class climbers arrived for the first time in the history of the competition. Although four-time Tour de France winner Chris Froome had to miss the race due to injury, we were not left without a Tour winner. Colombian Egan Bernal (INEOS Grenadiers) became the first such participant in the history of the competition, but Il Lombardia and Liége-Bastogne-Liége winner Jakob Fuglsang (Israel – Premier Tech) and Fléche Wallone winner Marc Hirschi (Swiss, UAE Team Emirates) were at the start as well.

The reigning European champion Fabio Jakobsen confidently won in Keszthely

Dutch and Swiss dominance, Hungarian records

In Szentgotthárd, the stars immediately took the leading role: just one and a half kilometers before the finish line there was a crash involving Bernal, but luckily he was able to continue the race. At the finish, Sam Bennett got a perfect leadout, but after a photo finish he ended up losing to Groenewegen. The Dutchman won the second Tour de Hongrie stage of his career - he triumphed in Kazincbarcika the year before.

The next day, one of our former stage winners was able to celebrate again: Fabio Jakobsen, riding in the reigning European Champion jersey, showed one of the most dominant sprints in recent years, passing his opponents one-by-one in the rain in Keszthely, and winning with a huge margin. The third clash of the sprinting stars was supposed to take place in Budapest, but after multiple discussions with the teams and the riders, the organizers had to neutralize the final stage due to the weather conditions. Thus, there were no changes in the final general classification, and at the end of the stage shortened to half distance no stage winner was announced.

The decisive moment: Marc Hirschi drops Ben Tulett on the steep Bárány Road in Pécs

As expected, the faith of the yellow jersey was decided on the climbs of Mecsek and Pilis. At the third stage, the steep climb of Bárány Road in Pécs made splits in the peloton. Arriving with the strongest climbing team, INEOS Grenadiers (winners of Tour de Hongrie 2022) started the action 40 kilometers from the finish line, and the result was one of the most exciting stages in Tour de Hongrie history. In the end however, it was not the British rising star, Ben Tullett, who appeared to be the strongest of the team, but Swiss Marc Hirschi (UAE Team EMirates), who finished first in front of Pécs Zoo. The next day, INEOS again fought with full force to break Hirschi on the steep Pilisszántó climb and the uphill finish to Dobogókő, but the Swiss repelled the attacks and kept the yellow jersey. The fairy tale of the fourth stage was delivered by his compatriot: Yannis Voisard (Tudor Pro Cycling Team) took the first professional victory of his career, and climbed to the third place on the podium behind Hirschi and Tullett in the general classification. The green jersey for the winner of the points classification went to the Slovakian Matus Stocek (ATT Investments), and the red jersey for the best climber went to the Austrian Sebastian Schönberger (Human Powered Health).

The final podium of the 44th Tour de Hongrie (from left to right): Ben Tulett, Marc Hirschi, Yannis Voisard

There was a significant number of our compatriots in the race since in addition to the six members of the Hungarian national team, Epronex – Hungary Cycling Team was also able to participate in the competition as the first domestic Continental Team since 2019. The best Hungarian rider from all however was the captain of ATT Investments, Márton Dina. The silver medalist of Tour de Hongrie 2019 won the white jersey for the best Hungarian rider for the third time (thus setting János Istlstekker's record), finished tenth on the Pécs stage and finished 17th in GC. Péter Kusztor and Viktor Filutás both successfully completed their eighth Tour de Hongrie, and Ádám Karl finished his sixth one in a row - all three are considered as records in the modern history of the race.

Live worldwide

Hungarian cycling fanatics could follow every detail of the fantastic fight live. Local sport channel, M4 Sport broadcast every stage live from the start to the finish, and also showed the team presentation held at the Festetics Castle in Keszthely live, as well as a highlights programme called Après Tour.

At the same time, millions were able to watch the "Magyar Körverseny" even beyond the country's borders. Thanks to our international media partner, Amaury Sport Organisation (ASO), Tour de Hongrie was shown on screens in 190 countries worldwide, with countless hours of live broadcast. Processing accurate viewership data is a time-consuming process but we already know that 4.5 million people watched the events on screens via Eurosport, and the total potential technical reach exceeded one billion people.

Some additional interesting facts, or Tour de Hongrie in numbers

• The entire crew of the TV broadcast consisted of 60 people. Their work was supported by 22 cameras, 3 trucks, 4 vans, 6 cars, 1 SNG, 1 crane, 1 aggregator, 4 engines, 1 helicopter and 1 small plane.
• 96 distinctive jerseys were made for the competition: 20 podium jerseys for the award ceremonies, 60 competition jerseys, and 16 spare ones.
• The race caravan contained a total of 115 vehicles (75 organizers and 40 team vehicles). The sponsor caravan was made up of another 15 vehicles.
• 132 competitors from 22 teams were able to start the race - 120 of them completed the entire distance. Among them, we find a total of 50 cyclists who participated in at least one Grand Tour, which is of course a record in the history of the competition.
• A total of 320 people (teams and their staff) participated in the Tour.
• 794 volunteers worked at the race. We had 58 helpers in Pécs, 97 in Pilis, and 279 in Budapest - the latter were joined by 360 law enforcement students from Than Károly High School.
• With the shortened stage in Budapest, the 44th Tour de Hongrie covered 804 kilometers - 729 of them at race pace.
• In addition to volunteers, approximately 2,700 people worked to secure the race route (1,700 policemen, 1,000 civil guards). Another 27 motorcyclist marshals followed the caravan from start to finish.
• The entire team of Tour de Hongrie spent approximately 3,500 guest nights in 18 hotels.
• In social media, almost 1.3 million users were organically reached by our official Facebook, Instagram or Twitter pages. During the week of the competition, 200 posts were published on our Facebook page, 159 posts on Instagram, in addition to 250 Instagram Stories, 89 YouTube videos and 190 tweets.

44th Tour de Hongrie (10-14 May 2023, 804 km)

Stage winners:
Stage 1 (Szentgotthárd - Szentgotthárd, 168 km): Dylan Groenewegen (Dutch, Team Jayco AlUla) - in yellow: Groenewegen
Stage 2 (Zalaegerszeg - Keszthely, 175 km): Fabio Jakobsen (Dutch, Soudal Quick-Step) - in yellow: Jakobsen
Stage 3 (Kaposvár - Pécs, 180 km): Marc Hirschi (Swiss, UAE Team Emirates) - in yellow: Hirschi
Stage 4 (Martonvásár - Dobogókő, 206 km): Yannis Voisard (Swiss, Tudor Pro Cycling Team) - in yellow: Hirschi
Stage 5 (Budapest - Budapest, 75 km): neutralised

General Classification:

1. Marc Hirschi (Swiss, UAE Team Emirates) 17:19:28
2. Ben Tullett (British, INEOS Grenadiers) +0:10
3. Yannis Voisard (Swiss, Tudor Pro Cycling Team) +0:13
4. Max Poole (British, Team DSM) +0:16
5. Sylvain Moniquet (Belgian, Lotto Dstny) +0:18
6. Oscar Onley (British, Team DSM) +0:22
7. Matteo Fabbro (Italian, Bora - hansgrohe) +0:22
8. Egan Bernal (Colombian, INEOS Grenadiers) +0:22
9. Davide Piganzoli (Italian, EOLO - Kometa) +0:45
10. Abel Balderstone (Spanish, Caja Rural - Seguros RGA) +0:45

Winner of the Points Classification
(in green jersey) Matus Stocek (szlovák, ATT Investments)

Winner of the Mountains Classification
(in red jersey) Sebastian Schönberger (Austrian, Human Powered Health)

Best Hungarian Rider in the General Classification:
17. (in white jersey) Márton Dina (ATT Investments)