Race Day - Frankfurt/Eschborn

The First of May (Labour Day and a official holiday in Germany) traditionally is Race Day in Frankfurt - i.e. Germany’s most famous bicnycle road race is taking place on that day. For most of my youth it was know as the Race Around the Henninger Turm after a famous Frankfurt landmark, a brewery storage tower (kind of an urban grain elevator). Even before the tower was taken down a couple of years back, the race changed sponsors and is now officially called the Eschborn Frankfurt Rund um den Finanzplatz (“around the financial district”) and gets five hours of live coverage on the regional TV station from four helicopters hovering over the peloton.

The race route cuts off the entrance to the cul-de-sac where we live. So we either leave early for a First-of-May trip or we activly try to enjoy the race - as we did this year: We biked over to Eschborn to see the start of the race and watch some of the bicycle related shows. After that we went to the centre of our little village where the route makes takes sharp turn. Eventhough it doesn’t quite show in the picture this makes for some pretty exciting viewing during the two Minutes it takes the leading riders and the main field to speed by. The rest of the time one can meet the ohter locals over a glass of beer. And that of course is one of the main attractions of the whole Race Day thing…