Stage 03 of 05
Stage 3 — Monopoli to Brindisi
A long, flat day — and the one where your time is decided by the weather rather than by you. Ridden south in season, this is the stage that flies.
There is almost no climbing on this stage. That sounds like good news and it means something more specific: with no gradient to hide behind, every variable that isn’t you is the wind. The coast here runs roughly north-west to south-east, the land beside it is flat limestone with low scrub, and there is nothing between the sea and the road to slow the air down.
From May to November the prevailing wind comes from the northern quadrant — up to 68% of observations at Brindisi in the first week of August. Riding south-east, that is behind you. It is the reason we describe this route north to south rather than the other way round, and on this stage the difference is measured in hours.
Travelling south-east with a northerly behind. tailwind, May–Nov In April it reverses. Data.
- Distance
- 78 km — road distance, not a recorded ride. The second-longest of the five
- Elevation
- At sea level almost the whole way, past Savelletri, Torre Canne and Torre Santa Sabina. No climbing figure for the full stage: we hold no elevation data at all for the final stretch into Brindisi
- Surface
- Asphalt for almost all of it, on provincial roads
- Traffic
- Normal outside the summer, heavier in July and August
- Direction
- South-east — with the season’s prevailing wind
- Best bike
- Trek Domane AL, if you are travelling light
- Roads to avoid
- SS379 · SS16
- Exposure
- High. Very little shade for most of the day
The day the road bike makes sense
This is the one stage where we would point you at the Domane rather than the Checkpoint, and only if you are travelling light. Flat, surfaced, fast, with a tailwind: this is what an endurance road bike is for, and a gravel bike with 42 mm tyres is carrying weight and rolling resistance it has nothing to do with today.
The caveat is the one that runs through this whole site: the Domane has no rack mounts. If your luggage is on the bike, this argument evaporates and the Checkpoint stays under you. It is worth being honest that a day like this is where riders on a loaded gravel bike notice the difference — and where nobody riding a 17 kg electric bike into a headwind enjoys themselves at all.
Staying off the trunk roads
Two roads shadow this coast and neither is for you. The SS379 runs the length of it as a fast dual-carriageway, and the SS16, the old Adriatic state road, carries heavy traffic where the newer road doesn’t. Published cycling accounts of this coast are consistent on the point: use the parallel minor network instead.
The minor network here is a grid of straight agricultural roads running between the coast and the inland towns. It is not scenic in a dramatic way — low walls, scrub, occasional masserie, the sea appearing and disappearing on your left — and it is quiet, which on a long day matters more.
Water, shade and the middle of the day
This is the stage to take seriously in summer. It is long, it is flat, it is exposed, and the towns are further apart than on any other day of the route. Public fountains exist in the coastal villages — look for acqua potabile — but between them you can go a long way past nothing but groves and walls.
Carry two bottles and fill both whenever you pass something. In July and August, do not plan to be riding this stage between one and four in the afternoon: not only because of the heat, but because that is when the bars in small towns are shut and there is nowhere to sit it out.
Brindisi
Brindisi is a port, and it is not a pretty town in the way that Ostuni or Locorotondo are pretty. It is also the practical hinge of the whole route: it has an airport with flights to northern Europe, it is on the main railway line, and it is where a lot of people either start or finish rather than pass through.
The Roman column at the end of the harbour marked the terminus of the Appian Way — the point where the road from Rome ran out of Italy. Arriving here by bicycle from the north, having ridden the coast, is a better way to understand what that meant than reading about it.
It is also, by some accounts, the southern terminus of the EuroVelo 5 route from London. We have not been able to confirm that on the official source, so we mention it as something you may read elsewhere rather than as a fact we are standing behind.
How to ride it
Save this stage for the windiest day of your week. That advice sounds backwards and it isn’t: this is the one stage where the wind works for you in season, so a strong northerly that would ruin stage 2 turns this into the best day of the trip. Watch the forecast and reorder the week accordingly — the stages are a suggestion, not a schedule, and this is precisely the freedom that a package tour doesn’t give you.
Start at first light in any month between June and September. The distance is not the problem; being on an exposed road at two in the afternoon is.