2026 UEC European Gravel Championships
Date
Sunday 30.08.2026Distances
94 - 141 kmCity
Houffalize
Country
BelgiumThe 2026 UEC European Gravel Championships will take place in Houffa, location of the yearly Houffa Gravel since 2021 and organized by the team running the 2024 and 2025 UCI Gravel World Championships.
Course
The course below is the 2025 edition of the event which will get an update towards 2026 with a new final. It winds around the famous mountainbike city of Houffalize, starting from the main square in the city center. The steepest climb of the days follows directly after the start with the famous Rue du Saint Roch, one of the steep road climbs during Liège Bastogne Liège. The first gravel section follows after 5km. 70% of the route is offroad.
The new course includes a 47km lap to be done three times for the younger categories while men over 60 and women over 50 race over 2 laps.
Compared to last year’s editions, this course has less technical downhills but is still challenging with 700m of elevation per lap.
Houffalize
The city of Houffalize in the South Eastern part of Belgium is located next to Luxemburg and has just over 5000 inhabitants. It is considered as the capital city of mountainbike in Belgium but has also nice courses for gravel riding and racing.
The picturesque center is located in a small valley next to the Ourthe river and also hosts the first climb of the yearly Liège Bastogne Liège classic with the steep Rue Saint Roch and often also hosts the finish of the mountain stage in the Benelux World Tour stage race.
In the second world war, the battle of the Bulge, one of the very decisive moments at the end of the war was fought in Houffalize and surrounding villages. A Panther tank monument has been installed in the city center to remember this period. It’s here that generals Patton and Montgomery met to start their counter attack against German forces in January 1945.
Houffalize is also the hometown of the La Chouffe Beer with its brewery in the small neighbouring town of Achouffe.
