Hairpin heaven: the most switchbacks on one climb

A road with enough hairpins stops being a road and becomes a staircase. You can see where you are going and where you have been in the same glance, stacked above and below you, and every corner buys a few seconds of easier gradient on the outside before the wall starts again.

These are the climbs somebody drew onto a mountain face that had no business carrying one. The Stelvio's numbered bends are the most photographed thing in cycling, and you count them down for an hour. The Lacets de Montvernier fold eighteen of them into two kilometres of cliff, one directly above the next. Sa Calobra ties itself into a full loop and passes back under its own bridge, which is either engineering or showing off.