Valparaíso Cerro Abajo: the world's most extreme urban downhill race
A downhill mountain-bike race run through a dense, vertical city, using stairs and alleys as its course.
Valparaíso Cerro Abajo has a strong claim to a simple title: the most extreme urban downhill race in the world. It is not held on a mountain but inside a city, and it uses the hills, stairs and alleys of Valparaíso as its course. That combination, downhill speed in a dense, vertical city, is what makes it hard to match anywhere else.
What Cerro Abajo is
Cerro Abajo is a downhill mountain-bike race with a difference: the track is a route through the city rather than a purpose-built trail. Riders drop from the upper cerros towards the lower town, and the course changes from edition to edition as organisers find new lines through the streets.
Why the city is the course
Valparaíso is built on steep hills above a narrow coastal plain. Between the houses run long flights of stairs, narrow passages and sudden drops, the exact features a downhill course needs, already in place. The race simply borrows them.
- Steep gradients: the hills drop quickly towards the sea.
- Stairs: natural obstacles that punish any mistake.
- Narrow streets: little room to recover from a bad line.
- Spectators: locals watch from doorways, balconies and steps.
It is a downhill race in the middle of a living city, watched from people's homes, a setting no purpose-built track can copy.
The rise of urban downhill
Cerro Abajo helped popularise the idea that a city can be a race venue. Riders who normally compete on mountains come to face cobbles, walls and staircases, and the event has drawn international attention to Valparaíso as a host. Its success showed organisers elsewhere that old cities, with their steps and slopes, can host a race that no mountain can. The format has since echoed in other cities, but the original setting remains the benchmark.
Why it is called the most extreme
| Feature | Mountain downhill | Cerro Abajo |
|---|---|---|
| Surface | Dirt and rock | Stairs, stone, asphalt |
| Setting | Open mountainside | Dense, vertical city |
| Obstacles | Natural features | Walls, corners, gaps |
| Run-off | Usually some space | Almost none |
The spirit of the race
The event is as much a festival as a competition: the city turns out, the hills become grandstands, and the descent becomes a shared spectacle. For a few hours the city belongs to the riders, and the streets that usually carry traffic and pedestrians become a single, roaring slope. It celebrates exactly what makes Valparaíso difficult to live in and impossible to forget.
Practical tips
- The race is usually a one-day event; arrive early and stay in one place.
- Wear comfortable shoes and be ready to climb to reach a good viewpoint.
- Follow local signage and marshals at all times.
- See the city beyond the race with our Valparaíso city guide.
Cerro Abajo turns a city's greatest problem, its steepness, into its greatest show. That is why, wherever urban downhill is raced, Valparaíso remains the reference point.
