Up to the Coves de Gènova

Mallorca route guide · Palma & Southwest

Riding Up to the Coves de Gènova

Palma's west gate, and a road that stops being a city street halfway up. The Ma-1044 leaves Santa Catalina as a one-way couplet, crosses over the ring-road tunnels that carry this hill's own name, and climbs past a military compound to the one node where three numbered roads meet. Above it everything changes: the Ma-1045 runs 2,561 metres between two points 542 metres apart — a sinuosity of 4.7 — through three genuine hairpins and not one roundabout, on a single-track lane with a cut limestone face on the inside and a coursed rubble parapet on the outside, pines and olives above, and open sea behind. It ends at a hole in the hill: the Coves de Gènova, thirty-three metres off the last station, with a second cave mouth a tenth of a metre off the line further down.

This point-to-point line covers 6 km, from Plaça del Pont toward the Gènova gate toward the cave mouth.

This is coastal Mallorca rather than a generic blue horizon: the road’s relationship with coves, cliffs, ports, stone retaining walls, and open water is what defines it.

Captured in muntro

Relief, gradient, and how to pace it

The elevation trace is rolling rather than alpine, spanning 140 m from low point to high point. There is 153 m of total ascent, enough to reward measured pressure over the rises without turning the whole route into a survival exercise.

Ride the early gradients a shade below the effort you think you can hold. The broken rhythm rewards cadence changes and short, controlled pressure rather than repeated spikes above threshold.

Points to watch for

The best Mallorca routes are remembered as a sequence of places, not as a GPX line. These are the changes of scene that organise this ride.

1. 01

   Plaça del Pont

   The route rolls away from Plaça del Pont, giving you a few minutes to find cadence and read the road ahead.

2. 02

   the Gènova gate

   the Gènova gate is one of the route’s defining changes of scene and a useful marker for pacing the ride.

3. 03

   the cave mouth

   the cave mouth is one of the route’s defining changes of scene and a useful marker for pacing the ride.

4. 04

   150 m high point

   At 150 m high point, the elevation trace reaches its ceiling before the road releases the height it has earned.

Why this road works indoors

muntro does not flatten Up to the Coves de Gènova into a workout backdrop. The route’s bends, height, and junction order come from the road itself, while a compatible trainer reproduces the changing gradient under your pedals.

The point-to-point format gives the session a destination. There is no need to invent a finish when the real road already has one.