The SIXDAYS legacy

February 1878. London’s Agricultural Hall. A crowd gathers to watch something that seems impossible: a man attempting to ride 1,000 miles in six days on a Penny Farthing bicycle.

The challenge came from a wager, as so many great sporting traditions do. Professional cyclist David Stanton accepted a bet backed by Mr. Davis and the Sporting Life newspaper. The terms were simple but brutal: ride 18 hours every day for six consecutive days, cover 1,000 miles, and win £100. To put that in perspective, £100 in 1878 could support a family of four for nearly two years, covering housing, food, clothing, transportation, everything. For context, that distance – 1,000 miles – would take 20 to 30 days by horse or coach. It seemed absurd.

Stanton didn’t just win the wager. He demolished it. Riding that ridiculous high-wheel bicycle, he finished the distance in just 73 hours at an average speed of 13.5 mph. The public ate it up. Crowds packed the hall to watch this display of human endurance and determination. Promoters saw dollar signs.

Within months, the first proper multi-rider six-day race was organized in the same venue. Instead of one man against the clock, this was a competition – multiple riders battling exhaustion and each other to see who could cover the most distance. The format was simple, visceral, and absolutely captivating to watch.

Six-day racing was born, and it spread like wildfire.

The late 1800s saw six-day racing explode across two continents. Chicago hosted the first American event in 1879, just a year after Stanton’s ride. By 1891, New York’s Madison Square Garden – already America’s premier entertainment venue – launched what would become the most legendary six-day race in the world. Berlin followed in 1909, with 15 teams competing and Germany’s crown prince showing up trackside. Paris, Brussels, and other European cities quickly joined in.

These early races were absolutely brutal. Riders competed nearly 24 hours a day with minimal sleep, pushing themselves to the edge of human capability. Some literally hallucinated from exhaustion. The American races became known for their extreme intensity. Riders would pedal until they collapsed, be revived, and get back on the bike. The New York Times called it “brutality,” but the public couldn’t get enough. The velodromes were packed night after night with crowds drawn to the spectacle of human beings testing their absolute limits.

The format evolved quickly out of both necessity and innovation. In 1899, New York introduced two-rider teams to comply with new labor laws that limited individuals to 12-hour work days. One rider would race while the other rested, then they’d switch off. The hand-off became an art form. The resting rider would grab his racing partner’s hand and sling him into the race at speed while simultaneously mounting the bike himself. This team relay format, with its dramatic exchanges and strategic depth, became known as the Madison, named after Madison Square Garden itself. It’s still raced today at the Olympics and world championships.

Between the 1920s and 1930s, six-day racing hit heights it has never reached again. In America, it was arguably bigger than baseball. Madison Square Garden’s six-day events drew over 100,000 fans. These weren’t just cycling fans – these were everyone. Charlie Chaplin showed up. So did Bing Crosby, the Marx Brothers, Frank Sinatra. Al Capone reportedly had his regular seats. High society mixed with working-class fans in a democratic sporting spectacle that crossed all social boundaries.

The atmosphere inside the Garden was electric and chaotic. Bands played between races. People danced in the aisles. Bookmakers worked the crowds. The air was thick with cigar smoke. Fans would camp out for days, bringing blankets and food, treating it like a multi-day festival. The racing itself was relentless. Teams would cover over 2,500 miles across the six days, sprinting periodically to gain laps while conserving energy during slower stretches. Strategy mattered as much as fitness.

Europe embraced the format with equal fervor. Berlin’s Sportpalast drew massive crowds. Ghent’s event became a pillar of Belgian cycling culture. Paris, Brussels, Copenhagen, Zürich – all had thriving six-day races that became annual highlights. Summer road racing stars would transition to the boards in winter, filling their bank accounts while maintaining their fitness. The best riders could make serious money on the six-day circuit, and the top teams became legitimate celebrities.

The velodromes weren’t just sports venues, they were cultural institutions. People went to be seen as much as to see the racing. Couples dated there. Business deals happened trackside. The six-days were where sport, entertainment, and social life converged into something that transcended any single element.

World War II devastated six-day racing, particularly in America. The war effort redirected attention and resources. After 1945, American tastes had changed. Motor racing was ascendant. Television was pulling people away from live events. The economic realities of the Great Depression’s lingering effects made it harder to fill arenas for multi-day events. Chicago’s last race was in 1948. New York’s Madison Square Garden held its final six-day in 1950. There were a few attempted revivals in the decades that followed, but they never stuck.

Europe told a different story. While the golden age glamour faded, the tradition endured. Berlin, Ghent, Rotterdam, Copenhagen, and Zürich maintained annual events that became fixtures in the cycling calendar. The format modernized. Instead of 24-hour marathons, races shifted to evening sessions, typically 6pm to 2am across six nights. The brutal sleepless grinding gave way to a more strategic, explosive format with multiple racing disciplines each evening. It remained popular among serious cycling fans, even as mainstream attention drifted elsewhere.

Through the 1970s, 80s, and 90s, six-day racing existed in this middle space. Not the cultural phenomenon it once was, but not dead either. Top riders still competed. The atmosphere remained distinct. The events maintained their character. They just weren’t headline news anymore.

In 2015, British entrepreneur Michael Gollner looked at the landscape of track cycling and saw an opportunity. Track cycling drew massive television audiences during the Olympics every four years, then basically disappeared from the public eye in between those. But the sport itself was thrilling. Fast, tactical, visually spectacular. It just needed better packaging for modern audiences.

Gollner’s company, Madison Sports Group, relaunched the Six Days of London at the Olympic velodrome in Lee Valley. The concept: preserve the essential character of six-day racing – the accessibility, the festival atmosphere, the team competition – while updating everything else for 21st-century audiences. Modern production values. Live music between races. The tagline practically wrote itself: “Bikes, Beats, and Beers.”

It worked. The 2016 London event became Sir Bradley Wiggins’ final UK track appearance, drawing massive attention. Encouraged by the success, Madison Sports Group launched the Six Day Series in 2016 – a connected global circuit starting with London, Berlin, Copenhagen, and Amsterdam. The vision was ambitious: create a worldwide series of connected events that would bring top riders to different cities, building a season-long narrative with points and standings.

By 2018-19, the series had expanded to seven events across five countries. London and Manchester in the UK. Berlin in Germany. Rotterdam in the Netherlands. Copenhagen in Denmark. And for the first time, six-day racing reached Australia with events in Melbourne and Brisbane. The goal was to grow to 20-25 events worldwide within five years, creating a global circuit that would elevate track cycling’s profile year-round, not just during Olympics.

The modernized format struck a balance. Racing was condensed – sometimes to three or four days instead of six – but retained the essential elements. Multiple disciplines each evening. Team competitions. Athletes accessible in the paddock between races. The party atmosphere with DJs and lighting that made it feel like a festival. Olympic champions and world title holders competed in front of crowds that included hardcore fans and first-timers who just wanted a fun night out.

The production quality was a step up from traditional European six-days. Real-time data on screens. Broadcast innovations with multiple camera angles. Social media integration. It was designed to work both as an in-person experience and something that could translate to streaming platforms. The goal wasn’t to replace the traditional European events – many of which continued independently – but to expand the pie, bringing six-day racing to new cities and new audiences.

Then the pandemic hit, and the entire plan collapsed.

COVID-19 devastated live events globally. Sports leagues suspended seasons. Concerts were cancelled. Velodromes went silent. The Six Day Series, which had been expanding rapidly just months before, saw event after event cancelled. London, Copenhagen, Amsterdam, Melbourne, Brisbane – all gone. The global circuit that had seemed so promising in 2019 simply ceased to exist.

When restrictions began to lift and events cautiously resumed, only Berlin survived. Of all the Six Day Series events around the world Berlin was the one that came back. The 2021 and 2022 editions were still cancelled due to ongoing pandemic concerns, but when racing finally resumed in 2023, Berlin was there.

The format had changed by necessity. The traditional six-day, six-night format wasn’t financially viable in the uncertain post-pandemic landscape. The 2023 event was shortened to three days. In 2024, it became two – hence the name “SIXDAYS WEEKEND.” The once-mighty global series had been reduced to a two-day annual event in a single city.

It would have been easy to give up. The momentum was gone. The global infrastructure had evaporated. The investment required to rebuild seemed daunting. But Berlin kept going.

Berlin’s SIXDAYS WEEKEND is now the oldest still regularly held track cycling event cycling history. That’s a remarkable achievement considering how close the entire tradition came to extinction. The 2025 event drew 14,000 fans across two nights. The same electric atmosphere that defined the golden age, just condensed into a more intense format.

The essential elements remain. Olympic champions and world title holders compete. The racing is explosive – up to 8 different disciplines each evening with minimal recovery between events. The DJ and the commentators never stop. The lights transform the velodrome. The paddock stays open so fans can meet the athletes, grab photos, talk strategy. The beer flows freely. The crowd gets loud.

In many ways, the shortened format works. Two intense evenings might actually suit modern attention spans better than six nights. The racing has to be aggressive from the start—there’s no time to play it safe. And concentrating all that energy into 48 hours instead of spreading it across a week creates an intensity that’s hard to match.

But the bigger vision still persists. The hope to expand SIXDAYS to other cities remains very much alive. The blueprint exists. Berlin, just like other six-day racing events (Copenhagen, Ghent, Rotterdam and Bremen) that exist independently, prove the format still works. Track cycling’s popularity hasn’t diminished; if anything, the Olympics continue to showcase how compelling the sport can be. Cities around the world have velodromes sitting unused for much of the year. The appetite for unique live sporting experiences is stronger than ever, particularly for events that blend athletics with entertainment and accessibility.

The infrastructure for a modern six-day series could be rebuilt. Different cities, different dates, connected events building toward something larger. The “Bikes, Beats, and Beer” formula has proven it works.

SIXDAYS WEEKEND in Berlin isn’t just preserving history – though it’s doing that too. It’s proving that this 145+ year-old six-day racing format still has something unique to offer. In an era of increasingly sanitized, distant sporting events, you can still grab a beer or a lemonade and chat with an Olympic champion. In a world of algorithmic entertainment customized to individual preferences, here you can be part of a collective experience where 14,000 people create an atmosphere together. In a time when elite sport often feels inaccessible, you can stand meters from the track and feel the rush of wind as world-class athletes push the absolute limits of human capability.

The story of six-day racing is one of constant evolution. It started as a bet about one man’s endurance. It became a spectacle of suffering. It evolved into strategic team racing and reached golden age heights, then crashed. It survived wars and cultural shifts. It modernized and expanded globally. It collapsed again under a pandemic. And now Berlin is writing the next chapter.

SIXDAYS WEEKEND carries a legacy that stretches back to 1878, to a Penny Farthing rider who accepted an impossible challenge and crushed it. Every time someone watches SIXDAYS for the first time and gets hooked by the speed and the atmosphere, that legacy continues and the tradition grows.

This is something worth fighting for. And the fight isn’t over – it’s just getting started!