4 roads · Touge

Touge roads in Japan

Touge (峠) is Japanese for a mountain pass, and in car culture it means the tight, twisty roads over them, the roads Initial D made famous. 4 famous driving roads in Japan, each called corner by corner by Turini’s pace-note engine. On the routes here, the Usui Pass has the most hairpins (28) and is the longest at 15.1 km; the Hakone Turnpike has the biggest climb, about 1,020 m in all. They are listed by the number of hairpins Turini calls, then by length: a count from the map, not a verdict on which road is best.

Touge roads in Japan, by hairpins

1. 1
   Usui PassRoute 18 · Japan15.1 km · 151 calls · 28 hairpins · ↑560 m

   Every curve on the old road has a numbered sign, up to 184 at the top, and the road passes the Megane-bashi, a brick railway viaduct from the early 1890s.

2. 2
   IrohazakaRoute 120 · Japan11.8 km · 76 calls · 23 hairpins · ↑720 m

   Each bend carries a sign with its iroha character, so drivers count them off on the way up: 20 on the Second Irohazaka going up, 28 on the First coming down.

3. 3
   Mount HarunaRoute 33 · Japan11.0 km · 71 calls · 18 hairpins · ↑100 m

   Initial D's Mount Akina is modelled on Mount Haruna, and fans of the manga and anime come from all over the world to drive the downhill and photograph the hairpins.

4. 4
   Hakone TurnpikeAnest Iwata Turnpike Hakone · Japan13.7 km · 48 calls · 1 hairpin · ↑1,020 m

   It is a toll road built for driving, with long sweeping bends and a steady climb from near sea level to about 1,000 m, and it has carried sponsors' names over the years, including Mazda and Toyo Tires.

Counts are from Turini’s pace-note engine on the route shown on each road’s page, which is often one side or one stretch of the road. Climbs come from terrain data.

See how these compare with the rest of the world: the twistiest famous roads, ranked by corners per mile ›

What the numbers mean

Each corner is called as a direction and a grade from 1 (tightest) to 6 (nearly straight). Hairpins are the turns that double back on themselves. The counts come straight from Turini’s engine reading the OpenStreetMap road, the same calls you hear in the car. The climb (↑) is the height gained over the route, from terrain data. New to it? Read how to read pace notes.

Always drive within the law, the conditions and what you can see. Turini tells you what the map says; the road is what counts.

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