Milan · Sports & events

Milan and Inter both play at the Stadio Giuseppe Meazza, M5 to San Siro Stadio. Tickets go on sale on each club's own site weeks ahead and are personal — the name on the ticket has to match your ID at the turnstile, and resale is restricted, so buy direct rather than from a tout or a marketplace. The derby is the hardest ticket of the season.

The Italian Grand Prix circuit, about 20km north of Milan inside the Parco di Monza, running since 1922. Beyond the September race weekend the track hosts other championships and track days, and the old banking is still standing in the woods. Grand Prix tickets sell out months in advance and hotel prices across Milan follow.

Italy's most decorated basketball club, playing domestic and EuroLeague games at the Unipol Forum in Assago on the southern edge of the city, reached on M2 to Assago Forum. Tickets are far easier to get than football ones and the season runs October to June.

The racecourse across the road from the stadium, at Via Ugo Bassi 6, staging both flat and trotting meetings. Race days are quiet, cheap and almost entirely local, which is the opposite of everything else on this list, and the Art Nouveau grandstands are worth the trip on their own.

A flat April road marathon through the centre — the next edition is 4 April 2027 — run alongside a four-person relay, a Family Run and a dog run, with around 40,000 people across all the events. The relay is the realistic entry for most visitors and the charity places are the ones that stay open longest.