Denote by R(L, L, L) the minimum integer N such that any 3-coloring of the edges of the complete graph K N contains a monochromatic copy of a graph L. Bondy and Erdős conjectured that for an odd cycle on n vertices C n ,
This is sharp if true.Luczak proved that if n is odd, then R(C n , C n , C n ) = 4n + o(n), as n → ∞. We prove here the exact Bondy-Erdős conjecture for sufficiently large values of n. We also describe the Ramsey-extremal colorings and prove some related stability theorems.