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The 2020 Tour de France, postponed due to coronavirus, will start on Saturday August 29 in Nice. Organizers will have to deal with the continuing threat of the coronavirus. Masks and barrier gestures will be required on the biggest race in the world.
Unlike several major events that were to take place this summer (Euro football or the Tokyo Olympics), the Tour de France managed to save its skin with a staggered start. The largest cycling race in the world, the economic lung of world cycling, starts on August 29 from Nice for three weeks, while cases of coronavirus infections are increasing every day on French soil.
In this context, the Tour de France accumulates questions. The Tour, a national heritage, received the green light to be organized at the end of the summer, for the first time so late in its century-old history.
Mask compulsory everywhere?
Despite the coronavirus pandemic, according to the organizer, the public will have good access to the race. But it will be a “near closed session” for the departure to Nice according to the prefect. For the first two stages, which are run in the Nice region, spectators along the route must be masked, and no vehicle may park in the passes. From this Thursday, August 27, the public was reduced from 1,750 to 1,000 people for the presentation of the runners at the end of the day, in the center of Nice.
There will be communication campaigns for the respect of barrier gestures, hand hygiene. During the Tour, two tons of hydroalcoholic gel will be distributed. According to the prefects, masks could be compulsory. They are now in Paris, place of the last stage on September 20.
In the mountains, filtering will be provided by the State services and supporters must wear a mask. We can imagine that, due to the lag of the Tour, from July to September, we will see a less dense public. On the Tour routes, there are 20% foreigners in July, 50% in some passes. The British, Australians and Americans should largely be absent. The Tour de France 2020 has twenty-nine passes or climbs classified in second, first or out of category. In addition, the advertising caravan, which still attracts the public, goes from 160 to 100 vehicles.
What winner for a year unlike any other?
Even the media have adapted their coverage to follow the 176 runners, divided into 22 teams of eight. With the complications related to Covid, and the difficulty of traveling, most have reduced the number of journalists sent on the Tour’s routes. Among the 190 countries which broadcast the event, only two TV channels sent commentators there, the Italian Rai and the German ARD.
With visits to the five mountain ranges of France, the 2020 edition can seduce climbers, in the front row Egan Bernal, the outgoing winner under the colors of the powerful Ineos team. The Colombian is freed from internal competition represented by two other former winners: Christopher Froome and Geraint Thomas.
Bernal will still have to take into account the rise of the impressive Jumbo team with Slovenian Primoz Roglic as leader. Thibaut Pinot will carry the French hopes of winning the Tour 35 years after Bernard Hinault.
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