It’s strange when we look at the route of the Tour de France 2024 (June 29 – July 21) unveiled this Wednesday by its director Christian Prudhomme. Paris is not on the map. For the first time and after 110 editions all arriving in the capital, the 111th will be unfaithful to the City of Lights. The Tour will end in Nice in the city which gave the Grand Départ in 2020, the year of Covid.
This is no longer a surprise since the peloton must arrive five days before the opening of the Olympic Games in Paris, but it is the main particularity. “There are a little less mountain this year with three major passes and 3,000 m less altitude difference compared to 2023 but there will be some very nice stages,” Christian Prudhomme also anticipates.
LP/Infographic
Download the Tour de France 2024 route by clicking here
Florence for a first Grand Departure in Italy
For the first time in 121 years, Italy will start the race. The Tour has already started from all our neighboring countries but never from Italy. This anomaly will be repaired at the end of June. The Tour will spend 3 days in La Botte, starting from Tuscany and Florence, heading towards the Adriatic and Rimini.
The first stage promises 3,800 m of positive altitude difference: “It will have the greatest altitude difference of the first day of the Tour. It will be a very high Tour from the start and very high until the end,” remarks Christian Prudhomme. The second stage will start from Cesenatico where Marco Pantani, the winner of the 1998 Tour who died in 2004, rests. Then head to Piedmont via Emilia-Romagna to arrive in Turin.
Return to France on July 2 via the Alps
The Tour will cross the border again on July 2 for a first passage in the Alps, before returning there at the end, with an arrival in Valloire in the Maurienne massif. “This is the first time that the Tour will pass through the Alps twice,” smiles Prudhomme. This stage may well cause the first major damage with the passage of the Col du Galibier, an unmissable event. With a smoother ride the next day, the peloton will head towards Bugey and the vineyards of the Côte-d’Or.
Colombey-les-Deux-Églises, 80 years after the Liberation
Dijon and its region will be an anchor point for the entire end of the first week. The great wines of Burgundy will be in the spotlight with a finish of the 7th stage in Gevrey-Chambertin before a lowering of the flag the next day in the medieval town of Semur-en-Auxois. In 2008, Nicolas Vogondy won a French championship title there. The Tour will pass very close to the supposed site of the seat of Alésia. In Troyes, the peloton will make its northernmost incursion after a detour through Colombey-les-Deux-Eglises, stronghold of General de Gaulle. 80 years after the Liberation, the Tour has not forgotten the history of France.
The Massif Central before the Pyrenees
After a first day of rest in Orléans on July 8, head for Saint-Amand-Montrond, the hometown of Julian Alaphilippe, then the Massif Central. Auvergne will be in the spotlight with a stay in Cantal before the inevitable detour to Pau. The first Pyrenean stage will arrive in Saint-Lary-Soulan where in 1974, Raymond Poulidor won his last stage. 50 years later, the race will pay a new tribute to him before a terrible sequence the next day with the passes of Peyresourde, Portillon, Mente or Portet-d’Aspet between Loudenvielle and the Plateau de Beille.
To end on the edge of the Mediterranean
Rest in Narbonne to attack the last week which will pass through Nîmes, the Southern Alps, Saint-Paul-Trois-Châteaux, Super Dévoluy before a rugged course between Embrun and Isola 2000 and three passes beyond 2000 including that of the Bonnette (2802 m) “When we decided to arrive in Nice, the Col de la Bonnette was an obvious choice. It’s a pass far from everything where we haven’t been since 2008,” continues Prudhomme.
If the decision is not made, the last two steps will take care of it. The penultimate between Nice and the Col de la Couillole will break tired legs. As this Tour definitely cannot end like any other, it is an individual time trial which will close it between Monaco and the Promenade des Anglais… This is the first time since 1989 and the victory of Greg LeMond for 8 seconds ahead of Laurent Fignon as the Tour ends with a stopwatch. We say banco for the same ending.
