The first rest day is followed by the first of the obvious baroudeur stages.
Profile
Map
The route
After adding a new amusement park to the list of those the Tour has been to, it's an uphill start with the final 4.7 kilometres of Col de la Moréno.
Its shallow descent backs into the Col de Guéry.
The intermediate sprint in Le Mont-Dore, at the foot of Puy Sancy, the highest point of the Massif Central, is only 9 kilometres from here by road, but the riders take a detour of well over triple the distance. The terrain is rolling, and the sprint sits on a rise.
The road rises more sharply after the sprint, as it is immediately followed by the start of Col de la Croix Saint-Robert, the final 6.9k of the profile below.
After descending into Chambon-sur-Lac, where Christophe Laporte won a Dauphiné stage last month, there's a short valley section before the next categorised climb, Côte de Saint-Victor-la-Rivière.
The next categorised climb doesn't start for almost 50 more kilometres, yet the interlying section is rarely flat, containing uncategorised climbs to Lac de Bourdouze...
...the final 4.0 kilometres of Col de la Chaumoune...
...and finally to La Godivelle, an easy hill for which I have no profile. After a plateau and a longer descent, it is time for that final categorised climb, Côte de la Chapelle-Marcousse. This is probably the hardest climb of the day and really should have been a cat. 2.
The true summit comes at about 26 kilometres from the line. Most of those are on a shallow, but somewhat narrow and at times technical descent, which is interrupted by a brief rise into Ronzières.
The descent then ends at about 10 kilometres from the finish line in Issoire. Both the finish and the run-in are different from the 2021 Dauphiné stage won by Brent Van Moer, which was the first time a professional race had been in town since the 2011 Tour stage to Saint-Flour won by Luis León Sánchez, but much better remembered for both Voeckler taking the yellow jersey and Hoogerland being crashed into a barbed wire fence by a car, started here.
Final kilometres
Profile
Map
The route
After adding a new amusement park to the list of those the Tour has been to, it's an uphill start with the final 4.7 kilometres of Col de la Moréno.

Its shallow descent backs into the Col de Guéry.

The intermediate sprint in Le Mont-Dore, at the foot of Puy Sancy, the highest point of the Massif Central, is only 9 kilometres from here by road, but the riders take a detour of well over triple the distance. The terrain is rolling, and the sprint sits on a rise.

The road rises more sharply after the sprint, as it is immediately followed by the start of Col de la Croix Saint-Robert, the final 6.9k of the profile below.

After descending into Chambon-sur-Lac, where Christophe Laporte won a Dauphiné stage last month, there's a short valley section before the next categorised climb, Côte de Saint-Victor-la-Rivière.

The next categorised climb doesn't start for almost 50 more kilometres, yet the interlying section is rarely flat, containing uncategorised climbs to Lac de Bourdouze...

...the final 4.0 kilometres of Col de la Chaumoune...

...and finally to La Godivelle, an easy hill for which I have no profile. After a plateau and a longer descent, it is time for that final categorised climb, Côte de la Chapelle-Marcousse. This is probably the hardest climb of the day and really should have been a cat. 2.

The true summit comes at about 26 kilometres from the line. Most of those are on a shallow, but somewhat narrow and at times technical descent, which is interrupted by a brief rise into Ronzières.

The descent then ends at about 10 kilometres from the finish line in Issoire. Both the finish and the run-in are different from the 2021 Dauphiné stage won by Brent Van Moer, which was the first time a professional race had been in town since the 2011 Tour stage to Saint-Flour won by Luis León Sánchez, but much better remembered for both Voeckler taking the yellow jersey and Hoogerland being crashed into a barbed wire fence by a car, started here.
Final kilometres

