Tour de France Tour de France 2024: Stage-by-stage analysis

[Devil's Elbow]

Welcome to the 2024 Giro, mark two. No, really – it’s basically the same route. Let’s run things down:

• Both the Giro and the Tour have an unusually hard start
• Both have a really weak middle section of the race
• Both have too many sprint opportunities
• Both have a sterrato stage that’s unlikely to do much for the GC
• Both are extremely backloaded
• Both are overreliant on MTFs, or at least on the final climb when there isn’t a big MTF
• Both don’t have a true queen stage
• Both aren’t really hard enough in general
• Both do at least have a decent amount of TT
• Both don’t end in the city that tradition would dictate

Perhaps it’s rather fitting that this mirror image comes to pass in the year where the Tour starts in Italy for the first time…

The area where this Tour was supposed to be completely different was the GC battle, but with Vingegaard’s form and fitness completely in doubt, Roglic and Evenepoel not looking likely whatsoever and UAE having shown ominous form in the buildup, the massive hype that surrounded the race has dissipated rather rapidly in recent months. But, sometimes a great race comes when you aren’t expecting it, and so this disappointing season could still produce the all-time great edition that the past few years have shown potential for...

Day	Stage	Start	Finish	Distance	Elevation gain	Starts at	ETA
Sat 29	1	Florence (Firenze)	Rimini	206.0k	3600m	12:40	17:34 – 18:05
Sun 30	2	Cesenatico	Bologne (Bologna)	198.7k	1850m	12:35	17:06 – 17:33
Mon 1	3	Plaisance (Piacenza)	Turin (Torino)	230.5k	1100m	11:35	16:57 – 17:30
Tue 2	4	Pinerolo	Valloire	139.6k	3600m	13:15	17:05 – 17:37
Wed 3	5	Saint-Jean-de-Maurienne	Saint-Vulbas	177.4k	1050m	13:30	17:16 – 17:37
Thu 4	6	Mâcon	Dijon	163.5k	1000m	13:50	17:19 – 17:38
Fri 5	7	Nuits-Saint-Georges	Gevrey-Chambertin	25.3k (ITT)	300m	13:05	17:29
Sat 6	8	Semur-en-Auxois	Colombey-les-Deux-Églises	183.4k	2400m	13:20	17:19 – 17:42
Sun 7	9	Troyes	Troyes	199.0k	2000m	13:35	17:49 – 18:13
Mon 8	R1	Orléans
Tue 9	10	Orléans	Saint-Amand-Montrond	187.3k	950m	13:25	17:24 – 17:46
Wed 10	11	Évaux-les-Bains	Le Lioran	211.0k	4350m	11:30	16:54 – 17:31
Thu 11	12	Aurillac	Villeneuve-sur-Lot	203.6k	2200m	12:50	17:16 – 17:41
Fri 12	13	Agen	Pau	165.3k	2000m	13:50	17:21 – 17:41
Sat 13	14	Pau	Saint-Lary-Soulan Pla d’Adet	151.9k	4000m	13:20	17:17 – 17:50
Sun 14	15	Loudenvielle	Plateau de Beille	197.7k	4800m	12:05	17:22 – 18:04
Mon 15	R2	Gruissan
Tue 16	16	Gruissan	Nîmes	188.6k	1200m	13:30	17:31 – 17:53
Wed 17	17	Saint-Paul-Trois-Châteaux	Superdévoluy	177.8k	2850m	12:45	16:58 – 17:26
Thu 18	18	Gap	Barcelonnette	179.5k	3100m	13:20	17:30 – 17:56
Fri 19	19	Embrun	Isola 2000	144.6k	4400m	12:30	16:28 – 17:03
Sat 20	20	Nice	Col de la Couillole	132.8k	4600m	13:55	17:18 – 17:44
Sun 21	21	Monaco	Nice	33.7k (ITT)	650m	14:40	19:30

 

[Devil's Elbow]

Stage 1: Florence (Firenze) - Rimini, 206.0k​

The Tour kicks off with its first stage on Italian soil since the one where Andy Schleck launched his epic raid in 2011. It’s a rather odd stage with lots of elevation gain, but all of it in mid-length climbs seemingly too far from the finish to entice the GC riders. In any other situation it would be one for the break, but this being stage 1 means that’s the one scenario we can safely rule out…

The route

There are two kinds of stage hosts I dread when starting a writeup: ones that have little to note, and ones that have so much to note that it’s hard to tell anything new. Few cities fit the latter description as well as Florence, or rather Firenze (no, I will not be following the let’s-pretend-the-only-language-in-existence-is-French nomenclature enforced by ASO whenever it has a stage abroad). Founded towards the end of the Roman Republic, it prospered initially, but only in the second half of the Middle Ages did it become one of the most powerful cities in Italy. Economically, it reached its zenith as the banking centre of Europe, reintroducing gold trade to the continent from the 14th century onwards, but of course its most significant contribution to history is as the traditional birthplace of the Renaissance under the Medicis. House Medici slowly turned Florence from a(n oligarchic) republic into a duchy that controlled Tuscany and, for a while, even the Papacy. Both House and city declined in the 17th century, and by the time Florentine independence ended with the extinction of the Medicis in 1737, both the city and Tuscany as a whole were among Western Europe’s poorest regions. It recovered from the 19th century onwards, serving briefly as the capital of the newly-united Italian state until the subjugation of the Papal States, with its enduring cultural influence apparent from the introduction of the Florentine dialect-based Standard Italian. Today, it is of course known above all else as a tourism destination.

The neutralisation is scheduled to take a ridiculous 40 minutes (seriously, why aren’t there UCI rules prohibiting this?) and despite that, they couldn’t even be bothered to take the two-kilometre detour through Ponte a Ema, the hometown of the late, great Gino Bartali, even though the race passes through the municipality of which it is a part. This is also the right moment to mention that the starting times in the table in the previous post are always the actual start, not the neutralised one. The first kilometres of the Tour proper are spent heading up the Sieve valley into the Mugello, the northeastern corner of Tuscany. We are not heading for the eponymous motor racing circuit where Freddy Maertens suffered his career-changing crash, though, instead taking the shortest route out of Tuscany by climbing the Válico dei Tre Faggi. This is probably the day’s hardest climb.

Early on in the descent, the riders cross the border with Emilia-Romagna, where they’ll spend the majority of their time in Italy. The already-shallow descent soon gives way to a downhill false flat, which lasts all the way until the bottom of the easiest KOM of the day, Passo Monte delle Forche.

After an equally-brief descent, there is the intermediate sprint in Santa Sofia.

Immediately after this, it’s time for the Passo di Carnaio, final climb of the 2021 Giro stage won by Andrea Vendrame. Even though that stage also came from Santa Sofia, the side used here is much easier. It’s still about three times as hard as the previous climb, but still hands out the same amount of KOM points – I guess ASO really wanted to give a nod to true Italian cycling heritage…

Another short descent backs into a more extended valley section, but the final four climbs of the day it precedes have very little recovery time in between them. First up is the Colle del Barbotto, containing the steepest slopes of the day.

This is followed by the climb to San Leo, the day’s final cat. 2.

This time, there is no flat after the descent, but rather the climb to Montemaggio.

The descent from this climb is almost negligible, but does take the riders into San Marino, the first new country on the Tour route since (checks notes) 2022. Again, the descent backs directly into the next climb. Sadly, the route they take up to Città di San Marino is both the shallowest climb of the day as well as the easiest of the many ways to climb into the microstate’s capital.

Following the day’s longest descent, there are 18 flattish kilometres left to race, starting with the re-entry into Italy and ending with a rather technical finale through Rimini.

Rimini was founded by the Romans in the third century BC and grew to be an important city, owing to its location at the point where the Via Flaminia (the main road from Rome to the north) reached the Adriatic. The well-preserved Arch of Augustus and Bridge of Tiberius serve as reminders of this era. In the Middle Ages, it remained a regional power, but upon losing its independence it slowly declined until it rapidly gained popularity as one of Europe’s earliest seaside tourist destinations from the mid-19th century onwards. In spite of five-sixths of the city being leveled by Allied bombing in the Second World War, it has remained a popular destination ever since, having slowly transitioned from serving the aristocracy to the mass tourism widely associated with the city nowadays.

What to expect?

Not the easiest stage to call, but with the final climb being as shallow as it is coupled with the flat finale, it should be some sort of sprint. Last year’s Jaizkibel stage (harder final climb, easier terrain before that) is not a bad yardstick, but really any group that contains up to 50-60 riders wouldn’t be a surprise here.

 

[Devil's Elbow]

Stage 2: Cesenatico - Bologne (Bologna), 198.7k​

If the first stage was this year’s Jaizkibel stage, then this one is this year’s Pike Bidea stage. In other words, time for the GC riders to come out to play.

The route

(side note: am I the only one annoyed by the city being called Ravenna and the province being called Ravenne? It’s almost like trying to francisise everything is silly…)

On the first Sunday, the Tour continues to provide evidence in favour of it being a rehashed Giro by going for some good old Pantani veneration. And where better to do so than in Il Pirata’s hometown of Cesenatico? There honestly isn’t much to say about Pantani that qualifies as news to most of you, but I will point out that it’s rather serendipitous that, of all 26 Tour editions where he has stood as the most recent rider to complete the double, ASO picked the one where he’s most likely to get a successor to visit his turf for the first time.

Oh, and Cesenatico itself? Bog-standard beach resort town, that like Rimini had to be mostly rebuilt after severe damage in the Second World War.

The monument to Pantani in Cesenatico. Riposa in pace.

The first port of call is Ravenna, one of the most important cities in Italy in Late Antiquity. The ailing Western Roman Empire moved its capital here in 402, and following its collapse, the city served as the capital of the Ostrogothic Kingdom and then, upon (re)conquest from the East, as the seat of the Byzantine Exarchate of Ravenna. All three states contributed to the city’s famed early Christian mosaics and monuments.

We then trade architecture for sport as the race heads for Imola. It’s a significant location from a cycling history perspective, having hosted the world championships in 1968 and 2020, but of course its significance is far greater in Formula 1. A Formula 1 circuit from 1980 to 2006 and again since 2020, it will forever be remembered for its darkest moment, perhaps the most notorious and impactful death in the history of sport in general – Ayrton Senna’s fatal crash in 1994.

…this is a rather depressing stage breakdown, isn’t it?

Returning to the present, Imola is reached via the climbs to Monticino and Cima Gallisterna. The former is the profile below as far as Rontana…

…whereas the latter should be familiar as the deciding climb from the latter of the two Imola WCs.

After hearing down the racing circuit, the riders make for the intermediate sprint in Dozza.

The next section is spent heading straight down the Via Emilia towards Bologna. Just outside the city, there is another detour through the Apennine foothills, taking in KOMs at Botteghino di Zocca and Montecalvo. They skip the final 1.1k of the latter profile.

Then, the riders do finally enter Bologna, where they will do two laps of a circuit featuring San Luca, of Giro di Emilia fame. Will we get another memorable performance by a GT winner here?

Oh, come on, this is the last time that video will be at all topical. Of course I was going to include it.

As for the climb, it’s very similar to Pike Bidea from last year’s first stage overall (2.1k at 9.5% versus 2.0k at 10.0%), but that one was all about the steep final kilometre, whereas the similarly steep ramps here are more spread out.

San Luca is a bit further from the line than Pike Bidea last year (12.6k instead of 9.6k), thanks mainly to the rolling ridge road also used in Emilia just after the climb. There really isn’t much else to say about the finale, it’s very straightforward after the short descent from the ridge.

Bologna, the largest city in and capital of Emilia-Romagna, has been continously inhabited since Etruscan times. It was one of Europe’s largest cities in the second half of the Middle Ages, an era which saw the establishment of the world’s oldest surviving university as well as the construction of its famous towers. The equally well-known porticoes are generally a bit more recent, the one up the San Luca (which is the longest) dating back to the 17th century. By this time, the previously more or less independent city had become a part of the Papal States, whose jurisdiction oversaw a gradual, but long decline from the end of independence in 1506 until Italian reunification. Today, it is one of Italy’s richest cities once more, still boasting a very well-preserved city centre in spite of significant damage in the Second World War.

What to expect?

A lot of GC riders and a number of Ardennes types battling it out, with the first GC gaps being opened up.

 

[Devil's Elbow]

Stage 3: Plaisance (Piacenza) - Turin (Torino), 230.8k​

The longest stage of the race, and the first of eight sprint stages. Apparently that wasn’t enough to assemble a strong field for this kind of terrain, can anyone stop Philipsen regardless?

The route

The final part of the Tour’s venture into Emilia-Romagna starts in Piacenza, its westernmost city. Founded by the Romans in 218 BC, it has fluctuated somewhat in importance – at one point, it was the largest city in Emilia – but has remained a regional centre throughout its history. It was also the place where the First Crusade was proclaimed. In cycling, it is notable for being the birthplace of Giorgia Bronzini, the 2010 and 2011 women’s world champion.

The first part of the stage is spent following the edge of the Apennines, briefly crossing through Lombardia before entering Piemonte. From a cycling perspective, the most significant stopoff here is Tortona, where Fausto Coppi passed away. The KOM above town, named after him for this Tour, is on the Corso Fausto e Serse Coppi. It is the first 1.2k of the profile below.

Following the intermediate sprint in Alessandria…

…the race enters the rolling hills surrounding Alba, noted for wine and truffles. On the stage itself, it only makes for slightly more rolling terrain, including two KOMs in Barbaresco and Sommariva Perno. I don’t have profiles for either.

The summit of the latter climb marks the transition from hills to upper Po floodplain and the rest of the route into Turin is straightforward. As we know from the Giro and Milano-Torino, there’s plenty of interesting stuff to do with this area, but after two difficult stages and with an Alpine stage up next, a sprint makes sense. What doesn’t make sense is the route they’ve selected: save for a few roundabouts, the route is ramrod straight from Stupinigi at 8.7k to go until two huge left-handers at 900 and 700 metres to go. Not my idea of an ideal finale for a first sprint stage, hopefully everyone stays upright.

Torino was already visited in the Giro this year, so to save myself some time, I’m rehashing my description from that stage rather than writing the same thing twice.

Originally founded by the Romans, Torino gained influence after the Duchy of Savoy moved its capital there in the 16th century. The development of the Duchy into a kingdom that conquered/reunified all of Italy helped it prosper, but of course eventually cost it its status as capital. Despite this, unification was not unkind to the city, with the construction of the Fréjus tunnel and development of the Italian car industry (centred here until this day) ensuring its status as one of the country’s foremost cities. Its subsequent history has been turbulent at times – a fascist massacre of the labour movement shortly after Mussolini’s coup d’état, Allied bombing in WWII, economic turmoil due to the oil crisis in the 70s and 80s hitting its car industry – but it remains an important centre – not just economically and culturally, but also in sports, having hosted the Winter Olympics in 2006 and being home to Serie A record champions in Juventus. In cycling, it hosted the finish of the sport’s oldest race in Milano-Torino until very recently. It has also seen the Giro thrice in the past four years already, with Ganna taking the opening TT in 2021, Simon Yates winning the last great Giro stage the year after, and then of course Jhonatan Narváez doing the unlikely less than two months ago. The Tour hasn’t been here since 1996, when a Zabel-won stage to Gap started here.

What to expect?

Pretty standard sprint stage. Maybe the distance will hurt some a bit, but that definitely shouldn’t apply to Philipsen.

 

[Devil's Elbow]

Stage 4: Pinerolo - Valloire, 139.6k​

A stage starting in Pinerolo? Check. Three Alpine climbs? Check. Final one is the Galibier from Briançon? Check. Is it the stage Andy Schleck did his great raid on in 2011? Not check. It should still legitimately test the GC field, though.

The route

The final of our seven Italian stage hosts is Pinerolo, the only one to have already hosted in this century. In 2011, Edvald Boasson Hagen won here from the break the day before the aforementioned queen stage. Of course, it’s better known for being the finish on that day when Fausto Coppi did the most legendary ride of his career in 1949. Away from cycling, it was already a significant town from the 10th century onwards, sitting at a strategically-important point to defend Piemonte from French invasions. Indeed, France held the town for large parts of the 16th and 17th century, after which it returned to the House of Savoy under the condition that it would no longer be fortified. It hosted the curling events in the 2006 Winter Olympics.

The route itself is essentially the shortest possible route from Pinerolo to Valloire. The first 50 kilometres are spent heading up the Val Chisone, through the intermediate sprint in Castel del Bosco (see the climb profile below), eventually climbing to the pass at Sestriere. It’s the fifth-highest climb of the race, notable only for its sheer length which could easily have earned cat. 1 status. Sestriere has been the finish of quite a few memorable GT stages, starting with Coppi cementing his second and final Giro-Tour double by winning by seven minutes in 1952, then including Chiappucci’s ridiculous raid in the 1992 Tour, Riis and Armstrong’s equally-notorious wins in the 1996 and 1999 editions, Garzelli snatching the Giro from Casagrande at the last moment in 2000, Savoldelli’s great defense in 2005, and most recently Tao Geoghegan Hart deciding the 2020 Giro. It was also the Olympic skiing venue in 2006.

An easy, shallow descent takes us to Cesana Torinese, which sits at the foot of the Col de Montgenèvre. Towards the summit of this climb, the riders enter France. As the lowest route over the western half of the Alps, it has been of great significance since ancient times, but it isn’t the most exciting climb for the same reason.

After descending (this time even more easily) to the famed citadel of Briançon, it is time for the Souvenir Henri Desgrange, unusually not being awarded at the highest point in the race. Yes, this is the easy side of Galibier, but it still beats Passo di Foscagno for all three of height, steepness and elevation, and we all saw what happened there in the Giro. Heck, we saw Bernal drop everyone here last time this side was used at the pointy end of a stage in the 2019 Tour. It isn’t brutal, but definitely shouldn’t be underestimated either.

The descent is decently technical until its midway point at Plan Lachat, then becomes quite straight as well as less steep. However, it does last until the flamme rouge, which makes it harder for things to come back together.

Valloire is distinct from the majority of French resort towns at this altitude in that it’s actually (developed from) a mountain village, rather than being a bunch of concrete apartment blocks slapped onto a mountainside. The hometown of two-time slalom world champion Jean-Baptiste Grange, it has hosted the Tour twice before: a sémitappe in 1972 won by Eddy Merckx, and the aforementioned 2019 stage where Nairo Quintana emerged victorious (what Colombia would give to relive those days…).

What to expect?

I don’t see a reason for Pogacar not to attack. It isn’t suited for a decisive blow, but it is definitely hard enough for real gaps.

 

[Devil's Elbow]

Stage 5: Saint-Jean-de-Maurienne - Saint-Vulbas, 177.4k​

After all of four kilometres over 8%, the first Alpine ‘block’ comes to an end, and suddenly the next mountains are quite far away. With the race sticking to the valleys for most of the day rather than using the ample opportunities to give the fast men something to think about, this should be the second sprint.

The route

A short transfer down the Télégraphe has brought the riders into the Maurienne valley, where the northern and southern French Alps meet, for a stage start in its historical capital and largest town: Saint-Jean-de-Maurienne. This will be the sixth Tour it hosts, all of which have been since 2006 (although the Tour has, of course, passed through it many more times). The first of those appearances was as the start of that stage to Morzine.

The first part of the stage is spent exiting the Alps by the shortest, flattest route available. The most notable stopoff is Chambéry, historical capital of the Savoie (the original area of the Duchy of Savoy, only ceded to France in 1860 as payment by the eponymous, aforementioned house in exchange for French help in its conquest/unification of Italy. Just after this, the route turns uphill for the first time, up the easy, uncategorised Col de Couz.

The first KOM, Côte du Cheval Blanc, is tiny even compared to Col de Couz and clearly only categorised because someone threw some money at ASO. By this point, the race has left the Alps in earnest. Following an intermediate sprint in Aoste (not that one)…

…the riders make for the Ain valley, in which the final quarter of the stage is mostly spent. It is briefly left for the day’s hardest climb (which isn’t saying much), Côte de Lhuis. It is the first 4.7 kilometres of the profile below.

The finish town isn’t exactly large, but you wouldn’t know it from the road widths. With two roundabouts and three traffic islands being adjusted or removed for the race, it is a very straightforward finale, save for that 40-degree turn at 250 metres to go.

Saint-Vulbas is a village (just over 1200 inhabitants, so it joins the list of smallest-ever Tour hosts) surrounded by a nuclear power plant and a large industrial terrain, the latter of which we finish on. I’m really not sure what a place like this stands to gain from ponying up the cash to organise a Tour finish, but it does love its cycling, being a staple of the Tour de l’Ain and having hosted the Dauphiné in 2016. None of those stages had the same finale as this one, which concludes on the road through the woodlands on the image below.

What to expect?

A sprint, of course. Any sprinter who gets dropped on that final cat. 4 may as well retire on the spot…

 

[Devil's Elbow]

Stage 6: Mâcon - Dijon, 162.5k​

The single easiest stage of the race is a trek up the Saône valley into the heartlands of the Bourgogne.

The route

The stage starts from Mâcon, historically the southernmost city in Bourgogne. This was a strategic site, as the Saône (on which the city was located) was the border of first Bourgogne and then France with Savoie until the French conquest of the lands between Saône and Rhône in 1601. With that, the military importance was gone, but its position for trading remained strong – indeed, it is still a major crossroads today. It is also the hometown of France and Atlético Madrid star Antoine Griezmann.

The only KOM of the day, Col de Bois Clair, comes very early. It definitely feels like it could be the sort of day where nobody wants to enter the breakaway.

Just after this, the peloton passes the famous Abbey of Cluny, the leading monastic order and one of the most powerful forces within Catholicism during the High Middle Ages. Cluny grew so rich that the basilica constructed at the apex of its power was the world’s largest church until the construction of St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome, five centuries later. Most of the site was razed in the French Revolution.

The intermediate sprint in Cormatin comes shortly after.

And that’s as much as there is to tell about this stage. We could have had a pretty hard hilly stage through the famed vineyard-covered hills of the Côte d’Or, but instead it’s a flat trek through the floodplains into Dijon. Even the finale is pretty straightforward, although sprint teams should beware of a significant narrowing into a slight left-hand corner at 1700 metres to go (marked on the map).

Dijon is the historical capital of Bourgogne, now a French region known for its rich food and wine, but a powerful duchy in the second half of the Middle Ages. Although nominally subject to the French kings, the duchy usually had a great degree of independence. It reached its zenith in the 15th century, when it controlled not just modern Bourgogne and its surroundings, but also a vaguely triangular area stretching from Luxembourg to the English Channel and Holland, with its dukes attempting to forge an independent kingdom. However, this was suddenly halted when the last duke died without male heirs in 1477. Dijon was then swiftly annexed by France, but the area east of it fell to the Habsburgs, who besieged the city in 1513. French expansion eastward in the late 17th century removed such threats, and with first the canal and then the railway from Paris reaching the Saône floodplains here, its location became progressively more favourable again. In the Tour, this situation between the Alps and Paris meant it often hosted the decisive final TT of the race, with Charly Gaul in 1958 and, more famously, Stephen Roche in 1987 flipping the GC lead on the penultimate stage here. Oddly, this will be the first stage it hosts since 1991.

What to expect?

Too early in the race and too easy to think of anything other than a sprint.

 

[Devil's Elbow]

Stage 7: Nuits-Saint-Georges - Gevrey-Chambertin, 25.3k (ITT)​

You know your race is backloaded when a TT of this length is unquestionably the most important GC day in the first half. It’s a moderately hilly affair – I would say well suited to the specialists, but all the top time trialists here are either GC riders or Wout van Aert, so that doesn’t really fly.

The route

Before I start, there is a hyper-detailed breakdown of the route here (in French) that deserves a shoutout. If you think my analyses are long, think again.

This is another stage straight from the Giro playbook, although this time, it’s a 2010s thing: the wine time trial that they kept including and marketing as such for years on end. It’s a good concept to copy, though – you get good scenery and solid hills included in the package by definition. This TT is a bit flatter than most of those Giro TTs, though.

The wine region in question for this TT is the Côte de Nuits, northernmost of the main French wine-producing areas. The stage connects the two centres of this region, starting in the town that gives its name to these hills: Nuits-Saint-Georges. The Tour has been here once before, when Marcel Kittel beat Edvald Boasson Hagen in a photo finish in 2017.

Despite the length, ASO have decided it’s a good idea to have three time checks on course, so undoubtedly they will struggle to keep track of all three once the GC riders are racing. Most of the route is untechnical and never steeper than a false flat, with the exception of one real hill, Côte de Reulle-Vergy.

That section aside, it’s a case of speeding between the pinot noir vines, speeds unquestionably picking up on the way to Gevrey-Chambertin. Nothing screams prestigious wine town like having the name of your most famous wine appended to your original town name as early as 1847, and that’s exactly what the municipality of what had been known as Gevrey did with the Chambertin wine. In fact, vines have been planted here since at least the 1st century BC – making it possibly the oldest winemaking area in Bourgogne.

What to expect?

With all the bigger names more than capable in this discipline, big gaps in the GC battle seem a stretch until you get further down the top-10 – indeed, we could even have something along the lines of the main TT in the 2023 Giro. But then again, Planche des Belles Filles and Combloux did happen in the past four years…

 

[Devil's Elbow]

Stage 8: Semur-en-Auxois – Colombey-les-Deux-Églises, 183.4k​

A bit of an odd stage for this second Saturday. There are 2400 metres of elevation and some of the hills are pretty decent, but at the same time nothing is actually hard and the finale is, in fact quite easy.

The route

For this stage, the Tour turns to rather seldom-trodden roads. Not only is this an area that isn’r useful from a transitional perspective, sitting away from the routes between the race’s heartlands, but these rolling hills are also quite sparsely populated. In fact, the department in which we finish, Haute-Marne, has the lowest population density of all departments in the northern half of the country.

The Côte d’Or hills are similarly depopulated once you get past the winelands, and today’s starting location, Semur-en-Auxois, is one of few places large enough to host in the western half of the department. The town is built on an easily-defensible hill surrounded on three sides by the Armançon river. As the Auxois was the western frontier of Bourgogne, this made it a strategically-significant spot and thus Semur became the capital of the province. After the fall of the Duchy, it became less significant, its fortifications being dismantled (the current construction is a 19th-century restoration) and eventually also losing its administrative position. Today, it’s a quiet, but picturesque town, that hosted its only previous Tour stage start in 2007 and the French national championships the year after.

The first 20 kilometres are easy, the 20 after it are the day’s hardest, with three KOMs. If the break goes here, it is likely to be a strong one.

Côte de Vitteaux:

Côte de Villy-en-Auxois:

Côte de Verrey-sous-Salmaise:

I will say that this is a comparatively easy route, there is quite a bit of Ardennes-grade terrain in this area and I’d like to see them have a proper hilly stage at some point here.

Next up is the intermediate sprint in Lamargelle.

After crossing over into the Haute-Marne, the hills return, with the Côte de Santenoge…

…and the Côte de Giey-sur-Aujon.

With that, at 60k to go, the KOMs are done, hence why this isn’t even remotely worth calling a hilly stage. The only place of note on the route is the departmental capital of Chaumont, notable for its spectacular railway viaduct and for being the headquarters of the American forces in the First World War. There is one hill, Côte de Sexfontaines at 14k to go, that I’m surprised has not been categorised, but it’s hard to see that hill in isolation being enough to force splits.

The finale is almost completely straight from Juzennecourt onwards. The final 1.2 kilometres average 3.3%, ramping up to 5.1% in the final 180 metres, but they will enter this section at high speed.

Colombey-les-Deux-Églises is a small village known for one thing, and one thing only: Charles de Gaulle bought a large property on its outskirts in 1934, and for the final 35 years of his life he spent the time he wasn’t preoccupied with war or presidency here. His grave is also in the village. De Gaulle’s legacy is a confusing one… the military commander who rose as a protégé of Marshall Pétain, only to become the leader of the French government in exile in opposition to Pétain’s nazi puppet regime. The hugely popular leader at the time of liberation, only to immediately fall out with the first postwar parliament and found the majority of the French people were not on his side anymore. The (former) monarchist who had come out against democracy in private letters, only to not pursue dictatorship when he probably had the power to do so after the army forced the collapse of the Fourth Republic. The man whose return to power was triggered by the coup d’état of the military and the colonists in Algeria, only for him to immediately move against both parties and allow Algeria the right to self-determination. The leader who had enjoyed great popularity for most of his career, only to suddenly find himself desperately out of touch when the protests of 1968 reached France. And the man who had always been branded an authoritarian by his critics, only to peacefully resign the presidency after the loss of a referendum in 1969. His legacy still looms large in France, 54 years after his death.

What to expect?

Most of the sprinters should back themselves here. With this being the best opportunity for the likes of Pedersen and De Lie, it’s hard to see the break having a shot either.

 

[Devil's Elbow]

Stage 9: Troyes - Troyes, 199.0k​

One of the most-discussed stages of the Tour sees ASO incorporate a genuine gravel stage into the race for the first time. It’s no Montalcino, but will it do the trick anyway?

The route

ASO have kindly saved myself some work for this stage by putting the start and finish in the same city, namely Troyes, the largest city on the Seine east of the Paris metropolitan area. Although settled prior to the Roman conquest, it was much more significant in the second half of the Middle Ages, when it was the capital of the large, rich County of Champagne. In addition, it was an important trading centre, its fairs being well-frequented even by Italian merchants as early as the 12th century, as well as a production centre for leather, textiles and paper. The loss of its county seat, a brief period of English conquest during the Hundred Years’ War, and a devastating fire in 1524 contributed to the end of its heyday. However, the city centre constructed after the fire is well-preserved. Its long-standing textile heritage is reflected by the fact that Lacoste was founded here. In the Tour, it has never been more than an intermittent stage host, for the last time in 2017 (stage finish won by Kittel, stage start for the aforementioned Nuits-Saint-Georges stage also won by Kittel).

The stage itself is fairly benign for the first 40 kilometres, then the sterrati (or chemins blancs, to use the French terminology) start. After the first sector (Bligny à Bergères), we have two short hills. Unlike in the 2022 women’s stage, which served as the trial version of this one, the former is the one handing out the KOM points. (profile from my preview of that stage, hence the QOM).

The descent takes us into Bar-sur-Aube, where that stage – won by Marlen Reusser – finished. The way out of the Aube valley is via the Côte de Baroville, with the first three-star sector (the maximum rating) forming part of it.

The next section is easier, and takes us through the intermediate sprint in Fontette.

Next up is the hardest part of the day, the 50-kilometre section from sector 12 to sector 8 that contains the remaining three three-star sections as well as most of the hills. Sector 12 and part of 11 were both at least partially raced in the opposite direction in that Femmes stage (those were the perfectly-fine sections, not the ones with the huge rocks – clearly, ASO learned a lesson that day). Note that sector 12, Les Hautes Forêts, is longer according to both Streetview, satellite images and the time schedule than the map claims – I have it as 2.1 kilometres.

Sector 11 contains the steepest slope of the day, on gravel no less.

The irregular sector 10 is the day’s longest, and almost entirely uphill.

After this, the route already starts to get easier. We have some pretty benign uncategorised climbing and the straightforward sector 9 before the last sector that is at all uphill. And even here, it’s only the final 350 metres that actually pack a punch.

From this sector onwards, the landscape changes dramatically, as the vineyard-covered hills give way to fairly flat terrain. The sterrati themselves are quite different too: not only are they also almost completely flat from here on out, but the surface itself is easier. I have a very hard time seeing major splits in the final 55 kilometres, so if there is still a sizeable group going into it, we are getting some sort of bunch sprint. Of course, if it rains, these sectors will become a lot harder, but if that happens there won’t be a big group at this point in the race to begin with.

The final kilometres are quite technical, and lack a final straight that’s actually straight. This could be an ugly sprint, if we get one. Now, you might think: ‘Devil’s Elbow, if ASO think they didn’t need to worry about designing a finish suitable for sprinting because the stage is hard enough, then surely they know better than you and a sprint isn’t on the cards?’ To that, I have only two words to say: Grid. Start.

What to expect?

To turn this into a truly hard day, I think it’s outright required to go insane from sector 12 until sector 10 – a section that ends with 75k to go. Normally, I’d say that that’s impossible in a GT, but as we all know, normal often doesn’t apply to Pogacar and Van der Poel on this sort of terrain. If that part of the stage is raced more defensively, as much as half the peloton could survive for a sprint. Finally, the break has a pretty good chance here too, just like in the two previous Giro sterrato stages and the most recent Tour cobbled stage.

 

[Devil's Elbow]

Stage 10: Orléans - Saint-Amand-Montrond, 187.3k​

After a 200-kilometre transfer, the riders find themselves in Alejandro Valverde’s least favourite part of France. It’s the flattest stage of the race, but if the wind blows…

The route

The race restarts from Orléans, where the riders have already spent their rest day. Located at the northernmost point of the Loire (and thereby the closest point on the river to Paris), it has always been well-situated for trading – in fact, there was already a bridge over the Loire here prior to the Roman conquest of Gaul. In the Middle Agesz it became the capital of the largest duchy in the country. Above all else, it is associated with the Siege of Orléans, the turning point in the Hundred Years’ War. France had lost half its territory and had offered to surrender the city, and with it its last major foothold in the northern third of the country, to Bourgogne (who were allied with the English). The English refused, believing that the city would fall anyway… but this refusal led Bourgogne to withdraw from the siege, leaving the English short of manpower when French reinforcements, and with them Jeanne d’Arc, arrived. The siege was lifted, and the rest, as they say, is history.

At the time of the siege, Orléans was one of the most prominent cities in France, but its status as the capital of the Huguenot Revolution in the 16th century, the loss of its university (one of France’s oldest) in the French Revolution, and the decline of the river trade in the 19th century have all contributed to a somewhat decreased importance today.

The stage can be divided into two halves: the first through the forests of Sologne, and the second through the highly-exposed plains of the Berry. As such, the only point of interest in the first half is the intermediate sprint in Romoranthin-Lanthenay.

After leaving the city of Vierzon, on the southern tip of the Sologne, it will be code red if the wind is blowing. The final 60 kilometres, from Issoudun onwards, are mostly identical to the 2013 stage into Saint-Amand-Montrond. The bump on the profile towards the end is very straightforward.

The finish is completely identical to the 2013 stage. There are some curves to stretch things out, but nothing too technical.

Saint-Amand-Montrond is a shrinking town at the edge of the Berry plains. In the Second World War, a significant number of Jews went into hiding here. 37 of them were arrested by the Milice, the Vichy regime’s paramilitary arm, and then murdered by being thrown into wells and then crushed by boulders. This atrocity is only remembered because one of the 37 managed to survive the massacre. In cycling, it is most notable as the birthplace of Julian Alaphilippe. This will be its fourth stage finish, and the other three have all been notable: the final TTs in 2001 and 2008 (the winners of both have since been scrapped) and the aforementioned echelon stage in 2013.

What to expect?

A very hectic and potentially crucial second half of the day if the wind blows, a second rest day if not.

 

[Devil's Elbow]

Stage 11: Évaux-les-Bains - Le Lioran, 211.0k​

For the first time in over a week, real climbs. This is potentially one of the best stages of this Tour, so buckle up.

The route

A sizeable transfer south has taken the peloton out of the plains and into the hills, for a start in Évaux-les-Bains. The town owes its existence to its thermal baths, already in use in Roman times but abandoned when the western half of the empire collapsed. A village, based around a monastery (later replaced by the present collegiate church) survived , and eventually, in the 17th century, the spa was restored. The current developments mostly date back to the 19th century, when the construction of a now-defunct railway led to a peak in the spa’s popularity. It has not hosted the Tour before.

The stage is rolling to hilly for its first three quarters. The first point of interest is the intermediate sprint in Bourg-Lastic.

Shortly after, there are two KOMs at Côte de Mouilloux and Côte de Larodde. I don’t have profiles for either, so with little to talk about away from cycling we’re skipping ahead to the finale. This starts with the Col de Néronne.

At the summit, we join the route of the 2016 stage into Le Lioran. The next 11.4k are the final 11.4k of the profile below. Puy Mary/Pas de Peyrol may be overcategorised, but it’s still the steepest, highest and most famous pass of the Cantal massif, and can do real damage off the back of the hard side of Néronne as seen in the 2020 MTF here.

After the first proper descent since the one down the Galibier, it’s time for the third and final of the steeper climbs, Col du Perthus.

The ensuing descent is short, but narrow and fairly technical. Once we’re off it, it’s onto the main road for a while, and now the gradients are far lower. Just before the summit, it’s away from the main road and up to Col de Font de Cère.

The final descent is very narrow, but also very short. The final 800 metres, on the main road once more, are uphill at a consistent 6.5%.

Le Lioran is one of the largest ski resorts in the Massif Central and the only one in the Massif du Cantal, the largest (though long-extinct) stratovolcano in Europe. It is the wettest place in France (weather stations on mountains aside). This will be its third finish in the Tour, after 1975 (Michel Pollentier, ahead of Eddy Merckx two stages before he was famously brought to his knees on the way to Pra-Loup) and 2016 (Greg Van Avermaet).

What to expect?

I know the slightly easier version of the same finale didn’t do much for GC in 2016, but given that almost every mountain stage wasn’t raced properly that year and given how well this stage suits both Pogacar and Evenepoel, there is a very good chance of things being different this time round. Major GC action or not, the break will have high hopes here too.

 

[Devil's Elbow]

Stage 12: Aurillac - Villeneuve-sur-Lot, 203.6k​

The last 200k+ stage of the race is the westward half of the transition from Massif Central to Pyrenees.

The route

The start is in Aurillac, capital of and only place even remotely resembling a city in the Cantal. It sits at the point where the higher ranges of the Massif Central give way to the lower plateaus in the western part, where mountainous stages give way to sprintier ones. The southwestern half of the Massif Central has always one of the more remote and less populous French reasons, so while Aurillac has been the regional centre since the Middle Ages, it also never played much of a role beyond the region. Its location at the base of the ‘high’ Massif Central means the Tour has often passed here on either the way in or the way out, for the last time in 2011 when Mark Cavendish won a comparable sort of stage.

For the second time this race, the Tour starts a stage by skirting around the hometown of a former winner, this time that of 1931 and 1934 champion Antonin Magne. Instead, it’s a rolling start, before a longer descent into the Dordogne valley. The way out of said valley is the first KOM of the day, Côte d’Autoire.

After passing by the Gouffre de Padirac, France’s most-visited cave, and a short section on the furthest extent of the causses (the plateaus of the Massif Central), we pass the famous pilgrimage site of Rocamadour and do the final section of the 2022 TT in reverse. This includes the second KOM, Côte de Rocamadour (no profile available, in the TT it was the descent where Vingegaard nearly crashed). Following some uncategorised climbing, there is an intermediate sprint in Gourdon.

From here, the hills become lower, but the flatter roads remain mostly unexposed. There is one last KOM at the Côte de Montcléra, then join the Lot in the town of Fumet. From here, there were two options to go to the finish: cross the Lot to take in some decent hills, or stick to the northern side of the river where there aren’t any. Take a guess which option ASO went for. It’s the fourth sprint stage that they could have done something more interesting with – in fact, there’s a 1k at almost 10% hill overlooking the town…

Instead, it’s a finale littered with road furniture if the roadbook is to be believed. They’ve even marked a traffic island at 200 metres from the line, which I think will be removed anyway but if not, then heads should roll, because the riders certainly would…

Villeneuve-sur-Lot was among the largest of the many bastides founded to replace a town destroyed by the Albigensian Crusade (or, as we would put it had it happened today, the Albigensian genocide), hence the regular road pattern in the city centre. The bridge over the Lot was first built when southwestern France was under English control. It served as a river port on the Lot, which flows into the Garonne not too far from. here, for places as far away as the Auvergne, where the stage started. Its location was far less suitable upon the development of the railway and industrialization, and thus it has declined relative to the wider region. This will be its third time hosting, after two breakaway stages in 1996 and 2000.

What to expect?

Fairly sheltered and heading west all day – even with the elevation gain, that’s a bad scenario for anyone hoping for something other than a full bunch sprint. Still, we definitely can’t rule out the breakaway here.

 

[Devil's Elbow]

Stage 13: Agen - Pau, 165.3k.​

The penultimate sprint opportunity, although there are once again some hills to deal with.

The route

A short transfer has brought the peloton to Agen, capital of the Lot-et-Garonne department in which they already finished the prior stage. Located on the Garonne halfway between Toulouse and Bordeaux, it was already a sizeable place in the Roman era, with a theatre that could hold at least ten thousand. It flourished in the Middle Agesz but was hit relatively hard by both the Hundred Years’ War and Huguenot attacks. After a resurgence in the 18th century, it was rather left behind by the Industrial Revolution and even today, the economy relies more strongly on agriculture and associated industries than one would expect of a city in this location. This will be its fifth time hosting the Tour, and the third in a row as the stage start the day after a finish in Villeneuve-sur-Lot.

The first 45 kilometres are rolling, so if the baroudeurs feel like they have a chance, it will be a hard start. This section culminates at the edge of the Landes, but unlike the previous two years, which featured long sections through the endless pine plantations, the riders turn away from it to head south. This makes for a somewhat more exposed day than the previous stage, but this is not an area where the wind tends to blow. The next point of interest is the intermediate sprint in Nogaro. Unlike last year’s stage finish on the motor circuit, it’s in the centre of town.

The main hilly section comes between 50k and 20k from the line, but there’s nothing too tricky here. The first KOM, Côte de Blachon, is the final 2.0k of the profile below.

Next up is Côte de Simacourbe, the final KOM.

After a final hill (uncategorised, 800 metres at 6.6%), the final 20 kilometres are pretty flat. As you see, there’s nothing to bother any but the most onedimensional sprinters, courtesy of ASO’s ongoing policy to avoid interesting hills like the plague in any of the eight sprint finales. The final kilometres are the same as usual, identical to the 2017 and 2018 stages (the most recent road stages to finish here – the 2019 TT took a different approach).

Pau is on the route almost every year, in fact this will be the 75th edition since its first appearance in 1930 to have a start and/or finish here, meaning it will likely draw level with Bordeaux as the most-visited city other than Paris next year. It was a relatively unassuming place until the kings of Navarra (who had lost Navarra itself by that point) moved their capital here in 1512. The French throne fell to the kings of Navarra in 1589, starting the Bourbon dynasty, and after unification in 1620 France was formally known as the Kingdom of France and Navarra until the French Revolution (the name was restored during the brief restauration of the House). The city became both a global centre of aviation and a favoured tourist destination among the British elite in particular in the 19th century, but after the First World War it lost some of its status. It grew rapidly after the Second World War when a (now-depleted) gas field was discovered in nearby Lacq. However, the aerospace and fossil industries have endured here, and together with the university and location as the main gateway to the Pyrenees, there is plenty to keep the city afloat.

What to expect?

Just like the previous stage, it just isn’t hard enough to stop the sprinters from being favoured.

 

[Devil's Elbow]

Stage 14: Pau - Saint-Lary-Soulan Pla d’Adet​

Almost two-thirds of the way into the race, we arrive at the first MTF. For the last Tour that had its first MTF this late, we need to go back to 2006 if we don’t consider Pla de Beret (KOM at 2k to go) a MTF, and to the awful 1992 route if we do – but of course, we won’t hear the cycling media about that when they do their annual talking up the route spiel. The stage itself is… fine, I guess, just don’t expect much before the MTF.

The route

Zero transfer overnight, so instead of talking about the stage start, we can jump straight into the action for once. The first half of the stage is flat, the most prominent stopoff being Lourdes, living proof that all you need to prosper as a city is one person convincing the world an important religious figure has appeared to them.

At the stage’s approximate midpoint, there is the intermediate sprint, in Esquièze-Sère.

This village borders Luz-Saint-Sauveur, and that can only mean one thing: time to head up one of ASO’s three favourite climbs. With neither the super-mediocre nor the Alp of alcohol abuse appearing this year, it was inevitable. Now, I know I said this last year too, but this time round, major GC action here really is as likely as me climbing it on a unicycle.

After a long descent, the riders reach the easiest climb of the day, Hourquette d’Anzican from the lesser side.

Following the descent and a short valley section, it’s time for a MTF I didn’t expect to see ever again. No, it’s not as big a surprise as Puy de Dôme last year, but when you’ve introduced Col de Portet (which is in the same ski resort, the same municipality, and follows the same road up to Espiaube, at almost 1500 metres), it’s rather weird to regress to the classic Pla d’Adet when that climb is barely half the difficulty. It becomes stranger still when you aren’t designing the stage for long-range action anyway.

Just like in the old days, the MTF is a rather overcategorised HC. This will be its eleventh inclusion in the Tour, and the first since 2014 (victory for Rafal Majka). The most famous stage to finish here is surely that of 1976, when Lucien Van Impe was forced into a long-range attack on Peyresourde by his illustrious DS Cyrille Guimard, who threatened to run him off the road if he stayed put. It won him that Tour, which remains the last Belgian victory.

The route deviates slightly from the profile below towards the end, taking a different, longer, but more irregular approach for its final 1.5 kilometres.

I’ve kind of exhausted things to talk about where Pla d’Adet is concerned, and Saint-Lary-Soulan isn’t really noteworthy outside of mountain and spa tourism (and of course cycling), so I guess I’ll wrap this post up with a picture of the town taken from the road up to the MTF.

What to expect?

Hotly-anticipated answers in the GC battle, but it would take a truly thermonuclear attack to strike a decisive blow here…

 

[Devil's Elbow]

Stage 15: Loudenvielle - Plateau de Beille, 197.7k​

Here’s another parallel with the Giro I didn’t mention in the first post: both of them have their queen stage (by elevation gain) on the penultimate Sunday, and both have done an absolutely awful job of using that elevation gain well. As such, this one is all about the MTF where the GC is concerned.

The route

(I really should put that profile in the worst profiles thread…)

The smallest stage host of this year’s Tour is Loudenvielle, appearing for the fifth time (the previous four, most recently in 2020 when Peters won thanks to Zakarin’s meme descending and Pogacar took back crucial time). There’s not much else to say about this place, a village depending primarily on tourism.

For the first time all race, we have an uphill start: Peyresourde from the easier side. It’s the final 7.0k of the profile below, enough to break things up but not enough to ensure the break goes here.

After Froome’s favourite descent down Peyresourde and a passage through the classic Tour host that is Bagnères-de-Luchon, there is quite a bit of valley before the intermediate sprint in Marignac.

The next course consists of tackling the second-hardest climb of the day, Col de Menté from the more difficult side. If the break goes here, it will have been a really hard start of the stage.

A fairly technical descent takes the riders to the bottom of Col de Portet d’Aspet. This is comfortably the preferable side to ascend: not only is it harder, but it’s also the side that has seen more than its share of awful crashes, including Casartelli’s fatal one, when used as the descent.

The actual descent is short and quite easy, and gives way to almost 60 kilometres of valley, where we’ll find out if this is one for the breakaway. The penultimate KOM of the day, Col d’Agnès, is too far from the finish to serve as a proper launchpad, but is at least hard enough to really thin out the peloton.

As ever when we’re heading west to east through this area, it’s a double summit, with the final 3.8k of Port de Lers (in defiance of tradition and common sense, uncategorised this year) to tackle before the main descent.

And then it’s time for the problem with Beille – barring easy climbs, it necessitates a much longer stretch on wide, flat valley roads than the already-problematic one before Alpe d’Huez. The MTF is pretty good, but a purported queen stage just shouldn’t have a long valley before the big MTF.

Plateau de Beille is the most important Nordic skiing venue in the French Pyrenees. This will be its seventh inclusion in the Tour (first stage in 1998, last one in 2015). Oddly, the first four of those stages were all won by the eventual GC winner (at least until Armstrong was erased from the record books).

What to expect?

Of the four main mountain stages, this is probably the best one for the break, because it isn’t easy to control and the GC riders should keep their powder dry until the MTF. That being said, it’s unlikely the GC action will be as poor as on the last two stages here, when the favourites all finished together.

 

[Devil's Elbow]

Stage 16: Gruissan - Nîmes, 188.6k​

The final sprint opportunity… unless the wind plays ball.

The route

For the first time since the morning of stage 2, the riders find themselves on the coast for both the rest day and the start of this stage. The town of Gruissan consists of an old part around the ruins of a castle on the brackish lakes that characterise this part of the Mediterranean, and a new part directly on the beach. Unusually for a French town, it has hosted the Vuelta (2017, ironically coming from Nîmes, won by Lampaert) but not yet the Tour.

The stage offers little in the way of climbing, but does present the second and final real opportunity for echelons. The Mediterranean coastal plains are of course more densely populated than the Berry, but the roads between the towns are more often than not exposed. This is especially true for the first and final thirds of this stage – the middle part is more hilly and more often sheltered by hills or trees. Said part starts just before the intermediate sprint in Les Matellettes, as the riders arc around Montpellier.

The sole KOM, Côte de Fambetou, is barely worth categorising (no profile). After it, the openness re-emerges as the route heads close to the classic echelon terrain of the Bellegarde stages in Étoile de Bessèges. The finish in Nîmes is where it was in 2019 and 2021. The more similar run-in is the 2019 one, with which it shares its final 2.4 kilometres.

Already settled in prehistoric times, Nîmes is mainly noted for the ruins from its Roman heyday. Of course, the Pont du Gard just down the road overshadows everything else in terms of fame, but both the amphitheatre and the temple to Augustus dubbed Maison Carrée are among the best-preserved Roman structures of their kind. The city declined relatively early, with Arles surpassing it in Late Antiquity, but the worst damage came in the 8th century. The height of Muslim expansion in Western Europe saw the Umayyad Caliphate destroy the Visigothic Kingdom (which had conquered Nîmes in the dying days of the Western Roman Empire) and hold this part of France for a generation. Halfway through this period, the Franks mostly destroyed the city, and by the time they had conquered it from the Umayyads, only a small town consisting of little more than the former amphitheatre was left. Only from the 16th century onwards did real prosperity return. A big part of this revival was centred around textiles – in fact, denim originated here (the modern word is a contraction of de Nîmes). That industry is now mostly gone, but between the tertiary sector and tourism, the city is doing quite well for itself.

What to expect?

A sprint is more likely than a big echelon day, but even a pessimist can live in hope for this stage.

 

[Devil's Elbow]

Stage 17: Saint-Paul-Trois-Châteaux - Superdévoluy, 177.8k​

At last, the race re-enters the Alps with a slightly disappointing stage. There’s nothing wrong with the Noyer-Superdévoluy combo, but to put as little as possible before it in a race with only five other mountain stages is… not the decision I would have made.

The route

Today’s stage start, Saint-Paul-Trois-Châteaux, wins the misleading name award: it actually doesn’t have three castles, instead it was settled prior to the Roman invasion by the Tricastini and somehow that name evolved into Trois-Châteaux over time. It has been a town since that era, and was the seat of a bishopric until the French Revolution. Today, it’s essentially your average southern French town. This will be its fifth appearance, all stage starts in the past 14 years.

There’s some ground to cover between the start and the edge of the Alps, which is reached in Nyons. Here, the riders enter the Baronnies, the least developed and (highest massifs aside) most sparsely populated area in the French Alps. There’s some decent terrain to be found here, but you wouldn’t know it from the route, which sticks to the valleys as much as possible. Of course, the riders do need to climb a pass of sorts to get from the Rhône to the Durance basin… the Col de la Saulce, the long drag out of Verclause on the stage profile.

In Serres, the route leaves the Baronnies, and the landscape becomes less depopulated. The intermediate sprint is in Veynes, the first place that can be described as a town since Nyons, over eighty kilometres back.

After a short, easy descent down Col de la Freissinouse into Gap, the actually-hard part of the stage starts. Col Bayard is the highest point of the Route Napoléon, the route through the Alps taken by the former emperor after escaping from his exile on Elba that led to his brief return to power known as the Hundred Days. It is the same climb as the more commonly-used Col de Manse until the junction to Orcières on the profile below.

There isn’t much of a descent, rather a rolling section until the bottom of the main course of the day, Col du Noyer.

After a short descent, the riders take on the HTF to Superdévoluy. As you can see, it is not hard in the slightest.

A classic budget destination, Superdévoluy is a strong contender for ugliest French ski station. As anyone who’s been to the French Alps will be able to tell you, that’s quite an achievement. It has not hosted the Tour before, but we’ve seen finishes here coming from Noyer in the 2013 and 2016 Dauphiné.

What to expect?

Huge opportunity for any climbers that manage to make the breakaway on the flat. Col du Noyer is definitely hard enough for GC action, but it wouldn’t be a shock to see the big guns keep their powder dry for the final three days.

 

[Devil's Elbow]

Stage 18: Gap - Barcelonnette, 179.5k​

In many ways, this is the epitome of a filler stage. It isn’t needed for transition, because they don’t cover much ground and the finish of stage 17 is close to the start of stage 19 anyway, and it’s also the last non-GC day. However, for half the peloton, this is anything but a filler stage, instead representing their final shot at glory, because this is such a typical breakaway day it might as well be AI-generated.

The route

The start is in Gap, France’s highest departmental capital. It sits at the point where the direct route from the eastern half of the Provence to Grenoble (which Napoleon used) branches off from the road to Montgenèvre, the most important route into Italy. Gap has guarded this crossroads since Roman times, and as such has been at or near a border since the end of Roman times. As such, it has frequently suffered from war, most notably an invasion by Piemonte in 1692 which destroyed most of the town, but also once from its then-Protestant hinterland, which sacked Catholic Gap just over a century prior to the Piemontese invasion. Its location has proven equally strategic for the Tour, as this is one of the most common stage hosts in the modern era.

The stage essentially consists of all of ASO’s favourite climbs to use for padding ahead of the big climbs in a Southern Alpine mountain stage, only this time, there are no big climbs. The neutralisation takes us up the side of Freissinouse descended on the previous stage, with the flag dropping just before the summit. After the best part of 20 kilometres, it’s time for new roads, which lead to the day’s first climb: Col du Festre.

After passing through the Dévoluy valley again (this stage really just consists of taking in any roads not used on the stages that bookend it), the riders face the shortest climb of the day, Côte de Corps.

The riders then turn south, back towards Gap, taking some back roads to avoid reusing even more terrain from Wednesday’s stage. This involves some uncategorised climbing (that’s actually harder than some of the day’s cat. 3s) to Les Costes, for which I don’t have a profile. The next place of note is Saint-Bonnet-en-Champsaur, with the intermediate sprint almost literally a stone’s throw away from the road taken between Bayard and Noyer a day prior.

Up after this is Col de Manse, from a side that barely counts as a climb.

The descent is not as narrow as the one traditionally taken into Gap, but still technical. Just after it, we reach Chorges, to do the second half of the 2013 pseudo-MTT in reverse. This means we do the side of Côte de Saint-Apollinaire, the hardest climb of the day, that starts at Jean-Christophe Péraud’s favourite turn.

Upon reaching the Lac de Serre-Ponçon, the riders leave the 2013 route to head for the final KOM, Côte des Démoiselles Coiffées.

The final 25 kilometres are an endless false flat up the Ubaye valley towards the finish in Barcelonnette. Things level off completely near the end.

Barcelonnette has been the main settlement in the Ubaye valley since Roman times. As such, it’s an important base for both summer and winter tourism, but also a surprisingly attractive town in its own right. It is also notable for having many large villas, constructed by the minority of the wave of Mexican colonists hailing from the valley who returned to France with newfound wealth. Sitting at the foot of some of the biggest climbs in the Southern French Alps, I would normally be very annoyed that it’s being wasted for a breakaway day, but with Col d’Allos not opening this year due to severe road damage in the winter, it’s likely that a mountain stage would have been at least partially castrated anyway.

What to expect?

A veritable breakaway bonanza.

 

[Devil's Elbow]

Stage 19: Embrun - Isola 2000, 144.6k​

There are barely 200 kilometres to cover in the final three days, and yet this is by far the hardest triptych of the race. This stage is the first part of this decisive trilogy, taking in the summit of the European cycling season, and also the best designed mountain stage of the race.

The route

This final Friday starts in Embrun, the capital of the upper Durance valley from Roman times until it was outpaced by Gap. Most of its history is rather similar to that town – founded to safeguard the Montgenèvre route, the same two devastating sackings – except that it was much more important, serving as a provincial capital for part of the Roman era and subsequently as a bishop’s seat until the French Revolution. The loss of this status, coupled with the growth in importance of the Col Bayard route, seem to have contributed to its decline relative to Gap. For the Tour, it is also not as useful a stopoff, although this will still be its seventh stage start (six of which have come since 2008, when it had two stage starts).

The first 20 kilometres are still relatively easy, a section that ends with the intermediate sprint in Guillestre.

Here, the riders join the route of the decisive final mountain stage of the 2016 Giro – in fact, both stages are the same except that that stage started in Guillestre and came through Isola 2000 at 15k from the line rather than finishing there. From here on out, the stage follows two-and-a-half cycles of the following pattern: big climb, big descent, then a false flat downhill until the next climb starts. The first of these climbs is the easiest, and it’s both untraditional and undeserved for Col de Vars to be a HC.

After passing through the Ubaye valley once more, it’s on to the highest pass (not paved road, as is often incorrectly claimed) in Europe, Cime de la Bonette. It is in a bit of an isolated spot, and as such has only seen the Tour four times so far (for the last time in 2008, and most recently from this side in 1993, which was essentially a supercharged version of this stage with Izoard before the same final three climbs). And here’s another aspect in which this Tour mirrors the Giro: the highest climb is handing out additional mountain points – in this case, double the amount awarded on other HCs.

And then, it’s time for the big MTF. It isn’t quite as hard as Bonette and the steepest stuff comes early, making it a good pick for a big MTF this late in the race. It also definitely should have been a HC, and the fact that it isn’t confirms that we’re back in the ‘GC riders winning the polkadots without even trying’ phase of the ‘ASO don’t know what they want from the KOM competition’ cycle. I give it a maximum of five years until the ‘the polkadots shouldn’t be won by riders who are nowhere near the best climbers’ phase recommences.

Isola 2000 is the southernmost of the main ski stations in the French Alps, and also the only useful base of anywhere near this altitude that’s anywhere near Nice. This makes it a popular base for altitude training, which is the only thing the peloton will know it from as the only pro race that’s ever finished here was that 1993 Tour. Once again, it isn’t exactly the most idyllic place in the Alps.

What to expect?

Col de la Bonette is probably the single best place to attack from range in this year’s Tour, so this could be a cracker if the GC situation is right. If nobody is willing to attack in places that aren’t the upper slopes of MTFs, on the other hand, this could be a day where the main GC riders all finish together, but that’s the kind of risk you have to take when designing your final mountain bloc.

 

[Devil's Elbow]

Stage 20: Nice - Col de la Couillole, 132.8k​

After the well-designed stage 19, this is perhaps the most disappointing stage of the race. Probably the only chance in our lifetimes to design a final mountain stage in this area, and they’ve come up with a route where the final climb is the hardest and the penultimate climb is far easier. In addition, having a big MTF here has the potential to incentivise the waiting game on the Isola 2000 stage. On the plus side, at least it’s up and down almost throughout.

The route

The stage starts where the race will end the day after, in Nice. The city was founded by Greek colonists in the fourth century BC. From the Middle Ages until the 19th century, it was more Italian than French – although it was often controlled for short periods by first the Provence and later France, it was usually in Italian hands, being a part of the Duchy of Savoy for a period spanning almost six centuries (with interruptions). In the 19th century, it was a majority-Italian city, albeit with a substantial French minority. In 1860, Nice and surroundings were ceded by Savoy to France (together with Savoy proper – I discussed this in my stage 5 analysis), the annexation ‘validated’ by a sham referendum. This enraged many Italian nationalists, including the ‘people’s leader’ of the movement, Giuseppe Garibaldi, who hailed from the city. In 1871, the first French elections following the final dissolution of monarchy, pro-Italian lists led by Garibaldi dominated in Nice, and an uprising broke out. The French successfully suppressed this, and Niçard Italians were left to choose between forced Frenchification (which had already started in 1860) and emigration. This episode also helped sow the poisonous seeds of Italian irredentism.

Despite this turbulent period, the development of tourism, which had already started towards the end of the Savoy era, only accelerated. Originally the playground of the wealthy English, Nice and the surrounding riviera became the favourite haunt of the well-off from most of Europe, growing to become the most-visited French tourism destination not named Paris. It was also a popular spot for artists and writers, which explains the city’s wealth of museums. Of course, it is perhaps an even more popular spot today among cyclists, with seemingly half the peloton living in the area, and between Paris-Nice and a litany of Tour stages (most recently the Grand Départ in 2020), it can definitely claim to be a cycling heartland.

After about 10 kilometres of false flat, the climbing starts with another piece of cycling heritage: Col de Braus. While it hasn’t been seen since 1961, it was a staple in the Tour’s early days, with no fewer than 25 ascents prior to the Second World War. The cat. 1 feels just about merited, although very generous compared to what is to come.

From that classic of early cycling, we move to a classic of motorsports: Col de Turini, the showpiece of the famed Monte Carlo Rally. We climb the side used as a descent there and descend the side climbed by both the cars as well as the riders in the 2020 Tour and the 2019 and 2022 Paris-Nice MTFs.

The penultimate climb of the stage is the Col de la Colmiane, another one that should be familiar. While the Paris-Nice MTFs and the 2020 Tour used the other, harder side, this one is the usual lead-in to Couillole and has been used as such by both Paris-Nice and the Mercan’Tour Classic. The intermediate sprint is on its lower slopes in Saint-Martin-Vésubie, right before the proper climbing starts.

Its descent backs directly into the final big climb of this Tour, Col de la Couillole. It has only been seen once before in the Tour, but that happened to be in one of its most famous stages: the 1975 epic to Pra-Loup where Merckx’ dominance shattered so abruptly. It has resurfaced of late, with MTFs in Paris-Nice in 2017 and 2023 and as the hardest climb of the Mercan’Tour Classic, of which the finale (perhaps not so much the one this year) would have been far better suited to a role as the final mountain stage. Once again, this should probably have been a HC.

There really isn’t much else to say about the finish, it’s just a pass in the relative middle of nowhere, definitely giving a Vuelta-esque vibe.

What to expect?

It could definitely get hectic with the lack of flat, but it will be hard to actually make the difference before the MTF.

 

[Devil's Elbow]

Stage 21: Monaco - Nice, 33.7k (ITT)​

For the first time in its history, the Tour does not finish in Paris. The reasons have been more than sufficiently discussed, I think it’s much more interesting to point out that this is the first Tour to finish with a TT since 1989. It would be poetic if this Tour becomes the modern equivalent of that famed edition, but it doesn’t have the feel of being that year. Either way, with the champagne staying corked for a little bit longer, it’s actually a 21-stage race for once…

The route

Here’s something that feels like a first, but isn’t: the final stage of a GT starting outside the national borders. In fact, I was shocked to learn that the Giro has done it no fewer than five times. Interestingly, the last time it happened, Pantani completed the first half of his double – sometimes, it really does feel like this is meant to be the year he is succeeded at last.

What hasn’t changed, is the fact that you need to be a really rich country to get to host the final stage of a GT if you’re not France, Spain or Italy. After five times in Switzerland, it’s Monaco’s time. Usually more or less independent since the Middle Ages, its modern path was shaped by the success of its famous casino. The revenues it generated meant the country could afford to stop collecting income tax, and the world’s elite have never stopped flocking here since, as it is a centre not just for tax evasion but also money laundering (and, in certain cases, vaccination avoidance). The money sloshing around the microstate has funded such endeavours as its tennis tournament (among those ranking directly below the grand slams), eight-time Ligue 1 winners and 2004 Champions League finalist AS Monaco, and above all motor sports, its hallowed Grand Prix overshadowing the aforementioned rally. In the Tour, it was last seen as the 2009 Grand Départ.

This is definitely more a MTT than a normal TT, not at all dissimilar to the 2013 TT. After a brief flat taking in the coast, the climbing starts at the casino with the final KOM of the race, La Turbie. Imagine my annoyance when I found out at half past eleven that the Cyclingcols profile a) didn’t fully match up with the route, and b) was vague enough that I couldn’t see from where it did match up… the product of that is the profile below.

The last actual climb of the Tour is Col d’Èze.

After a descent that isn’t too technical, but definitely enough to make Adam Hansen seethe he can’t get it removed for the offense of being in a TT because his power is checked at the Tour, we arrive at the final intermediate, strategically positioned 5 kilometres from the line to rob the finish of its excitement. Those final 5 kilometres are a flat loop mostly on Promenade des Anglais.

And then, mercifully, I can post this, because Nice already got its writeup on the previous stage. Thanks for reading, inform me if there are any major ****ups in this analysis, and I’ll hopefully be back at it for the Giro next year.

What to expect?

All about the GC riders, also for the stage. And then, into Olympic mode we go.

 

[Red Rick]

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9wtvXoXh0VU&ab_channel=Arman

 

[Netserk]

Following the descent and a short valley section, it’s time for a MTF I didn’t expect to see ever again. No, it’s not as big a surprise as Puy de Dôme last year, but when you’ve introduced Col de Portet (which is in the same ski resort, the same municipality, and follows the same road up to Espiaube, at almost 1500 metres), it’s rather weird to regress to the classic Pla d’Adet when that climb is barely half the difficulty. It becomes stranger still when you aren’t designing the stage for long-range action anyway.

Just like in the old days, the MTF is a rather overcategorised HC. This will be its eleventh inclusion in the Tour, and the first since 2014 (victory for Rafal Majka). The most famous stage to finish here is surely that of 1976, when Lucien Van Impe was forced into a long-range attack on Peyresourde by his illustrious DS Cyrille Guimard, who threatened to run him off the road if he stayed put. It won him that Tour, which remains the last Belgian victory.

It's the 50th anniversary, so back to Pla d'Adet like in 1974. Worth noting that it will be the third way to finish there, as they'll take a detour with ~1.5 km to go.

Gotta say, I've since wondered if it would've been possible to tarmac the backside of Portet and celebrate with a Portet > Pla d'Adet combo.

 

[Gratemans]

My girlfriend gave me a really weird look when proclaimed out loud "See, that's why I love Devil's Elbow!!"
Pff. Her loss.

Anyway... this is actually a pretty balanced bunch of profiles as far as I'm concerned. Plenty of opportunities to go balls-out. This is one of the few times I can actually say: it's the riders that'll make the race.

Yaddahyaddah "they should have taken this turn and that route up that mountain because I know it and because reasons". Whatever.

I've hardly ever been this excited about a Tour. And I don't even really know why, I've been watching em for 20 years. Maybe it's just the startlist. Ugh. Just make it start already!