- Oct 13, 2021
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Stage 18: Vif – Courchevel Col de la Loze (171.5k)
Thanks to @Devil's Elbow for this amazing stage write up as always, can’t wait to kickback and (hopefully) enjoy Visma trying to light up the race to crack Pogacar on the beach tomorrow.
The queen stage, and it’s a deserving one. By sheer elevation gain, this is the hardest Tour stage since the Aubisque stage all the way back in 2007, although taking elevation into account it’s hard not to put Galibier in 2011 ahead of both. Either way, this is the kind of day where all time gaps could be measured in minutes, if it’s raced a certain way…
Map and profile
Start
The overnight transfer has put the riders well inside the Alps, arriving in the town of Vif. Located at the edge of the Grenoble urban area, Vif was established as a town around 1000, when it was the seat of a minor lord and a Benedictine monastery. However, there appears to have been a village here during both Roman and early Medieval times, with a church certainly having existed in the 6th century. During the Wars of Religion, it was the scene of multiple battles by regional forces on either side, with a castle that had belonged to the Dauphins being destroyed. During the Napoleonic era, it became a summer residence for the Champollion brothers, the younger of whom, Jean-François, became famous as the man who deciphered the hieroglyphs. From the mid-19th century until the 1970s, it was a centre of cement production. The opening of the railway line and the now-defunct tram line in 1876 and 1907 respectively firmly brought it into the orbit of Grenoble, and today it serves primarily as a commuter town. It has not hosted any previous edition of the Tour.
(picture by Jvillafruela at Wikimedia Commons)
Map and profile
The route
The first hour of this stage is spent heading into the Oisans valley via the main road, or in other words up Bernard Hinault’s favourite uphill drag. Part way through this drag, we have a very early intermediate sprint in the hamlet of Rioupéroux.
And then, at long last, the Alpine giants. The fun begins with Col du Glandon, which in this stage has the sole purpose of putting some more fatigue in everyone’s legs.
A long, somewhat steep and definitely technical descent brings the riders into La Chambre, where they have approximately zero metres to catch their breath before reaching the bottom of Col de la Madeleine. This is the second-hardest climb of the race, the only HC climb that is the penultimate climb on its stage, and thus far and away the best opportunity to go from distance in this Tour. Yes, that distance is very large with 67 kilometres left to race at its summit, but history has shown that that’s no problem if either Pogacar or Vingegaard needs to make up time and feels up for it.
The next descent is once again long and somewhat steep, but not as technical as its predecessor. It ends in Notre-Dame-de-Briançon (no relation to the much better-known town with the citadel, which is hours away). The only route from here to Moûtiers was actually completely blocked by a landslide for a week during this winter – now that would have been a disaster, as such a blockage would make both this entire stage and the next two transfers impossible. In any case, the valley lasts 14.5 kilometres until the bottom of the MTF in Brides-les-Bains, although there is an uncategorised, cat. 4-sized little dig towards the end of this section. This side of Col de la Loze cannot compete with the hard side via Méribel used in two different configurations in 2020 and 2023, but 1600 metres of elevation gain after what has already been a hard stage is still going to hurt a lot. Even in a world without Pogacar and Vingegaard and without much happening on Madeleine, you would expect proper gaps here, to say nothing of what will happen in this world. It’s also worth noting that this is the highest climb of this year’s Tour, and therefore hands out double mountain points.
Final kilometres
They hit the bike path at 5.4 kilometres to go. This side of the bike path is more irregular, but less steep than its counterpart that we are used to seeing.
Although the touristic development of this area started in the early 19th century with the spas of Brides-les-Bains, the development of Courchevel from tiny mountain village to mountain resort spanning five stations did not start until the construction of the first hotel in 1914. After a few decades of slow development, in 1942 the Vichy regime selected Courchevel as the location for a major ski resort. These plans were then carried out after the war, and in 1946 the first part of what is now Courchevel 1850 was opened. This was the first of the purpose-built ski stations that would become commonplace in the French Alps, and has since developed into one of the most expensive destinations in the Alps in general. In 1962, the altiport, the runway of which was used for the finish two years ago, was opened. During the 1992 Winter Olympics, it hosted the ski jumping and Nordic combined events, and the 2023 Alpine skiing World Championships saw the men’s events held here. The Tour has been here on four previous occasions, in 1997 (Richard Virenque), 2000 (Marco Pantani’s last-ever win), 2005 (Alejandro Valverde’s first Tour stage win) and of course 2023 (Felix Gall, with Tadej Pogacar cracking completely behind).
I managed to find a picture with all five stations. Col de la Loze is directly above the uppermost station, just below the rightmost of the rocky peaks (picture by Rémih at Wikimedia Commons)
What to expect?
Either a hard day with big gaps on Loze or a brutal day with the GC group shattering on Madeleine and herculean gaps on Loze.
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