Tour de France Tour de France 2026 route rumours

[Izzyeviel]

What's the obsession with 7 hour stages? They'll just go slower and attack in the final km

like they do when Pogacar isn't there?

 

[Red Rick]

like they do when Pogacar isn't there?

No it's for everyone. Longer, harder mountain stages are usually raced more passively because in a shocking discovery, riders do not have infinite energy resources.

 

[HashRouge]

So much of going to the Tour comes down to availability and determination. Of course, that rumored time trail on stage 16 looks to be just about the perfect stage. It’s a time trial. It’s easy to get to through transit and it’s in a gorgeous location.

I watched the stage 13 ITT last year and it was a great spectating experience. Maybe I need to look at the Alpine stages this year rather than focusing so much on the Pyrenees.

 

[Izzyeviel]

For much of the past 30 years, tactics at the grand tours & especially the tour consisted of the strongest team & rider not doing anything because they knew the weaker teams & rivals will ride all day. We used to call T-Telekom 'Lance Armstrongs own private taxi service'. If i'm forced to suffer watching another giro were the riders refuse to race a small mountain stage, then i'm all for making them suffer seven hours of an actual queen stage.

 

[Rob5091]

No it's for everyone. Longer, harder mountain stages are usually raced more passively because in a shocking discovery, riders do not have infinite energy resources.

"Your honour, I'd like to present exhibit A, namely the entire UAE team ...."

I suppose the good thing is if they're doing the Pyrenees early that means we can go off on our hols after week 1 and know we wont miss anything.

 

[rghysens]

Putting a 2014 Bergerac - Perigueux style ITT would be really good for the race IMO, atleast give remco a chance.

To become 2nd?
Btw, stage 8 will be a stage in line.

 

[Peyroteo94]

Putting a 2014 Bergerac - Perigueux style ITT would be really good for the race IMO, atleast give remco a chance.

Against Pogacar you can put 200 km of TT and he still will win. However, I would like to see a route with a good amount of TTs for once. It would be great to see big gaps before the mountains and Remco could wear the yellow jersey in the first week.

 

[rghysens]

That sounds to me like the Tour is not for him, not this particular route.

On current routes (at least 4 hc or 1c mtf´s, barely any flat itt), the tour is nothing for him, no.
By extension, that also counts for stage racing in general. Long gone are the times where races like Paris-Nice, Dauphiné and Switzerland had both a flat prologue and a long flat itt.

 

[Netserk]

On current routes (at least 4 hc or 1c mtf´s, barely any flat itt), the tour is nothing for him, no.
By extension, that also counts for stage racing in general. Long gone are the times where races like Paris-Nice, Dauphiné and Switzerland had both a flat prologue and a long flat itt.

And that's a shame. Some more variety would be nice.

I hope the ITT in the third week will be at least 40 km, I know I shouldn't hope for more than that.

 

[harrybo]

does anyone know what time the race route presentation starts on thursday please, as its not on tdf website, thanks

 

[Netserk]

does anyone know what time the race route presentation starts on thursday please, as its not on tdf website, thanks

11:00

 

[harrybo]

Next thursday, around 11.30 am local time.

so 10.30 uk time then

 

[ashhutch1997]

Against Pogacar you can put 200 km of TT and he still will win. However, I would like to see a route with a good amount of TTs for once. It would be great to see big gaps before the mountains and Remco could wear the yellow jersey in the first week.

I totally agree, but atleast give him an opportunity get a tiny headstart. This years TDF was almost designed for Pogacar with all the punchy stages

 

[pman]

I totally agree, but atleast give him an opportunity get a tiny headstart. This years TDF was almost designed for Pogacar with all the punchy stages

The punchy stages definitely favored Pog but I remember plenty of people thinking it was a Ving friendly route with the abundance of backloaded mountains including specific mountains that Pog was worse on than Ving.

 

[Jan the Man]

All most people want is balance- it has become unbalanced for the past decade - they need to introduce a lengthy TT preferably before the second big block of mountains.

As for some of the rumoured mountain stages they seem ok - we will always want more but my wishlist inlcludes-

A mountain top finishes where the penultimate climb is much harder than finishing climb.

A descent finish

A lengthy mountain stage c220km

 

[Kaptain Kool]

I'm pretty sure Remco fans want hundreds of more kms because it provides more road for Pogacar and Vingegaard to potentially crash out.

 

[YavorD]

I'm pretty sure Remco fans want hundreds of more kms because it provides more road for Pogacar and Vingegaard to potentially crash out.

I'm pretty sure Remco fans doesn't want that because Remco crashes (heavily) more often than them.

 

[Rob5091]

If a 19 year old pro can do a 300 km ride over 12 hours then is it not asking for too much to have a mountain stage over the current norm of 130 km?
https://www.cyclingnews.com/news/pa...-elevation-to-round-out-extraordinary-season/

...he got up at 3am on Sunday morning to take on a huge ride in the French and Swiss Alps, riding for 323km over 12 hours riding time, and racking up over 8,000m of elevation gain, .... He took the KOM on the Grand Saint-Bernard, completing the 34km climb in 1:44:16.

 

[houtdffan]

If a 19 year old pro can do a 300 km ride over 12 hours then is it not asking for too much to have a mountain stage over the current norm of 130 km?
https://www.cyclingnews.com/news/pa...-elevation-to-round-out-extraordinary-season/

as long as Mr. Youtube Cycling, Gouvenou, is ruining the tour, I suspect we will have much of the same

 

[Red Rick]

Quick, what was the longest mountain stage this tour in terms of duration and how exciting was it?

 

[Rob5091]

Quick, what was the longest mountain stage this tour in terms of duration and how exciting was it?

Trick question! There was no exciting mountain stage!

 

[ashhutch1997]

Although I feel it's good to have atleast one mountain stage over 200k, like the Giro tends to do. I actually don't have an issue with short mountain stages, as long as they are well designed, I think a sub 150k mountain stages can be good entertainment.

 

[Netserk]

Let's have two AdH stages done right:

19: Gap > Alpe d'Huez (traditional ascent)
20: Bourg-d'Oisans > Alpe d'Huez (CdF, Galibier, Sarenne)

 

[Monsi]

Let's have two AdH stages done right:

19: Gap > Alpe d'Huez (traditional ascent)
20: Bourg-d'Oisans > Alpe d'Huez (CdF, Galibier, Sarenne)

For your proposed stage 20, would Galibier be via the Telegraphe-Galibier combo or via the Lautaret?

 

[Netserk]

For your proposed stage 20, would Galibier be via the Telegraphe-Galibier combo or via the Lautaret?

The former, from the north. CdF is Croix de Fer.