- Joined
- Sep 20, 2017
- Messages
- 13,971
- Reaction score
- 26,343
- Points
- 28,180
Stage 12: Circuit de Nevers Magny-Cours – Chalon-sur-Saône, 179.1k
From the Loire to the Saône, bypassing as many hills as possible. Yes, it’s the last flat stage, but given that it’s the fourth in sixth stages, it’s still annoying.Map and profile
Start
As you can tell from the title, the start is about as close to yesterday’s finish as it gets without actually starting in the same municipality. Although first opened in 1960, Magny-Cours was a pretty minor circuit until it was purchased in the 1980s by the government. Major investments were made to make the circuit suitable for big events, and starting from 1991, it became the new venue for the French Grand Prix in Formula 1. However, an uninspiring track layout and its remote location (by F1 standards) meant that it was never well-liked by the racers in particular, and the lack of major cities nearby meant that attendance was also often subpar. After years of speculation, the race was finally canned in 2009, and it would be almost a decade before F1 returned to France. Magny Cours has hosted a variety of other high-level races, but in the present, international races have become limited to Superbike and grand touring. It has also seen two Paris-Nice stages, but this will be the Tour’s first visit.
(picture by Cjp24 at Wikimedia Commons)
The route
Contrary to most of the sprint stages in this year’s race, the route taken on this occasion is actually quite direct. The first town on the route is Saint-Pierre-le-Moûtier, notable as the last town to be successfully besieged by Joan of Arc before her capture and execution. The route then briefly retreads part of the previous stage, once again crossing the Loire in Decize, which hosts the intermediate sprint this time.
East of the Loire valley, there is a long and wide range of hills that separates it from the Saône and Rhône valley. Just to the north of the route are the mid-mountains of the Morvan, the southern part of which could easily have been used on this route. In fact, if you draw a line between start and finish, you pass almost directly over Signal d’Uchon, the main climb of the 2021 monster-length stage into Le Creusot as well as this year’s echelon odyssey at Paris-Nice. Instead, ASO have opted for basically the lowest part of the hundreds of kilometres of hills east of the Loire, and then not even used the more interesting hills in this area. There are three KOMs, but all of them are really straightforward. The first of these is Côte de Lanty (2.1k at 3.9%), which is followed by the uncategorised Côte du Gros Foyard (910m at 5.0%), the latter being about as hard as the non-KOM hills get today. After this, the road rises again to Côte de Cuzy (2.4k at 4.5%).
A bit further down the road, the rural landscape briefly gives way to one of France’s main coal basins, and here we pass through the largest town seen since yesterday’s finish, Montceau-les-Mines. It’s a bit of an ironic name now, given that the last mine closed decades ago. After leaving coal country, the terrain becomes a bit more hilly again, taking in the uncategorised Côte de Montchanin le Haut (3.4k at an irregular 3.1%). Some false flat leads to the highest point of the day, Col des Baudots. Its descent leads into the final KOM of the day, Côte de Montagny-lès-Buxy. The summit is just inside the final 20 kilometres, so had ASO opted for one of the half-decent hills in this area, it might just have been a launchpad. However, 2.9k at 3.9% isn’t going to do anything other than provide pretty images of vineyard-covered hills.
The ensuing descent is easy, and with about 12k to go, we are near the elevation of the finish (although the roads do remain rolling). And with that, it’s time for one of the recurring segments of these posts: criticising the safety of sprint finishes. At 5k to go, the route turns into a false-flat descent, which ends at that roundabout that is marked on the map below. Both sides are open, but the left is clearly shorter. The big traffic island and the speed bump after this are not ideal, but no dealbreakers. However, the thing I really think could be a big hazard is that sharp bend at 2.3k to go. What is not obvious from the map or the profile, is that the 350 metres leading into it descend at about 3.5%, and the corner itself is actually part of a roundabout, so no wide apex either. At 1.8k to go, the route passes through the centre of a roundabout (there is a paved strip in place, requiring only a minor narrowing). The remainder of the finale is the same as in 2019 and very straightforward.
Finish
(yet another bad profile – the final kilometre is directly on the banks of the Saône river and the elevations are roughly correct, so obviously the finish is nowhere near as uphill as the profile suggests. The road starts to rise with about 50 metres to go, it’s negligible).
At the start of the stage, I mentioned that the route traversed the hills west of the Saône at their lowest point, and that’s exactly why Chalon-sur-Saône is located here – the relatively easy route west made this a natural junction of trade routes, that had already developed into something of a town by the time the Romans arrived. When the Western Roman Empire started to disintegrate, the Burgundians settled originally around Lake Geneva, establishing a kingdom that soon expanded westward into an area that includes modern-day Burgundy (Bourgogne), of which Chalon is a part. To the frustration of historians (professional or hobbyist) everywhere, this was the first of about fifteen different entities that were called Burgundy, many of which existed at the same time and quite a few of which were entirely outside of what we now conceive of as Burgundy.
The second of these entities was the Frankish Kingdom of Burgundy, established after the Frankish conquest of the Kingdom of the Burgundians (yes, I know, it’s all a bit Monty Python and the Holy Grail, and it’s not about to get better) in 534. Despite the name, it was initially subject to the crown in Paris, although it slowly developed into a more or less independent kingdom. The official capital was Orléans, but this was located near its border and was therefore quite peripheral given that Burgundy stretched as far as the Italian Alps and the Provence at this time. As a result, many of the kings preferred to rule from Chalon, and a royal palace was built here. After the Carolingians took over in the 8th century, the power of Burgundy was broken (although the kingdom would not be formally disestablished until 843) by being subdivided into four parts, all of which had Burgundy as part of their name. Thanks for nothing, Charles Martel.
By this point, the power of Chalon had also been broken, although that had little to do with the Carolingians – it was sacked during one of the Arab invasions of the era, and apparently not rebuilt until the reign of Charlemagne, half a century later. In the 9th century, the Carolingian Empire was subdivided over the course of four treaties, a key part of the reason why the kings in Paris became so weak. Simplifying things a little (something that is entirely necessary when discussing Burgundian history), these subdivisions led to the western half coalescing into what would become France, and the eastern half developing into the Holy Roman Empire. The old kingdom of Burgundy was formally disestablished and partitioned in the first of these treaties, and would end up with a smaller part under nominal French control and a greater part within the Holy Roman Empire. Chalon was on the French side, which was reorganised into the Duchy of Burgundy. The Holy Roman part was initially divided, then united into the Kingdom of Arles (officially also called Burgundy, but let’s not bother with that), then fractured again, with the northern part (bordering the Duchy) becoming the County of Burgundy (also known as the Franche-Comté).
These two were then joined in personal union in 1330, becoming the heart of what most historians call the Burgundian State. Although formally subject to the French crown, the dukes of Burgundy had proven as hard to bring to heel as the English kings with their French holdings, and although the dukes worked with the French king when it suited them and during the periods when the king did manage to exact some control, they also often allied with England during the Hundred Years’ War. In the 15th century, the dukes were at their most independent, and also ruled the southwestern half of what is now the Netherlands, most of modern Belgium and Luxembourg, and the northernmost part of what is now France (starting less than 100 kilometres north of Paris). However, just as the Burgundian State was becoming one of the major powers in Western Europe, the reigning duke died without a male heir in 1477. The territory was then fought over by France, which had nominal overlordship over a substantial part, and the rising Habsburgs, who had cleverly arranged a marriage with the duke’s daughter. This marks the beginning of the centuries-long rivalry between both royal houses. The Duchy was one of the areas that France did gain control of, and has remained there ever since.
You might be wondering what happened to Chalon during the seven centuries I’ve just skipped over, and the answer is… not that much. Of course, the town gradually grew, it just didn’t have a whole lot of cultural or historical impact. That changed during the French Wars of Religion, when it was initially seized by the protestants, but later became a bastion of the Catholic League, and was one of the last places to hold out during the War of the Three Henrys. At the end of the 18th century, the Canal du Centre was constructed, linking the Loire to the Saône. Chalon was located where the canal entered the latter river, and especially before the arrival of the railway, this led to a period of significant growth. In the second half of the 19th century, the economic focus pivoted towards industrialisation, aided by the proximity to the coal mining region passed through on this stage.
In more recent times, Chalon has been on the unfortunate side of history a couple of times. During the Second World War, the demarcation line between the German-occupied zone and Vichy France ran through the town, and after the war was over, the marquee project was the development of a large Kodak factory, which naturally led to the loss of many jobs in the 2000s. Partially because of this, the population contracted by almost a quarter between 1975 and 2011, but has stabilised since, remaining the second-largest in Burgundy. The town’s most famous son is Nicéphore Niépce, one of the pioneers of photography, and the creator of the world’s oldest surviving photograph in 1827. This will be the Tour’s sixth visit, the most recent instance being the aforementioned 2019 stage won by Dylan Groenewegen.
(picture by Oliver Schöpgens at Wikimedia Commons)
What to expect?
The roads are exposed enough that a strong southwestern (or northwestern) wind could wreak havoc, but once again, this just isn’t a part of France known for that kind of weather. So it’s hard to see anything getting in the way of the last easy sprint opportunity.
