It's going to be a spectacular route for 2013. Let's hope the riders make it a spectacular race. Photograph: AFP
At first glance, the 2013 Tour de France route looks mouth watering. Two trips up Alp d'Huez on the same day, two individual time-trials, a team-time-trial, four mountain top finishes, a visit to Mont-Saint-Michel, and a night finish in Paris that will see the riders loop up and around the Arc de Triumph for the first time.
It certainly appears to be a race of firsts with the clear intention of the organisors to make it a memorable one for the 100th Tour. The race starts on the island of Corsica with three stages that could potentially see a sprinter snag the Yellow jersey from day one, a scenario that is surely mouth watering for Mark Cavendish.
From there the race hits the south coast of France for a team-time-trial in Nice. I was in Nice last summer for my honeymoon ... in fact, it'll be two years to the day that I arrived in Nice that they'll run the TTT and only highten to make me wish they'd started this whole Tour de France thing two years earlier meaning this 100th anniversary route took place in 2011.
The Pyranees come first at the end of the first week to really begin separating the men from the boys. By then, what with some early flat stages and the TTT we should have seen the Yellow jersey change hands a couple of times and it surely will once again before the first rest day in Saint-Nazaire, Loire-Atlantique.
It's to the north west of France next for a couple of stages that will include an individual 33km time-trial onto the tidal island of Mont-Saint-Michel. That's another place I have visited before in France, way back in 1991 during a trip with my cycling club as a nine year old kid and it'll no doubt bring back some fond memories. We took in two stages that year, though none on Mont-Saint-Michel ... the last time the race visited there was the year before.
Following a trip through the middle of France the race then hits the Alps for a grueling final haul. A finish at Mont Ventoux comes before the second rest day at which stage we will really know who is in the mix to win the race. The final individual time-trial is a 32km effort on a hilly course that should allow the pure climbers to limit their losses before three savage days in the mountains. It'll heavily favour someone who can time-trial and climb well, someone like Alberto Contador or Chris Froome, and set up whoever seizes the initiative, nicely for the final charge.
It's safe to say the advantage swings back towards the climbers this year by comparison to last year, though not as far as they might have hoped. There's still the two individual time-trials, but then there is a lot of climbing to be done between that final time trial and Paris. That will allow them the opportunity to chase back any lost time as opposed to trying to build it ahead of a penultimate stage time-trial as we seen last year.
And then into Paris itself with a serious revamp. An estimated finishing time of 9:45 p.m. will make for a conclusion to the twenty-one day race under the lights. The circuit itself even gets a revamp. Rather than performing a u-turn a-top the Champs-Elysées, the riders will go right to the top of the street and loop around the Arc de Triumph before heading back down the again. It'll be a spectacular sight, in a three week period of spectacular sights, as the sun fades on the day, the tour, and it's first one hundred editions.
Route of the 2013 Tour de France
June 29, stage 1: Porto-Vecchio to Bastia, 212km
June 30, stage 2: Bastia to Ajaccio, 154km
July 1st, stage 3: Ajaccio to Calvi, 145km
July 2nd, stage 4: Nice to Nice, TTT, 25km
July 3, stage 5: Cagnes-sur-Mer to Marseille, 219km
July 4, stage 6: Aix-en-Provence to Montpellier, 176km
July 5, stage 7: Montpellier to Albi, 205km
July 6, stage 8: Castres to Ax-3 domaines, 194km
July 7, stage 9: Saint-Girons to Bagnères-de-Bigorre, 165km
July 8: Rest day in Saint-Nazaire, Loire-Atlantique
July 9, stage 10: St-Gildas-des-Bois to Saint-Malo, 193km
July 10, stage 11: Avranches to Mont-Saint-Michel, ITT, 33km
July 11, stage 12: Fougères to Tours, 218km
July 12, stage 13: Tours to Saint-Amand-Montrond, 173km
July 13, stage 14: Saint-Pourçain-sur-Sioule to Lyon, 191km
July 14, stage 15: Givors to Mont Ventoux, 242km
July 15: Rest day in the Vaucluse province (Avignon, Orange)
July 16, stage 16: Vaison-la-Romaine to Gap, 168km
July 17, stage 17: Embrun to Chorges, ITT, 32km
July 18, stage 18: Gap to l’Alpe d’Huez, 168km
July 19, stage 19: Bourg d’Oisans to Le Grand Bornand, 204km
July 20, stage 20: Annecy to Annecy-Semnoz, 125km
July 21, stage 21: Versailles to Paris/Champs-Elysées, 118km
