Paris (AFP)
If it is designed to multiply the appointments between the favorites, the Tour de France 2020 has several milestones that are crucial. Focus on five appointments:
9th stage: Pau - Laruns, 154 km
End of the first week and day before rest, as well as the commitment should be total for the second act Pyrenean, "the hardest" in the opinion of the organizers. Main novelty: the collar of the Hourcère. Its 11 kilometers to nearly 9% lead to Issarbe and then to the Soudet pass, before descending towards Arette in the opposite direction to the memorable climb of the Pierre-Saint-Martin du Tour 2015.
In the end, the Marie-Blanque Pass is climbed by its steepest slope before diving towards the valley leading to Laruns where the Tour made stage last year. But the race then came from the east, from Aubisque.
10th stage: island of Oleron - island of Ré, 170 km
"A stage island hopping, it will be unheard of on the Tour!" Welcomes its director Christian Prudhomme. Departure from the castle of Oléron, arrival at Saint-Martin de Ré. Between the two sites, a rise by the marshes to Rochefort then by the coast to La Rochelle, on a revolving course which passes nearly six fortifications testifying the genius of Vauban.
"Obviously we will have to count with the wind that day," said the director of the Tour. In this case, it is for climbers the stage of all dangers.
15th stage: Lyon - Grand Colombier, 175 km
At the end of the second week, which will also have the highlight of the Puy Mary stage, the Tour offers an unprecedented finish at the Grand Colombier, a mountain adopted since the first visit in 2012.
Two partial but extremely steep climbs (Selle de Fromentel, La Biche), by other access routes, precede the final climb of the Giant du Jura, from Culoz. The altitude rises to 1501 meters but the road, with spectacular laces, is cut for climbers: 17.4 kilometers to 7.1% average slope to reach the panoramic site on the Rhone and Lake Bourget.
17th stage: Grenoble - Méribel Col de la Loze, 168 km
The great attraction of the 2020 route. The Loze Pass? The last 6-7 kilometers are "a succession of ruptures of slopes, all more brutal than the others", explains the director of the Tour.
The final is so rough that the organizers had considered borrowing the Grand Cucheron during the stage. They were satisfied with a single large pass before, the Madeleine, climbed by a new road and steeper than the traditional way in its first two thirds.
20th stage: Lure - The Planche des Belles Filles, 36 km
The only time trial of the event, in the area of Thibaut Pinot, is on the eve of the finish. "A chrono in three parts", details Christian Prudhomme. "Flat first, then slightly inclined in a long false dish before the piece of bravery".
The climb, one of the most selective Vosges (5.9 km to 8.5%), concludes on the line installed in the same place as in 2012, 2014 and 2017. Last summer, the organizers had added an extra kilometer, very steep and mostly unpaved. That day (July 18), "it will be time to Lure," joked the director of the Tour.
© 2019 AFP