In 2024, due to the Olympics, the Tour de France will arrive in Nice and leave Paris for the first time in over a century.

The competition will end with an individual time trial, 35 years after the legendary duel Lemond-Fignon.

As is usually the case in an Olympic year, the start of this 111th edition, which should take place for the first time in Italy – in Florence – will also be brought forward by a week.

The race will therefore leave on June 29 and will arrive on the Côte d'Azur on July 21, five days before the start of the Olympic Games in the capital, the city of Nice and the organizers indicated on Thursday December 1.

That the Tour de France arrives in Nice in 2024 has been recorded for a while, while the Paris Games (July 26-August 11) will turn the summer sports program upside down.

In July, the French Minister of Sports, Amélie Oudéa-Castéra, had indicated that, to avoid "the dispersion of the security forces" at this time, "the arrival of the Tour de France will be a little anticipated and will probably not take place in Paris, but rather in Nice".

It is nonetheless a small revolution since the most famous race in the world has always ended in Paris until then, with the exception of the first two editions, in 1903 and 1904, with arrivals in Ville d'Avray. (Hauts-de-Seine).

Subsequently, it arrived first at the Parc des Princes (from 1905 to 1967), then at the Cipale velodrome (1968 to 1975) and since 1975 on the Champs-Élysées.

"Nice deserves it"

The choice of Nice was quickly imposed.

It needed a big city to finish and the city of the Riviera is used to working with the teams of Amaury Sport Organization (ASO), in particular with the arrival, each year, of Paris-Nice and recently the Grand Départ of the Tour de France 2020, postponed to September due to Covid-19.

The mayor of Nice "Christian Estrosi was the first to accept that we move for two months, explains the director of the Tour, Christian Prudhomme, to AFP. We have not forgotten it, but 2024 is d firstly because Nice deserves it. Nice is a city that shines, known worldwide. There is the beauty of the setting and the mountains nearby. The city offers an exceptional setting and a wonderful field of expression for the champions we going to use."

For this Tour like no other, the organizers are thus planning a "final weekend of fireworks" on the Côte d'Azur with first, on Saturday, a "mountain-oriented" stage starting from Nice.

Then, the next day, as the ultimate justice of the peace, an individual time trial which could start in Monaco.

Against the watch

It will be the first time that the Tour has finished on a clock since the mythical outcome of 1989 when the Frenchman Laurent Fignon, now deceased, lost the yellow jersey for eight seconds, between Versailles and the Champs-Élysées, the most small gap in the history of the Tour, against the American Greg Lemond.

"From the moment we were somewhere other than Paris, it was obvious that the last stage could potentially offer a turnaround. If it's played for nine seconds in 2024, we won't blame anyone" , laughs Prudhomme.

Generally, the last time trial is placed at the penultimate stage, although this is far from always the case.

Next year, for example, it will take place on Tuesday, five days before the deadline.

In 2024, there will therefore a priori be at stake until the last second for the leaders of the general classification, whereas currently the last stage looks above all like a criterium where the riders are already popping the champagne.

Christian Prudhomme does not want to reveal the profile of Nice's time at this stage, indicating only that it "will not cover ten kilometers" and that "it would be a shame if it were all flat". 

It will take place on Belgium's national holiday, the perfect opportunity to see Belgian prodigy Remco Evenepoel, a great chrono specialist, at work, who is due to make his Tour debut in 2024, adds- he.

In 2025, the return to normal is already scheduled, especially since we will have something to celebrate.

"We will be delighted to find Paris and the Champs-Élysées for the 50th anniversary of the first arrival" on the famous Parisian avenue, underlines the director of the Tour.

With AFP

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