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A volcano awakens. 35 years after its final look, the Puy de Dôme is making a comeback amongst different giants, throughout a Tour de France 2023 resolutely turned in direction of the mountains.

Go to of the 5 mountain ranges of France. A document of thirty passes. Almost 56,000 meters of elevation achieve. 4 summit finishes. And a single 22 km time trial together with a legendary raid: you’ll have to have gentle socks subsequent July!

Unveiled Thursday in Paris, the 2023 route is gaining peak. It isn’t all the time a present assure. However not less than it makes your mouth water throughout the eight months previous the large begin given on July 1 in Bilbao, the second launch from Spain and twenty fifth from overseas within the greater than century-old historical past of the occasion.

The route of the a hundred and tenth version appears to be like like an arrow that crosses France diagonally, from the south-west to the center-east, from the Basque Nation to Alsace, instantly abandoning complete sections of the territory, on the danger of offending lands of biking like Brittany, the North and the South of the Mediterranean.

However the mountain ranges, he doesn’t neglect any, successively traversing the Pyrenees, the Massif Central, the Jura, the Alps and the Vosges, the place a stage comprising six ascents proposes to make the suspense final till the eve of the arrival on the Champs-Elysées on July 23.

The return from the Col de la Loze

If just one large symbolic occasion needed to be remembered, it might be that of July 9 when the Tour de France will reconnect with the formidable slopes of the Puy de Dôme, 35 years after its final passage and 59 years after the legendary duel between Jacques Anquetil and Raymond Poulidor.

The Auvergne volcano, which has celebrated champions like Coppi, Bahamontes, Ocana or van Impe, is conducive to fantasy and the peloton may erupt that day, particularly within the final 4 kilometers at nearly 12% common and with out an viewers, given the narrowness of the premises.

However there are lots of different locations to shake up the Tour 2023. The riders will climb myths just like the Tourmalet, whereas the Pyrenees are on the menu from the fifth stage, between Pau and Laruns, with the passes of Soudet and Marie White.

The sprinters, who will be capable of console themselves on the levels resulting in Bayonne, Bordeaux, the Nogaro racing circuit or Limoges, will even curse the newer peaks, destined to turn into nice classics.

First, the infernal Col de la Loze with its passages at greater than 20%, found in 2020, and which might be taken this 12 months simply earlier than diving in Courchevel for the queen stage. But in addition the Grand Colombier, justice of the peace of the Jura, the place the arrival will happen, on July 14, for the second time solely in historical past, two years after the horrible failure of Egan Bernal.

A single stopwatch, within the Alps

Total, the 2023 Tour, whose final stage will begin from the Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines velodrome, appears greater than ever promised to a champion who loves climbing, and this from the primary stage with a loop round Bilbao providing a constructive altitude distinction of 3300 m.

The one stopwatch on this system, between Passy and Combloux, is positioned 5 days earlier than the end result. It is just 22 kilometers lengthy – in complete it’s the lowest water stage in historical past after 13 km in 2015 – and passes by means of the coast of Domancy (2.5 km at 9.4%), the place Bernard Hinault had disgusted the competitors in a bullfighting ambiance to turn into world champion in 1980.

If the Belgian Remco Evenepoel, very snug within the timed train, needed to be satisfied to attend till 2024 to make his debut within the Tour de France, the organizers wouldn’t have gone about it every other means!

With different robust climbs within the Alps (Ramaz, Joux Aircraft, Forclaz, Croix Fry, Le Bettex), the 2023 route appears, at this stage, to arrange a dream stage for a remake of the duel between Jonas Vingegaard, winner outgoing, and Tadej Pogacar, winner in 2020 and 2021, who goals of taking his revenge subsequent summer time.

This text has been printed robotically. Sources: ats / afp