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France's
biggest sporting event
Cycling
is a great tradition in France - specially when it comes to "le Tour".
Each
year, hundreds of thousands of locals and holidaymakers turn up in
spots all round France to watch not just the cyclists, but also the
great "caravan" of floats, cars, media and officals go by...
2012 -
Final result
The 2012 Tour is now over, and for the first time ever the race was won
by a Briton. Favourite Bradley
Wiggins
won the 99th Tour de France, ahead of fellow Briton and team mate Chris
Froom. The final day of the race was a great day for British cyclists,
with Mark Cavendish, another UK contestant, winning the day's leg.
French cyclists were not left out of the results
of what
has become a completely international event. Two up-and-coming French
riders came in in the top ten, and French rider Thomas Voeckler won the
mountain stages title.
Le
Tour
2012
the route
Tour
de France route map by About-France.com .
Copying
permitted only by permission.
The
route
of the 2012 Tour de France
Starting in
Belgium, the Tour is in France
from stage 3 onwards. From 3rd
- 5th July, riders will be in northern
France; from the 6th -
9th July they will be in rather hillier eastern
France, with, in particular, a finish at the summit of La Planche in
the Vosges mountains on Sat 7th. The first time trials are around
Besançon, in the Franche Comté region on Monday
9th July.
From 11th July to 13th
July,
riders will be attacking the
high hills of the Bugey and the Alps. France's national day,
14th July, will see them sweating it out in the dry Mediterranean
hinterland, between St. Paul Trois Chateaux, in the Rhone valley, and
Cap d'Agde on the Languedoc coast.
From 15th -
19th July, the race comes to the
Pyrenees, firstly the foothills, then the high Pyrenees. On
20th July,
riders head north from Blagnac - a suburb of Toulouse - to
Brive la Gaillarde, through the gentle hills of Gascony and Quercy.
Then it's back for two days close to Paris, Saturday 21st for
time trials near Chartres, and Sunday
for the final sprint from
Rambouillet to the finish on the Champs Elysées.
Click for Cycling in
France
A guide to cycling in France: rules, long-distance cycle routes,
essential cycling vocabulary, and more
The race can be watched anywhere along
the route:
near the start of the day's leg, riders tend to be very bunched, and
the actual race passes in about a minute. Towards the end of a leg,
riders are more spaced out, so the thrill of the race lasts longer.
However most of the spectacle comes not from the riders themselves, but
from the "caravan", an hour-or-more long procession of cars, floats and
motorcycles from the Tour's sponsors and the teams. It's all very
commercial, with freebies being thrown out to the spectators; cheap
baseball caps, little packs of sweets, mini-pretzels, keyrings and
other gimmicks. It's interesting to watch, and the kids love it. But if
its the actual race you want to see, then it's far better to watch it
on TV where the cameras follow the riders from start to finish.
Cycling is not just the Tour de France, but is a popular leisure
activity. Click for more information on cycling
in France and France's network of cycleways.
The 2012 Tour de France route
stage by stage
Stage |
Date |
Day’s
route
(towns, regions) and terrain |
Length
in Km. |
Prologue |
Sat 30th June |
Liège - Belgium |
6 km |
1st Stage |
Sun
1 July |
Liège
-
Seraing (Belgium) - mixed
|
198 km
|
2nd Stage |
Mon 2 July |
Visé
-
Tournai - fairly flat |
207 km |
3rd Stage |
Tues 3
July |
Orchies
- Boulogne sur Mer (Nord - Pas de Calais)
fairly flat, some small hills |
.197 km |
4th Stage |
Wed 4 July |
Abbeville
(Picardy) -
Rouen (Normandy)
hills and valleys |
214 km. |
5th Stage |
Thur 5
July |
Rouen (Normandy)
- Saint Quentin (Picardy)
- undulating then flat |
.197 km. |
6th Stage |
Fri 6 July |
Epernay (Champagne) - Metz (Lorraine) -
flattish to undulating |
210 km. |
7th Stage |
Sat 7 July |
Tomblaine
(Lorraine) -
La Planche des Belles Filles (Franche
Comté) - hilly, getting steeper - arrival at a
summit in the
Vosges mountains |
199 km. |
8th Stage |
Sun 8 July |
Belfort
(Franche
Comté)
- Porrentruy (Switzerland) - hills and valleys |
154 km. |
9th Stage |
Mon 9 July |
Arc et
Senans - Besançon
(Franche
Comté)
Time trials - gently hilly |
38 km. |
Rest
Day
|
Tue
10 July |
Macon
- (Burgundy)
|
none |
10th Stage
|
Wed 11
July |
Macon (Burgundy) -
Bellegarde sur Valserine (Rhône-Alpes)
flat, then properly hilly |
194 km. |
11th Stage |
Thur 12
July |
Albertville
- La Toussouire (Rhône-Alpes)
First Alpine stage - mountainous. Summit finish
|
.140 km |
12th Stage |
Fri 13
July |
Saint
Jean de Maurienne - Annonay (Rhône-Alpes)
Second Alpine stage - less mountainous |
220 km. |
13th
Stage |
Sat
14 July |
Saint-Paul
Trois Châteaux (Rhône-Alpes)
- Cap d'Agde (Languedoc-Roussillon)
Mediterranean hills - could be very hot. |
215
km. |
14th Stage |
Sun
15
July |
Limoux (Languedoc-Roussillon)
- Foix (Midi-Pyrénées)
getting hillier |
192 km. |
15th Stage |
Mon 16
July |
Samatan (Midi-Pyrénées) -
Pau (Aquitaine) |
160m. |
Rest day |
Tues
17 July |
.Pau |
none |
16th Stage
|
Wed
18 July |
Pau (Aquitaine)
- Bagnères de Luchon (Midi-Pyrénées) -
into the Pyrenees. Mountainous |
197 km. |
17th
Stage |
Thur
19 July |
Bagnères
de Luchon - Peyragudes (Midi-Pyrénées)
- Mountainous. Summit finish |
144
km. |
18th Stage |
Fri 20
July |
Blagnac (Midi-Pyrénées)
- Brive la Gaillarde (Limousin)
- fairly flat at first, then hilly |
215 km |
19th Stage |
Sat 21
July |
Bonneval
- Chartres (Région
Centre) - virtually flat - Time
trials |
52 km |
20th Stage |
Sun 22
July |
Rambouillet
– Paris
(Ile de France) |
130 km. |
Total length: 3,479 km
For
the record: route of
the The Tour de France 2008 : Tour de France 2009
Tour
de France 2010 : Tour de France 2011
With
almost 200 cyclists, including many of the world's best, the Tour de
France - which first took place in 1903 - is certainly a great sporting
event; nonetheless, it is an event that has been marred - even heavily
marred - in recent years by doping scandals, with cyclists proving
positive in anti-doping tests. The 2008 race was no different from
others, and at a small number of competitors were withdrawn from the
race following a positive doping test.
Yet in spite of the doping scandals, and the withdrawal in
recent
years of certain major teams, the "Tour" goes on, and it is difficult
to imagine how it could not. This mega sporting event is worth millions
of Euros in advertising, sponsorship and worldwide television rights,
attracts millions of spectators, and is one of Europe's great media
circus acts.
For the hundreds of thousands who turn up
to line the route, the cycling is actually only a tiny bit of the show:
While the time-trial races may offer a more long-drawn-out cycling
experience for spectators, with competitors taking part one by one, on
normal race days the riders may go past in just a minute, especially in
the earlier part of a day's leg, before the participants have become
more spaced out. But then, the actual race is just a small part of the
show. Starting some two hours before the race, the "Caravan" is a
cavalcade of floats, decorated cars and other vehicles that moves along
the route, throwing out goodies and free samples to the spectators; it
is a massive advertising stunt. The advertising caravan, made up of the
Tour's official sponsors, is followed by a long line of official cars,
technical vehicles, media and motorbikes, lights flashing, horns
sounding, all warming up the spectators for the actual event itself.
Then, at last, the riders come by - and are gone again as quickly as
they appeared, pounding uphill or downhill at speeds that can reach 50
mph or more. A bit of an anti-climax.... And with that, the day's
excitement is over.
Anyone wanting to watch the race
in a serious manner would be well advised to do so on television; but
for a day's outing, with all the fun of the crowds, the waiting, the
caravan, and the atmosphere, watching the Tour go by is as good as many
other events, and what's more it's free.
The Tour can
be watched all over France, and each year the route is different,
taking in at least one leg in another country.
If you go to watch the Tour, specially with kids,
take
care! Don't let children stand too close to the road, and never cross
the road while the caravan is passing.
Tourists wanting to book holiday
accommodation along the route are advised to do so early.
Click here for holiday cottages or
for bed and
breakfast accommodation in France.
Visit the Official
site of the tour de France
Tourist attractions in
France, by region :
France in general:
The main historic monuments
and tourist attractions in France
Follow these links for a more detailed list of major tourist
attractions in the following regions:
Paris tourist attractions
Things
to see and do in Languedoc-Roussillon
Tourist
attractions in Limousin
Tourist
sites in the
Midi-Pyrenees region
Tourist attractions in
Normandy
Tourist sites in the Pays
de la Loire
A brief introduction to the regions of France
|
Accommodation for the Tour
de France
All hotel rooms
in and around the start and finish points get booked up very fast by
the teams and the media.
To avoid disappointment, check out available hotel rooms as soon as
possible, using the major online portals booking.com
or Hotels.com,
***
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