With fifteen consecutive Tours of France under his belt, Guerlesquin native Éric Le Balch, emblematic speaker of the Grande Boucle since 2006, stopped crisscrossing France in 2020 to devote himself exclusively to regional Cycling races.
“This 2024 season was like the previous ones, extremely rich,” comments the official speaker of the French Cycling Federation (FFC) who has officiated at numerous professional events such as the Tro Bro Léon in Lannilis, the Tour du Finistère in Quimper, the Boucles de l'Aulne in Châteaulin, the Kreiz Breizh Élites, Bretagne Classic in Plouay (formerly GP de Plouay), Paris-Tours and the Critérium de Pipriac (35) with Daniel Mangeas (official speaker for 41 years of the Tour de France) and Damien Martin (current official speaker of the Tour de France).
Passion for cycling
Éric Le Balch started cycling at the age of 7, at VC Coatserho then in Plestin-les-Grèves. He ran until he entered university and always followed the path of young people in the region. Then, in 2006, he joined the big Tour de France team, where he talked about possible attacks, gaps, the position of the riders and their results, which requires significant documentation work upstream.
Even if he no longer comments on the Tour de France, Éric Le Balch's voice still resonates but this time on regional cycling races.
“The voice of the race”
In 2025, Éric Le Balch will embark on his 37th season as speaker. “Here, I am presenting the third generation of certain families of runners like the Le Bon where I rubbed shoulders with Dominique then Johan (his son) and now Raphaël. Same with the Conans where I rubbed shoulders with Jean-Louis then Herman (his son) and now Enzo, Nolan and Lucy”, smiles the man who keeps his passion for cycling intact and who says he is an expert in geography as he has traveled the territory . He even obtained a master's degree in geography at the Brest faculty!
But to remain the one who is called “The voice of the race”, and to be able to tirelessly host and talk about the runners' results, Éric Le Balch continues tirelessly and with passion his preliminary work of documentation.
France
Cycling
