Tour de France 2025. Pau will have its stage start, the Pyrenees will be spicy

This Tuesday noon at the Palais des Congrès in Paris, Pogacar will not be there. But he will haunt the room, he who has eaten away the brains of all his rivals this season. In an interview with the Italian media Tuttobiciweb, he has in any case already announced his impatience to discover this course which he will probably enjoy for the fourth time, even if he also announced his temptation to aim for some classics and return to the Tour of Flanders (which he skipped this year due to preparation for the Giro, which he won).

A Franco-French Tour?

So what will this 112th edition of the Tour de France look like? Something much more classic than in recent years. The Olympic Games and the Euro have passed: the Grande Boucle can therefore regain its place and will a priori remain completely on French territory. This is already a small event in itself after three consecutive major departures from abroad (Copenhagen in 2022, Bilbao in 2023 and Florence in 2024). We have known for a year that this 2025 Tour will start from the North in general and from Lille in particular. And if the northern departures are regularly accompanied by cobbled stages, this will not be the case this time, revealed Christian Prudhomme, thus promising a first yellow jersey to a sprinter.

Pau, 76th visit

And after a descent through Normandy, Brittany and a probable incursion into the Massif Central, the peloton should generally avoid Nouvelle Aquitaine. No Charente-Maritime, Dordogne de Landes, Gironde or Lot-et-Garonne in sight therefore, for this year, because the Pyrenees will be approached from the Occitanie side (rest in Toulouse, stage start in Auch). But a Tour de France without passing through Pau would not be quite a Tour de France.

Because according to our information, after a first Pyrenean round in the form of a hill race between Auch and Hautacam on July 17 then an 11 km mountain time trial probably already decisive on July 18, between Loudenvielle and the terrible ascent of Peyragudes (with arrival at the altiport, where Romain Bardet won in 2017), the queen stage of the Pyrenees will take off from the Béarnaise capital on July 19. On the program, an arrival at Luchon-Superbagnères, via Tourmalet, Aspin and Peyresourde, heavy and classic. Pau will thus host the Tour for the 76th time, even if it will be a minimum service after having received an arrival (Agen-Pau, victory for Philipsen) and a departure (Pau-Saint-Lary Pla d'Adet , victory for Pogacar, this year).