The 82nd edition of Paris-Nice, presented Tuesday in Versailles, will have a strong foretaste of the Tour de France which will also arrive on the Côte d’Azur in 2024 because of the holding of the Olympic Games in Paris.
The final weekend in the Nice hinterland of this prestigious eight-day stage race (March 3-10) will take several routes from the finale of the next Tour de France. Including the penultimate stage which will lead to the unprecedented arrival at Paris-Nice in Auron and will pass close to the La Couillole and Isola 2000 passes which could be the justices of the peace for the Grande Boucle next summer. On the last day, Paris-Nice will also pass through the Col d’Eze which will also be on the Tour program in July during a final, potentially decisive individual time trial.
“In March, on Paris-Nice, we imagine ourselves in July, we project ourselves, we put together plans,” commented the director of the Tour de France, Christian Prudhomme, on Tuesday. “We have a condensed version of the Tour de France in eight days, even more in 2024 because the Tour de France will end in Nice due to the Olympic Games,” he added. Paris-Nice will be used to repeat the ranges in racing conditions. And all the runners say that recognizing in training or in a race is completely different.”
The first six stages of “the Race to the Sun” will be traditional, first with a loop in Yvelines around Les Mureaux. There will be, like this year, a team time trial, where the time will be taken from the first rider of each team, in Auxerre. Two arrivals planned for previous editions but canceled due to bad weather have also been put back on the program. The peloton will thus climb to Mont Brouilly and will also cross the line at La Colle-sur-Loup which was unable to host the race in 2023 due to a violent storm.
As for the protagonists, the organizers of ASO hit hard in 2023 by attracting the Slovenian Tadej Pogacar and the Dane Jonas Vingegaard. The first flew over the event while the double winner of the Tour de France finished third, behind the Frenchman David Gaudu.
For 2024, “it’s too early to say but we have no concerns about the quality of the plateau,” underlined Mr. Prudhomme. Asked about the possible participation of Belgian star Remco Evenepoel, who should discover the Tour in 2024, he however conceded: “I think we can really hope yes.”
The route (1,219 km):
March 3: 1st stage Les Mureaux (Yvelines) – Les Mureaux (Yvelines), 157.7 km
March 4: 2nd stage Thoiry (Yvelines) – Montargis (Loiret), 177.6 km
March 5: 3rd stage Auxerre (Yonne), 26.9 km team time trial
March 6: 4th stage Chalon-sur-Saône (Saône-et-Loire) – Mont Brouilly (Rhône), 183 km
March 7: 5th stage Saint-Sauveur-de-Montagut (Ardèche) – Sisteron (Alpes-de-Haute-Provence), 193.5 km
March 8: 6th stage Sisteron (Alpes-de-Haute-Provence) – La Colle-sur-Loup (Alpes-Maritimes), 198.2 km
March 9: 7th stage Nice – Auron (Alpes-Maritimes), 173 km
March 10: 8th stage Nice – Nice, 109.3 km
