The 2026 Cycling Tour de France will start from Barcelona, the third time it has ever started on Spanish soil, race organizer Amaury Sport Organization (ASO) announced today.
“Barcelona is a prestigious city and a city of sport,” praised Tour director Christian Prudhomme in a statement to French news agency AFP, adding that Catalonia will host “two completed stages and the start” of the third stage of the Tour. 113. ª “Big Buckle”.
This will be the third time since its debut in 1903 that the Tour de France has started in Spain, following San Sebastian in 1992 and Bilbao in 2023.
It will also be the fourth “big match” abroad in five years and the 27th of 113 matches after Copenhagen in 2022, Bilbao in 2023 and Florence in 2024 – in 2025 he will travel from Lille.
“These great matches allow the Tour de France to shine even more,” Prudhomme said.
Barcelona, which hosted the 1992 Olympics, has long been a “candidate” and the city’s current mayor, Jaume Colboni, who has been in office for a year, has been “dreaming” about the opportunity, according to the Tour’s director.
Details of the “big start” will be revealed in September, so until then the race official will only say that Catalunya will hold “two full stages and a start on the third day” before the race “heads to France.” “.
Prudhomme admits that climbing the Montjuïc hill “is obviously an undeniable added benefit”, but without ruling out waiting for the Pyrenees during the first week.
This year, in its 111th edition, the Tour will leave Italy for the first time for Florence on June 29, followed three weeks later by an unprecedented visit to Nice, which will replace Paris for the first time for the Olympic Games. .
Author: Lusa
Source: CM Jornal
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