The route of Tour de France 2023 unveiled, and the mystery of the stage in the northern Basque Country lifted. This Thursday, in Paris, Christian Prudhomme, the director of the Tour de France detailed the 21 stages of the 2023 edition
of the Big loop. Since January, we knew that the Grand Départ would be given from Bilbao in Biscay. The first three stages will take place in Euskadi, and the third fromAmorebieta-Etxano in Biscay
had created the suspense since the route stopped at Irun. “We had left a little doubt” smiles Thierry Gouvenou, technical director of the Tour de France_._ The third stage will therefore end in the labordine capital. “Bayonne is the city elected, but I think it is the Basque Country that will benefit”.
After an early stage along the Atlantic coast, on the Spanish side, past the border, the runners will continue their route along the Corniche
. “As soon as we cross the border, we will go to the seaside as far as Saint-Jean-de-Luz.“explains Thierry Gouvenou. “Afterwards, we will return to the land to position ourselves in the right direction and come and make sure that it is as least difficult as possible”. Direction Saint-Pée-sur-Nivelle for the Tour de France, specifying that this time “we don’t go as far as Espelette or Cambo, we cut across through the magnificent forest and we take a beautiful national road to finish and enter Bayonne.”
Arriving in Bayonne, no sprint, not logistically possible: “_We tried everything to do a sprint in the city center, but clearly, with the speed at which the runners are going now, with all the urban developments that have been made these In recent years, it is no longer possible to have a safe enough finish to avoid big falls and so we had to go off the track a little”. The sprint will then take place upstream. But Thierry Gouvenou assures him “o_n will be in ideal conditions not to have a royal sprint”.
Runners should therefore pass along the Jean Dauger Stadium and finish their race, after the bridge that crosses over the Nive, on the avenue de l’Aquitaine above the Glain car park in the center of Bayonne. Before taking the road to Dax, in the Landes, for the 4th stage. The end of a three-day trip through the Basque Country. The Tour de France will be held from July 1 to 23, 2023.