Tour de France 2026 Route Preview: Can Tadej Pogacar Win On The Alpe d’huez?

Ewan’s journalist stories: https://www.cyclist.co.uk/author/ewan-wilson-staff-writer

For the Tour de France 2026, the 113th edition kicks off in Barcelona on July 4th with a rare team time trial, before crossing the Pyrenees for an early summit finish at Les Angles. The race then snakes through France’s classic cycling heartlands — Pau, Bordeaux, and Chambéry — but all eyes will be on the double stage finish at Alpe d’Huez, the defining feature of this year’s route. Stages 19 and 20 will both finish atop the legendary climb, with the penultimate day packing over 5,600 metres of elevation gain across the Croix de Fer, Télégraphe, Galibier, and the punishing Col de Sarenne before the final ascent to the Alpe. It’s a route made for pure climbers — and a showdown that could rival the most dramatic finales in Tour history.

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Hello everyone and welcome to another video here on the Cycling Dane Extra channel. If you’re listening to the Cycling Dane podcast, today I’m joined by Mr. Critical himself, Yuan Wilson of the Cyclist Magazine. We will have the link down below to read all his articles. But I mean, Yan, uh, yeah, the presentation eventually got there. It’s always long these things. Yeah, we knew some of the stages before beforehand. The Grand Depart in Barcelona. Yeah. Well, the tour of France was announced this morning. Well, in Paris, I believe it was at at the Palonga. That’s where it usually happens. In attendance, there were several stars from the cycling world, including Francis Star Boy from last year, Valanton Par winner on Mononton 2 as well. Well, no real GC favorites in the men’s side, nor really in the women’s side either for for the tour to France fam presentation, but both roots for both the fam and the the men. I would say I’m quite positive about and there’s really I mean you know head grabbing well eye grabbing headlines in both of them including the double alders what they’ve marked as al dz get it d too in French ez yeah that’s what they’ve written on the official press communicate so I’m going with that but yeah the first two stages we knew about them beforehand in Barcelona with that team time trial with a bit of a different profile which could be quite spicy well let’s take a step by step let’s just go through the week as a whole yes we start in Barcelona in Catalonia. Um for the opening stage of this year is to France. Yes, you mentioned the fact that it’s hilly. It’s got two climbs both 1 kilometer at 5%. The Monjuik I don’t speak Catalan. I I don’t know how to say it. If anyone can tell me in the comments, please do. And also the climb to the Olympic Stadium where the stage will come to its conclusion. Barcelona held the Olympics in 1992. Interestingly for British fans, that’s where Chris Borman won his gold medal on the track. back when drums used to be outdoors. Remember those days? Anyways, um it will also include Parinise rules. What does that mean? That means that the riders will have their times accounted individually. It won’t be based on the fifth rider over the lines. So, we’ll follow Parise rules as we’ve seen over the past what two three years um where it’s been somewhat met positively. It also will be an interesting way to open this to France and give it some opening day intrigue. The day after we go from Teragona to Barcelona. This profile was released um months ago. Yeah, it looks interesting enough. But stage three is where we get into the unknown. We start in Granonel Gran or Grano. Once again, Catalan not my strong point. But we head across the French border via Lolina, which we have visited in the in the past to Leong. That stage, it’s classed as a mountain stage, but it’s uh it’s an interesting profile. Say that. It’s one of these stages where there’s mountains, but it’s not necessarily super steep. The final climb to Leon to Leonga rather is 1.7 kilometers at 6.5%. That’s not super steep. So, it could be up to the breakaway, could be up into a sort of a a reduced bunch sprint like we saw the top of Lemon Ponte recently at the Balta Spa when Viego took his first stage win of his victorious Balta. At the following stage, we go from Kauasan to Fu. We’ve been to Kauasan so many times recently. Oh my lord. There was a stage there last year at the tour of France. Mark Cavendish won there a couple years back. No, he didn’t. Yes, he did. And Yasper Philipsson’s won there. God, so many carcass on stages. That may have some secret eyes. Anyway, we finished the stage in Fu where the KBUA rider took a stage win in 2022. There’s 2,700 meters of elevation gain. Should be open to the breakaway. Could be a really interesting stage to follow given that it’s so early on in this race. A yellow jersey change of hand could be on the cards. Stage five to Poe. Once again, another classic of the tour. That should be a sprint stage. The green jersey contenders will have their first chance to roll the dice before we head back into the Pyrenees in stage six for a stage from P to Gavani Jed, which is a place I’ve never heard of before, but um I mean that that’s for somewhat good measure in terms of of its cycling uh relevance. It’s never hosted stage of the tour of France before. It’s hosted a stage of the Ronda de Lizar recently. I say recently, this was about 3 four years ago. But this stage is uh it reminds me of the stage to Kotto we had a couple years back when Pogata attacked Vineo in the final couple kilometers back in 2023. That would be a common theme of this race. A lot of the route is very similar to 2023. But by that I mean we have the Kuldaspan the finally that climb to Gavani Javani. Don’t know how you say it locally but there apparently there’s a there’s a wonderful hiking route called the deeri. That should that that should look nice on camera. Anyway, stage uh seven takes us or stage seven and eight really another two sprint stages to Boulder and to Belarak, both known for their wine- making. Should be another chance for the green jersey contenders to build up some points and get some early battles in the bags. Finally, stage nine, the last stage of this week goes from Malamar to Usel. Um the capital, the prefecture town of the Kah de Palamon Kah, I believe is where Raymon Pulidor is from. Um, so nice little connection to poo poo. Not a great nickname in the English language, but still. Um, this was long long rumored on the cards. The mayor of cell said that he he was willing to finance X. I think it was like what for 50,000 euro, probably more than that to have have the to France visit and that ASO visited last summer in preparation. Anyways, that will take us into rest days. This first week has a bit of everything. Some mountain stages, a few sprint stages, and a lot of open ones like hilly stages that could work for the breakaway. This seems to be a theme of this year’s race and the to France fam which has a lot of these stages that the French called accident in a first week. Lots of yellow jersey changes of hands could be on the cards. Yeah, I agree. I think it’s a very very interesting one. I would have preferred to have the team time trial further into the week and then have a prologue at the beginning, but Vegas can’t be choosers on that one front. I think that the team time trial, it’s also let’s let’s also point out the first team time trial on the tour of France since co break. That in itself should be a headline worth savoring. I I I think it’s it’s a nice way to open it. We get that kind of touristic well, you know, open bus tour guide through Barcelona. We start as a familiar the cathedral there and finish by the Olympic Stadium. It’ll be good on camera. Also, it’s just quite a nice change of pace coming into the race. Since Copenhagen, all the opening stages have been road stages. So, it’s a bit of a change of pace here. And I think the Parines rules of the time trial will open it up. But that also means that we could get Pagatra in yellow on day one or in that case Val in yellow on day one since both teams seem to be the kings of team time traveling recently. Do you think we’re going to see Paga in the yellow jersey at the end of the first rest day or by the end of stage 9? If there’s no breakaways, yes. Um, but I think that that there could be breakaways and I think there’s there’s a lot of chance for breakaways to go up the road and UAE now with X amount of years experience know that they can just seed the yellow jersey up to the breakaway and be happy to deal it out to someone else for a little while. Especially since after the the the rest days we’ll get on to there are a couple of very very flat stages which you know your Vismmers and UAE don’t really need to waste their energy and control the pelon for those days. So if they hand it off to not necessarily Ben Healey, but someone along those lines that we saw this year’s tour of to France, that could work quite well in their case. What I also really like about this opening week, which I was scared of, is that they were going to place really big scary mountain stages in the first couple days since we have to cross the Pyrenees early on just geographically where Catalonia is. Uh we don’t necessarily have to. I think the two mountain top finales we have are only mountain top finales name. I don’t think in practice they will weeds down the GC field too much which I’m quite thankful for. That leaves some more suspense for later in the race so you won’t have a pogineration within the first 5 days of racing. Yeah, I thought Andoro is definitely going to be on the cards since they had to cross the Pyrenees but uh yeah, it didn’t quite happen. So I mean Yan, what does week two look like? Well, week two starts off with a stage that I mean Danish fans would be happy to see back. A stage 10 which coincides with Catal Vier the French national day will take us into the massi sal. For that we follow essentially the route from stage 11 of the tour to France two years ago. On that stage Pagantra attacked Vgo crossed the gap. Rocklage crashed. It was a great day heralded by many as the best stage of that year’s tour. We pretty much follow it meter for meter from Ory to Leon. Lon held that stage for all the one that Vgo won in a sprint. It’s very very similar and I think it should serve up a relatively good day. It’s got 4,000 m of elevation gain if that, you know, helps, which it definitely does. Following day, we go to Vichi, uh, which has a bit of a dark history in French history. This is where, uh, the capital of France’s puppet state during World War II was based. For that reason, perhaps tour hasn’t visited very often, but they’re finally making their comeback. It’s decades, decades since the tour has been here. It’s quite a well-known French place. Uh, perhaps for good or for bad, but it’s here again. And we start stage 11 there and we finish in Nals which held the stage a couple years back at the tour to France. Following stage starts at Manuk which used to hold the French Grand Prix back when that happened. And that stage finishes finishes in Shalon Sun which is a classic from Parinise often vis visits that part of the world. Those two stages would be sprint as should stage 13 which finishes in Bell. But there is a bit of a spanner in the works because we go up the balon zas for the first time in this race. We go back to it again later on, but that should, you know, perhaps throw up a breakaway, perhaps throw up a late attack that could succeed. Tim Wellins, Hela. Nevertheless, we return to the mountains on stage 14 with what should be, you know, a tour of the Voge. We don’t go to LA, which is possibly the most well-known climb in the Voge. Instead, the tour of France has ended that love affair that they have that they had for so many years. Instead, we go up the Grand Balon, the Balon disaster as I mentioned. Then the Marstein, the Marstein was used back at the Twitter France fam in 2022, the following year’s men’s race on that day Pagata won. We had the V Pino that day where Pino bowed out of the sport after being on the attack all day. It’s absolute scenes. I graduated from university the day before. So that’s reminds me of that. Anyways, that’s besides the point. Uh the Markstein is um it’s it’s a tough final climb. It’s 11 km 7.3 average percent gradient. It’s a bit of a kind of fickle climb. It’s got some very steep sections then levels out. So that will definitely thin out the GC field ahead of stage 15 which will be the closing one of that week which goes from Champol where um Sarah Anderson took his f second and final stage win of the 2020 tour to France and that will end on the plateau deleon which was long rumored to be in the route. That part of the world will be hosting the world championships in a couple years the super worlds as as they will be known. Originally the rumor was that there was going to be a time trial of the plat soles. I’m glad that hasn’t happened. Perhaps they saw the pogeneration at perigura earlier this year and decided let’s make this a road stage. The pla soles is 11 km at 9.1%. That’s really really tough. Uh and that will definitely shake up GC one final time before our very thick alpine final week. Thanks for that you think it’s a very interesting second week. very copy paste that we’ve seen sometimes. But yeah, missing La Planch to Belfie or even having the super uh plunge in there is a bit of a shame cuz that that was so good for the race in 2023 22 22 it finished up there. Yeah, Pog won the stage and 2019 they went up it 2020 had the time trial. Could have been nice to have that, you know, historical synergy, but perhaps we exhausted La Planch by visiting it what three times in four editions. So, uh, we’ve spaced that out now and we’re going to the Marstein. That was still a good stage. A lot of GC yo-yoing that day. Failix scout was particularly good. Patcha won the stage in the end. Carlos Rodriguez, I remember, was on the ropes that day. Suffered some time losses there. So, I I think that’s a that’s a good mountain stage to have in here, but the platon is much harder. So, it’s not necessarily guaranteed that we’re going to have this big battle in the Verge. But that’s why I should point out as well with all of those mountain ranges ticked off, this means that the tour to France this year visits all of the mountain ranges in metropolitan France, even if it’s one day in the Voge. Well, two days actually because the stage before has that little little putty excursion into the Voge. But yeah, it it’s uh it’s it’s it’s an okay second week. You can’t you can’t pile the second week too much because you need that intrigue in the final final week of racing. Uh so I’m I’m relatively content with this. However, I do fear that the pair of sprint stages that we have earlier in that week will um you know will help me reach for the snooze button. I don’t think they’re going to be great stages but as we’ve seen midweek sprints in recent years, everyone’s too scared to go in the break and it is a bit of a damp squib. I think that could happen here once again. That’s my only real sort of um critique. Two proonti French riders going in the break sometimes teammates. Yeah, exactly. But yeah, having the Markstein as well, not on the penultimate stage, but in the second week is also going to we’ll see if there’s a bit of a change there and not Bacha and Vingo sprinting for the line. Maybe it’ll be one rider coming through the line alone. But I mean, you’re in the final week. That’s the one we’re all excited for. What does that look like? Yeah, it’s it’s an exciting final week. One that’s packed with mountain stages. But we begin with a hilly time trial on the banks of Lake Geneva. This one is an individual time trial just across the water from where the Twitter France fam will start um 2 weeks later. Uh this starts in Evian Liba known for its bottled water. We all know it. And it finishes in Ton Liba, also on the banks of the lake. There is a climb halfway through that stage. It’s the K Lin. It’s 9.7 km long at 4% average gradient. It climbs straight out the gun. After that climb, it’s a descent. then about nine kilometers of flat lands towards the finish. This won’t be great reading for Pipoana um or Kung Schnean Bisa for that for that matter. It’s not a flat time trial. It’s the only individual time trial in kilometers of this year’s race and it looks perfectly suited for Pagacha Veno and Apollo. Given that it’s a flat finale, it could benefit a Neapol more than Pogata. But as we saw in the Nice time trial a couple years back at the tour, nothing’s beyond Pagato when it comes to races against the clock. Nevertheless, the following day heads into the chart. Good to see the chartres back. We’ve kind of missed it a little bit in the tour of France in recent years. That stage starts in Shambbury and finishes in Varon. Varon might ring a bell. That’s where we finished a stage of the Wild Caspia this year won by Ben Turner. Speaking of bells, that’s what the Grand Bell Tower was ringing out. Big Ben, as he’s known, he took the win. Great stage there. Anyways, the following day goes from Van to O. Bit of a throwback to the beginning of the Slovenian dynasty. There was a one-two for the Slovenians here in 2022 when Roglish took the stage win ahead of Pogata and Giamatang. Remember him? The finale is 7 km at 6.7% gradient. I don’t necessarily think this is also once again going to throw up massive time gaps, but you know, it could be a bit of an uphill sprint, something to clear the pallet before what’s going to be a really tough final two mountain stages in the Alps. Beginning on stage 19 from Gap to Alipadu. Yes, Alpadu. You’ll be hearing that name a little bit in in the in the following 5 minutes because it’s in the race on two occasions this year. The first time we go up it on the traditional ascent. These are 21 hair pins, which means it comes out to 13.8 km at an average gradient of 8.1%. It’s 128k. It’s a relatively short stage. And with 3,500 m of elevation gain, it’s very truncated towards the Alpu finale. Abduez haven’t seen it in the men’s race since 2022. On that day, it was little Thomas Pitcock who took a win on his debut tour of France. No real GC time caps that day, but that was also suffering with the hangover of um the Kugan the day prior. And perhaps they’ll be, you know, knowing that this year because stage 20 is a lot harder. Uh stage 20 starts in Lo Baldw, which is at the foot of Alipadz and we return to Alpadz in the evening. this time going up a separate ascent. To get there though, the riders will have to across a tick sheet of iconic tour of to France climbs that totals 5,600 m of elevation gain making this one of the hardest to France stages in recent memory in terms of elevation gain alone. This includes the ka quad called the telegraph the galib which runs straight afterwards. Then we got the saren which is said to be the harder ascent of aldues. It’s 12.8 km long at 7% average gradients which doesn’t seem as hard on paper but it’s narrower. The road is rougher. It might get repaved. We descended this side back at the 2013 centinary tour to France and then we went up it at the 2017 crouton and a stage one by P Kenyuk the narrow tide max rider. But from the sen we have an undulating finale to the alpadu which includes a steep steep ramp in those final couple kilometers which ramp which goes up to double digits. Nevertheless, from Alders, we travel up to the outskirts of Paris for our final stage, which will once again include the BMA. So, we will have that cobble climb on the final day after its successful debut this year before rolling onto the Shan Le for the finale. We don’t know if it’s going to be neutralized like last year that that was provoked by the rainfall in Paris. But perhaps that was a smart decision in hindsight to enhance the racing. But that rounds out the 2026 Tour to France, which has a total of 54,450 m elevation gain throughout the week. 30 climbs classified over the category 2 status, which is the most in recent years. This also includes several uphill finishes, of which there are five. There are eight mountain stages, four hilly stages, and seven flat stages. One team time trial and one individual time trial. and throw in two rest days along the way. Yeah, that third week uh those two stages back to back is going to be very very interesting. Um maybe the record of Marco Pantani is not going to be beaten by Pagacha or Vingo. And also with that second stage coming right after, maybe won’t see those two adding their names onto the list of hairpin winners. Uh, of course each winner of Upwear, they get their name on like on a plaque on on the heavens. But do you think of the whole week? I think it’s a really good final week. I think we get a bit of everything. A time trial and then a really heavy set of mountains. Once again, this reminds you of 2023, uh, where we had, you knife edge, then a time trial to sort things out and a fleet of heavy mountain stages. This year we’ve got a star-studded lineup here with Abdulz featuring twice. That second Abd stage up the Sav is is brutal. It’s a great way to finish it. You know, place your best card right at the end cuz this year we saw with stage 18, I think it was one that finished on Kalas. That’s felt like it decided things. We had the final day and everyone was quite tired. Then I think putting the queen stage right at the end is a great move for the race and to not have a time trial on the penultimate stage as again is also a great move I think for GC tension. I’m I’m quite satisfied with the final week and I’m happy to see the bomatra and the rule leak make its return because that was a fantastic addition to this year’s race and really brought in new eyes. I I mean I was talking to people who don’t necessarily follow the tour to France intensely on you know watch it every year and even they were were remarking about about the pictures that they saw on the the boot ma and how that kind of you know spiced up what they knew was a pretty you know confounding finale of having the the sprint stage that essentially is just a procession. So I’m happy to see all this back and I think it brings it up to these like you know biblical levels with this elevation gain and mountain top finishes. I’m quite happy with that. But Scott, what we what I do notice here is a lack of downhill finishes this year. Once again, we don’t have uh many downhill finishes. Is that a result of, you know, increasing safety concerns or perhaps the fact that it dampens the GC action? I find it interesting that once again they decided to favor uphill finishes. Are you not for that? Are you not? Because finishes sometimes are a bit stale. No, I I I’m for this. I think it’s a I think it’s a good thing, but I also find it quite interesting that once again they’ve decided to opt out of doing downhill finales. Um, even on I mean you could have a really interesting downhill finale off the culde and that could have been interesting. It’s quite a sketchy descent, but then that also raises safety concerns. There you go. Understandable. Um, yeah, and all the I mean so many riders complained when when they had to descend that a couple years back during the tour to France uh in 2013. So perhaps that that weighed on their minds. Uh but yeah, I think overall if if we’re talking about the tour of to France as a full package, I’m relatively content with this route. I think it it gives us a bit of everything. It’s very similar to 2023 and that year’s race, I think, was really wellcraftrafted. We had a bit of everything and the GC was kept on a knife edge right to the end. I think we’re going to follow a similar pathway here, which should be exciting. And it also, as I said earlier on, does throw up the opportunities for new people to dive into into the yellow jersey earlier on and offers up the chance for lots of breakaway stages, which allows new riders to etch their name into tour of France history as a stage winner. Because over the past couple years, it feels like stages have been so densely concentrated in the hands of a of a small few amount of teams and riders. That could change. Although knowing UAE or whatever, Vizma, they’ll just send riders into the breakaway to win those stages. Yeah, just look at the world test. But I know this year, how many stages did Yuri pick up? What was it? Seven. It was It was like a third of the race. Nothing could happen here, you know. Um, all these mountains off finishes for Bugattacha. Yeah. Tie on trial as well. Who knows? Obviously, the the natural question here is who’s going to win the tour of France? Is Pagacha going to get the fifth title on this route? Uh, precedent suggests yes, but precedent is also based on the 2023 route, which looks very similar to this. and Vigo won that one. I think Pagant’s learned his lesson as we’ve seen over the past two tours to France and Vigo isn’t necessarily on a level to rival Pagantra at the moment. That could change with time. There’s rumors he’s going to go to the JRO. Perhaps that’ll help him amp up his form early, but will that also add to the fatigue for the tour to France, particularly in what’s going to be a backloaded route with a tough tough final week? If you’re riding the JRO going into it, you might feel the pinch in that final week. Yeah, I still think it favors Pagata, but those two, it’s hard to to really tell what what route would favor one over the other. They’re both strong climbers. They could both time trial. Well, Vinko might be happy that there’s no flat time triing after his disappointment this year. All I’ll say is that I don’t think Apollo is going to like the final week. That’s what I can say is that I don’t think it’s going to suit Apollo. I think third place could be up in the air. Well, anyways, on that note, that’s been a great preview of the 2026 Routt. Make sure to hit the like button, subscribe to the channel if you haven’t already, comment down below what you thought of the route, and do check out by line uh so you can read more of his articles. I’ve also got a full rundown of the Twitter France fan route that was released. I was covering that this morning, so that’s why I’m a little bit out of tune with with what’s been going on with the men’s tour. But anyways, with that, thank you for watching and we will see you at some point together again.