'Le Tour'
Running from Saturday July 3rd to Sunday July 25th 2010, the 97th Tour de France will be made up of 1 prologue and 20 stages and will cover a total distance of 3,600 kilometres and Venture Sun offer luxury chalet accommodation in nearby Sainte Foy.
It's a Tour for the climbers this year as the Tour de France celebrates the hundred year history of the race in the Pyrénées. The 2010 edition of the French grand tour finishes with four straight days in the iconic mountains that demarcate the border of France and Spain, and the riders will make two ascents of the Col du Tourmalet. The final mountain stage finishes on high at the summit of the Tourmalet. Only one long time trial of 51 kilometres interrupts the climbers' rhythm and it comes the day before the traditional finishing stage in Paris. In all, the course includes twenty-three categorized climbs and three mountain-top finishes, the most climbing in a Tour de France since 2005.
Comparing 2010 to previous years... | 2010 | ||||
Flat Stages | 9 | 10 | 10 | 11 | 9 |
Medium Mountain Stages | 4 | 1 | 4 | 1 | 4 |
Mountain Stages | 6 | 7 | 5 | 6 | 5 |
# of Categorized Climbs (Cat 2, 1 and HC) | 23 | 20 | 19 | 21 | 22 |
Mountaintop Finishes | 3 | 3 | 4 | 3 | 3 |
Individual Time Trialling | 59k | 55k | 82k | 117k | 116k |
Team Time Trial | 0 | 39k | 0 | 0 | 0 |
Overall Distance | 3596k | 3435k | 3554k | 3547k | 3657k |
• 2010 will have 13 km of cobbles • 2010 has no time bonuses again • July 18 is the Etape du Tour day using stage 17 Pau to Col du Tourmalet
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Stage 9 - Morzine-Avoriaz to Saint-Jean-de-Maurienne (204 km)
With four climbs on the programme, this will be the major alpine stage, following the first rest day. The stage will start in Haute-Savoie then, after a climb to the Colombière mountain pass, cross the border into Savoie and the Aravis pass, followed by the Saisies pass. The final and most gruelling challenge will be the Madeleine pass that lies thirty kilometres from the finish in Saint-Jean-de-Maurienne.
Col de la Madeleine (el. 1993m) is a high mountain pass in the Alps in the Savoie region of France. It connects La Chambre in Maurienne with Aigueblanche and Feissons-sur-Isère in Tarentaise. The pass is closed from November to the beginning of June and has been on the route of the Tour de France 22 times; the first time in 1969 and most recently in 2005.
The Col de la Madeleine is just 40 miles drive away from Sainte Foy so our luxury self-catered chalets there are well placed to see what promises to be the most exciting climb of the 2010 Tour, as well as the stunning Haute Savoie mountains and villages.
Follow the link below for a 3d flight over the 2010 Tour de France Route, which this year starts and finishes in Rotterdam.
http://www.letour.fr/VIDEOS/TDF/2010/popup_video_parcours3d.html
More detail on the routes for each stage is due to be released in June, so keep checking for updates!
Fancy pitting yourself against the best climbers on the Tour? We can arrange to take you to stages past and present on the Tour with your own support vehicle and team of family and friends to cheer you on!
If you missed the spectacle last year, contact us now to book in for 2010. If you caught any of the action from your own sitting room, come and see it in real life - the excitement of the racing and the infamous publicity caravan are magnified a hundredfold!
Book your holiday now!
Call us on 0207 558 8278
