The Tour de France Femmes avec Zwift will change dates next year due to a clash on the international calendar with the Olympic Games in Paris in 2024.
The first two editions of the Tour de France Femmes have been positioned during the week that directly follows the conclusion of the men’s Tour de France; last year, the women’s race was held from July 24-31.
This year, the race is scheduled to take place from July 23-30. The route will begin in Clermont-Ferrand and travel south into the Pyrenees with a mountaintop finish on the iconic Tourmalet and a concluding with a time trial in Pau.
However, in 2024, that spot on the calendar is occupied by the Olympic Games, which are scheduled to take place from July 26 to August 11.
Tour de France director Christian Prudhomme confirmed that the Tour de France Femmes would change dates in an interview with BiciPro (opens in new tab).
“In 2024, there will be the Olympics. The champions go to the Olympics in the wake of the Tour de France and so we have to change the date. Last time one of the successes was that the Games became a ‘fourth week.'”
Cyclingnews reached out to ASO to confirm the new date of the 2024 Tour de France Femmes, and they said that the timing of the race on the international calendar is “currently being considered”.
It has been speculated that the Tour de France Femmes could take place either before or during the men’s event or perhaps even after the Olympic Games.
The position of the Paris Olympics has also meant that ASO adjusted the dates of the men’s Tour de France in the same way that it did ahead of the Tokyo Olympics. Therefore, the men’s Grand Tour will be held a week earlier, from June 29 to July 19 next year, and with a Grand Depart in Florence and a finish in Nice rather than Paris.
The women’s peloton raced their first official women’s Tour de France stage race in 1984, won by American Marianne Martin. Champions of those early editions of the stage race also included Italy’s Marian Canins winning in 1985 and 1986, and Jeannie Longo, winning three titles from 1987 to 1989.https://www.cyclingnews.com/news/2024-tour-de-france-expected-to-start-in-tuscany-and-finish-in-nice/
“When we relaunched the Tour de France Femme avec Zwift, we said to ourselves that we wanted to create a long-lasting event, which would still be alive in 50 years, like the Giro, like the Tour… There were many duels between Jeannie Longo and Maria Canins in the 80s: they existed, and they were real,” Prudhomme said.
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