Autumn has definitely settled in, but cycling is already revealing glimpses of next summer, as the routes of the 2025 men’s and women’s Tour de France (TDF) were revealed on October 29. For the first time since 2021, the Tour de France will actually start from France. It was already known that the North had been chosen for the beginning of the race, as well as Brittany for the women’s edition, but the rest of the route was yet to be unveiled.
For male racers, sprinters will have a chance to wear the first yellow jersey of the race. Classics riders will also get their shot for a stage win, as Brittany and Normandy will offer their most hilly terrains before a few transition stages that will get the peloton to the South. The Pyrenees will then host the first mountain stages, promising brutal battles between GC leaders, before the Alps stand as the last obstacle on the way to Paris. With two individual time trials punctuating the race, director Christian Prudhomme hopes for suspense: he expects that “until the last two stages in the Alps”, the Yellow jersey will still be “in the balance”.
The women’s edition, Tour de France Femmes (TDFF) will pick up the slack after three weeks of men’s racing on July 26. One stage was added to the route, continuing women’s cycling’s development. It will certainly be hard to get a scenario as exciting as Kasia Niewiadoma’s final win, only four seconds ahead of Demi Vollering, but Le Tour Femmes managed to extend its scope this year, leaving possibilities open. The race will indeed cross the country, not only focusing on only one region as in past years, and the racers will meet mountainous stages as soon as in their fifth day of racing. The penultimate stage’s finish on top of Col de la Madeleine will certainly be the climax of the climbers’ battle, letting us dream of another epic finish. This time, no time trial is planned, but transition stages will surely offer opportunities for sprinters.
Tour de France’s routes are now known, and so is the state of the 2025 peloton. The race’s lineup will undeniably include superstars Jonas Vingegaard and Tadej Pogacar, but their hegemony may be challenged by Remco Evenepoel’s talent in individual time trials as the two time World Champion in that discipline. For the stage wins, Tom Pidcock’s suspected tense relationship with INEOS Grenadiers’ staff casts doubt on his presence, or his ability to go and get a stage victory, three years after his first and only TDF win.
Multi-discipline rider Mathieu van der Poel has expressed his wish to shift his focus on mountain bike next year, but memories of his 2021 win in Mûr de Bretagne, where the 7th stage is set to finish, may convince him to think about it twice.
The women’s peloton keeps evolving and will present a fresh face in 2025, as winner of the 2023 TDFF, Demi Vollering, recently announced her signing with French team FDJ-SUEZ, after her disappointment in the last edition and the tough breakup with Team SD Worx. Another unknown variable will be Pauline Ferrand-Prévot’s ability to go back to road racing with Team Visma-Lease A Bike, after years of domination in MTB, crowned by the Olympic title in Paris last summer. There is a lot to look forward to, and thankfully, cyclocross will keep excited cycling fans busy until then.
“Tour de France 2015, Stage 18, Chris Froome” by filip bossuyt from Kortrijk, Belgium is licensed under CC BY 2.0.