Tour 2026: Alpe d’Huez the (double?) centerpiece, test idea and what else can we expect?

What we know for sure is that the Tour de France will start in Barcelona on Saturday, July 4, 2026. And we will do so with a team time trial, a specialty that will return to the Tour for the first time since 2019 (in Brussels at the time). It will be a remarkable one, because at the top of Montjuic, the individual time per rider will count.

In 2023, the Barcelona team time trial in the Vuelta was disrupted because it suddenly started raining and got dark earlier than expected, but A.S.O. will have learned from that. It will undoubtedly be interesting to see how riders and teams tackle the 20-kilometer challenge, which includes a double climb of Montjuic.

The second stage was also announced at the presentation of the Grand Départ in the Catalan city. It will start on Sunday in Tarragona, further south, and covers 178 kilometers. The first half of the stage will mainly show the Costa Brava, before heading inland, and the Begues (6.1 kilometers at 6.5 percent) looms up.

From this climb, we will head back towards Barcelona, where the riders will face a city lap, just like the annual final stage of the Tour of Catalonia. This will again include two ascents of Montjuic, so it will be another day when the GC contenders will have to be sharp.

Stage three starts in Granollers, north of the city of Barcelona, and is all about the return to France. In other words: the Pyrenees! According to the local Ici Occitanie, the stage will definitely finish at Les Angles (Pla del Mir), but it is not yet clear how many meters of climbing this will involve.

Stage four would start in the fortified city of Carcassonne, which we of course know from the board game. The finish could then be in Foix, according to Ici Occitanie, which could make it a blueprint for the sixteenth stage of the 2022 Tour. Back then, Hugo Houle won a stage with two climbs from an early breakaway, but a course could also be mapped out that is more suited to the sprinters.

In the fifth stage, according to La Nouvelle République des Pyrénées, the peloton would cross the Bigorre with a stage from Lannemezan to the regular stopover in Pau. We are now seeking a successor to Jasper Philipsen, who was the last to win a stage finishing in the city in 2024.

The next stage would also start from Pau. According to La Nouvelle République des Pyrénées, this will be a tougher stage, as the Gavarnie-Gèdres ski resort at an altitude of 1,850 meters is mentioned as the finish. The riders would also have to tackle challenging climbs such as the Soulor and Aubisque.

Stage seven would visit Bordeaux for the 83rd time in history, while the eighth stage would be held in the Dordogne and, according to ici Dordogne, could be a repeat of a stage won by Marcel Kittel in 2017. It is not yet clear what stage nine, the last stage before the first rest day, will be like.

On Tuesday, the Tour will continue, and that happens to be Quatorze Julliet, a day on which the organization often wants to pull out all the stops. This time, according to Le Montagne, it should be with a stage that goes from Aurrilac to Le Lioran. In the 2024 Tour, that was the finish where Jonas Vingegaard surprisingly beat Tadej Pogacar in a two-man sprint.

The next day, according to Le Montagne, the caravan will continue from Vichy to Nevers. At the same time, stage twelve, according to Ici Bourgone, is a transitional stage finishing in Chalon-sur-Saone. This bridges the distance to the Jura, where the Tour would arrive in stage thirteen, with a stage from Dole to Belfort.

Via the Jura, the Tour de France would cross over to the Vosges for the fourteenth stage, starting in Mulhouse. Ici Alsace states that this stage should end in Le Markstein, where the penultimate stage also finished in 2023 and where Annemiek van Vleuten dominated the Tour de France Femmes in 2020. The Saint-Amarin (11 km at 7.4%) would have to be conquered as the decisive climb.

The third Sunday is yet to be decided, although Dauphiné Libéré states that Plateau de Solaison has been chosen as the new uphill finish. This will test the climbers' legs once again, before the peloton gets a day in Thonon-les-Bains to recover for the final week of the Tour.

After the rest day, there would be an individual time trial starting in the same place and ending a little further on at Lake Geneva. The Alps loom large in this region, and by Thursday, details about the decisive final six stages should be known.

According to the latest rumors, a double finish at Alpe d'Huez—on Friday and Saturday before Paris—is even on the table. At the same time, the challenging World Championship course of Sallanches 2027 and the Orcières ski resort would also be featured. What seems inevitable is that the Dutch mountain will be a pivotal point in the Tour de France web for 2026.

The final stage in Paris would be similar in character to this year's, when Wout van Aert won the spectacular stage that included several climbs up Montmartre. For everything else, we will have to wait until Thursday, with extra focus on the final week for Tadej Pogacar, Jonas Vingegaard, and their teams, among others.