Following last December’s pronouncement that Yorkshire had won the bid to host the opening stages – the ‘Grand Depart’ – of the 2014 Tour de France, further details have been announced of the three stages that will take place in the UK. The opening Stage 1 (July 5) will begin in Leeds, take riders through the Yorkshire Dales and finish in Harrogate; Stage 2 begins in York, takes in Huddersfied and ends in Sheffield; whilst the third stage on Monday July 7 will begin in Cambridge, head to London and visit the Olympic Park and see riders finish on the Mall, te same ending as the London 2012 Olympic Road Race.
2014 will mark the fourth time the TdF has included Britain after previous visits in 1974, 1994 and 2007. The decision to stage the Grand Depart in the UK two years ahead of the original proposal was due, in no small part, to the huge success of British cycling in the Olympic year. Tour de France Race Director Christian Prudhomme commented: ‘Since the resounding success of the Grand Depart in London in 2007, we were very keen to return to the United Kingdom… Bradley Wiggins’s historic victory last July and the enormous crowds that followed the cycling events in the streets of London during the Olympic Games encouraged us to go back earlier than we had initially planned.’
July 5, Stage 1: Leeds, Harewood, Otley, Ilkley, Skipton, Kettlewell, Aysgarth, Hawes, Reeth, Leyburn, Ripon & Harrogate
July 6, Stage 2: York, Knaresborough, Silsden, Keighley, Haworth, Hebden Bridge , Elland, Huddersfield, Holmfirth & Sheffield
July 7, Stage 3: Cambridge, Epping Forest, Olympic Park & The Mall
