Although the Tour de France has tended to alternate the years starting inside and outside the country, that pattern has confirmed to have been broken with a 2015 start in the Dutch city of Utrecht to follow on from this year’s Grand Depart in Yorkshire.
Race organisers ASO today announced the decision to award the race start to the region, issued a short statement on the matter.
“Back in 1954, Amsterdam set the scene for the Tour de France's first start abroad. Scheveningen (1973), Leiden (1978), 's-Hertogenbosch (1996) and, most recently, Rotterdam (2010) have since lived the Tour experience too. The upcoming 2015 edition will be the sixth time the peloton sets off from the Netherlands,” the company said in a statement.
Further information will be withheld until later this month; ASO states that a press conference will be held on November 28th in Paris and in Utrecht, and more information will be made available then.
However race director Christian Prudhomme has elaborated a little more, according to Wort.lu. “Utrecht is a city that lives with bikes, a student city. It fits perfectly into the Tour,” he said.
“We are very happy with this decision.”
The city is the headquarters of the Rabobank company, which for many years backed a top level men’s team and still backs Marianne Vos’ women’s squad.
It is unclear if the company is involved in financing the Tour bid.
In recent years overseas starts for the race have included London in 2007, Rotterdam in 2010 and Liège in 2012. This year’s race started on Corsica, a first for the French island in the Tour’s 100 editions.