The Tour de France is set to visit the Alps ahead of the Pyrenees in 2018, with Alpe d'Huez taking centre stage as it returns to the race after a three-year absence.
The route for the 105th edition of the Tour will be officially unveiled in Paris on October 17, but a reliable trace can often be mapped out in the preceding weeks via reports in local French newspapers. Le Dauphiné Libéré, which covers the departments in the Rhône-Alpes region, had the Tour on its pages on Monday, reporting details of three stages in the Alps roughly half-way through the race.
There will be a stage, Le Dauphiné reports, from Annecy to Le Grand Bornand, followed by a stage that will possibly link Albertville to La Rosière, and then a stage from Bourg-Saint-Maurice to Alpe d'Huez.
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The only part of the route that has so far been officially confirmed is the Grand Départ in the Vendée region in north west France, which will feature two road stages and a team time trial. Stage 4 will start in La Baule but that's where the official information ends. Reports suggest that the race will head deep into Brittany in the very north-west of the country before travelling east towards Roubaix, which has been rumoured to be hosting the finish of stage 9 after covering some of the cobblestone sectors used in Paris-Roubaix.
It is widely predicted that the Roubaix stage will be followed by the first rest day on July 16, which will see the peloton transfer down to the Alps.
According to Le Dauphiné, Annecy will host the rest day and the start of stage 10 on the following day. A detailed report in the paper says the riders will set off from the banks of the lake for a 151km stage that will head over the Col des Fleuries, the Côte de Romme, and the Col de la Colombière before the descent into Le Grand Bornand. One particularly notable aspect is that the route would cover the Plateau des Glières, which features a 1.8km stretch of gravel track that the organisers are said to have no intention of tarmacking over.
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