Wildfire forces spectator ban for final 40km of Tour de France stage 3
No spectators will be permitted at the roadside for the final 40km of stage 3 of the Tour de France to Les Angles due to wildfires in the Pyrénées-Orientales department. There will also be no publicity caravan on the French portion of the stage.
Make us your Google favourite
As of early Sunday evening, the route looked set to be completed in full by the peloton despite earlier reports that the stage risked outright cancellation due to the wildfire outside the village of Trevillach, some 70km from the finish at Les Angles.
Stage 3 of the Tour brings the race from Spain into France, and the prefect of the Pyrénées-Orientales department confirmed on Sunday afternoon that no spectators would be permitted once the race entered France.
“The publicity caravan will not be travelling on French territory,” Pierre Regnault de la Mothe said in a press conference, according to L’Équipe. “Access will be limited to the passage of the riders and vehicles essential to the organisation of the race.”
Regnault de la Mothe called on fans to avoid trying to access the course or the finish area. “In other words, and I regret having to say this, this will be – in France, at least – a stage of the Tour de France without spectators,” he said.
The finale without spectators will bear echoes of the 2020 Tour, which took place amid COVID-19 restrictions in France.
The wildfire has already spread over an area of 1,500 hectares across the mountainside near Trevillach and some 700 firefighters have been deployed to try to contain it. The fire, which started on Saturday, has forced road closures and the evacuation of local residents.
Trevillach is not on the route of stage 3, which brings the race from Spain into France, but it is close to the off-course route between the start and finish that will be followed by team buses and other elements of the Tour convoy.
Regnault de la Mothe had indicated earlier on Sunday that stage 3 of the Tour was at risk of cancellation, with a decision to be taken by day’s end, but that prospect appears to have abated.
“I spoke to the prefect on the phone this afternoon as well, and we agreed – in view of the exceptional and appalling conditions caused by the wildfire raging in the Pyrénées-Orientales – not to allow the promotional caravan to pass along the final 40km – namely, the final stretch in France,” Tour director Christian Prudhomme said on Sunday evening.
Your Ticket to the Tour
Factor Bikes is a high-performance bicycle manufacturer and engineering-first brand, building the fastest UCI-legal racing bikes in the world. We design, prototype, and manufacture our frames in-house, enabling unmatched speed of innovation and uncompromising control over performance.
