Optimism growing that Tour de France will go ahead - Dauphiné dispatch

CHARTREUSE FRANCE AUGUST 13 Podium Egan Arley Bernal Gomez of Colombia and Team Ineos White Best Young Jersey Celebration during the 72nd Criterium du Dauphine 2020 Stage 2 a 135km stage from Vienne to Col de PorteChartreuse 1316m dauphine Dauphin on August 13 2020 in Chartreuse France Photo by Justin SetterfieldGetty Images
(Image credit: Getty Images Sport)

Speaking to a rider post-stage at the recent Route d’Occitanie, about their objectives for the Tour de France, with barely a pause he responded: "Do you honestly think the Tour is going to happen?"

After racing was suspended for almost five months, seeing four days of action at the Route d’Occitanie go ahead without a virus-related hitch was encouraging. The precautions that the race organisation had taken worked. 

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Peter Cossins has written about professional cycling since 1993 and is a contributing editor to Procycling. He is the author of The Monuments: The Grit and the Glory of Cycling's Greatest One-Day Races (Bloomsbury, March 2014) and has translated Christophe Bassons' autobiography, A Clean Break (Bloomsbury, July 2014). 

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