Tour de Suisse announces route

The Tour de Suisse will be a race for the climbers in 2007, with four mountaintop finishes and only one sprint stage. The race will cover 1255.6 km in nine stages from June 16 to June 24, the organizers announced Thursday. The course also includes finishes in the neighboring countries of Austria and Liechtenstein.

The race opens with a 3.8 km prologue time trial as the first stage in Olten. The second stage, ending in Lucerne, is the only stage foreseen as a sprint finish. The first mountaintop finish comes in the third stage in Nauders, Austria, with further mountaintop finishes in Malbun, Crans-Montana and the Grimsel Pass. The latter will be the finish of the Queen stage as it also includes climbs over the Pässe Furka and Susten. The race concludes with a 34.2 km time trial in Bern.

The race Tour de Suisse will be open to ProTour teams, but the Austrian Professional Team Volksbank will receive a wildcard invitation.

Tour de Suisse 2007
Saturday, June 16: Stage 1, Prologue time trial, Olten (3.8 km)
Sunday, June 17: Stage 2, Olten - Luzern (158.6 km)
Monday, June 18: Stage 3, Brunnen - Nauders, Austria ( 228.7 km)
Tuesday, June 19: Stage 4, Nauders - Malbun, Liechtenstein (167.2 km)
Wednesday, June 20: Stage 5, Vaduz - Giubiasco (194.1 km)
Thursday, June 21: Stage 6, Giubiasco - Crans-Montana (190.5 km)
Friday, June 22: Stage 7, Ulrichen - Grimselpass (125.7 km)
Saturday, June 23: Stage 8, Innertkirchen - Schwarzsee (152.5 km)
Sunday, June 24, Stage 9: Individual time trial, Bern (34.2 km)