'Super brutal' Tour de France Femmes UK stage routes revealed

The routes for the three UK stages of the 2027 Tour de France Femmes have been revealed, with riders saying it will be "super brutal".

A gruelling 154km second stage from Manchester to Sheffield, which includes nearly 3,000m of climbing and the iconic Winnats Pass in the Peak District, is one of the highlights, which organiser ASO says is "one of the hardest Grand Depart stages we've ever seen before".

The race also travels from Leeds over 85.7km to a likely sprint finish in Manchester, before an approximate 18km team time trial finishing on London's Pall Mall for the third stage - a first for the women's event.

The exact time trial route will be announced in October.

"Having the Tour de France Femmes Avec Swift so close to home feels like a full circle moment for me," said Movistar's English rider Cat Ferguson, who was born in the Yorkshire town of Skipton.

"I watched the men's [Grand Depart in Yorkshire] in 2014 from the side of my home roads as a young kid, and now I hope to have the opportunity next year to line up and race in the peloton."

Ferguson, 19, added: "I trained on those roads and I know they're going to be super brutal stages. Stage two in particular - always up and down. It's really going to be one [stage] that can change the Tour. The GC leaders can lose a lot."

The opening three stages of both the men's (beginning 2 July) and women's (beginning 30 July) editions of cycling's biggest race are taking part across Britain next year.

The route details for the three stages in men's race from Edinburgh, Keswick and Welshpool were revealed in January.

The stages are being billed as the "the most accessible major sporting spectacle ever held in Britain", according the government's Department for Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS).

It is estimated the Grand Departs of both races will "pass within an hour's drive of 60% of the population", with free spectating along more than 900km (559 miles) of public roads.

It will be the first time both the men's and women's Grand Departs have taken place in the same country outside of France.

The men's race began in Britain in 1974, 1994, 2007 and 2014, when an estimated 4.8 million watched at the roadside.

The 2014 edition followed on from the first wins in the Tour for British riders, with Bradley Wiggins triumphant in 2012 and Chris Froome a year later - both for Team Sky.

"Tour de France Femmes race director Marion Rousse said: "The United Kingdom has already shown its passion for the Tour, and these stages will once again showcase the energy of the crowds, the beauty of the landscapes and the growing importance of women's cycling on the world stage."

The announcement saw riders and leaders joined by seven young girls as a part of participation programme JOY, which aims to tackle inactivity and improve mental wellbeing in Britain.

Analysis: A victory for road cycling in Britain

Hosting six stages in total of the world's biggest cycling races - which organisers say has a billion viewing hours on television across 190 countries for the men's race - is unprecedented.

Three stages of the men's Tour were held in Yorkshire and London in 2014 and the sport globally has grown in popularity since.

Thanks to a golden period the last time the UK hosted part of the race - which produced Wiggins, four-time victor Froome, 2018 winner Geraint Thomas, sprinter Mark Cavendish and Lizzie Deignan - the UCI World Tour now boasts a combined record 49 male and female British riders, many of whom stand a good chance of winning the sport's biggest events.

But it also comes just in time, too: memberships for British Cycling have been falling, and the body itself stepped in in 2024 to save the men's and women's Tours of Britain from collapse.

Hosting bike races in the UK is much more expensive than it is for organisers on the continent, thanks to huge policing costs for high-speed events held on closed public roads, involving a race cavalcade of around 40 cars and as many motorbikes.

Race organisers make their money through TV rights and charge fees to towns and cities who want the race to showcase them.

While no official figures have been released, rough estimates put the costs of holding all these stages at more than £50m, most of which comes from central government and local authorities.