ASO organiser about the future of team time trials at the Tour de France: "We particularly like the new Paris-Nice format"

The team time trials have seemingly disappeared from the Tour de France itinerary, with last sighting dating back to 2019 when the yellow Jumbo-Visma train blitzed through the streets of Brussel.

"It’s been quite a few years since we’ve done it," Gouvenou told Velo. "The organization of a team time trial is often linked to the location of the grand départ and requires a certain unity of location between the start and finish." When the TTT is back on the Tour de France menu, Gouvenou hinted to that it’s very likely a new timing system will be introduced in the discipline that has roots to the earliest days of bike racing.

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Gouvenou insisted that ASO has nothing against TTTs, but it became difficult to combine the rather local discipline with three foreign Grand Departs between 2022 and 2024. "In recent years we have not had a grand départ which wanted to highlight a fairly restricted area, but rather to extend as far as possible across the territory, so [point-to-point] road stages were essential."

And even though Gouvenou didn't confirm that we'll see a team time trial make comeback at the Grande Boucle, he hinted that it's certainly a possibility ASO is weighing. We have already seen the organizer conduct various experiments in the traditional discipline and it seems like they've found what they were looking for recently.

At last year's Paris-Nice, the ASO presented a new timing system. Rather than to have the times taken based on third, fourth rider for the best finishers, each rider's time was now counted individually, allowing teams to use a strategy reminiscent of a spaceship launch. "This is not at all a desire to eliminate this format which we hold very dear," he said. "And we particularly like the new format that has been put in place at Paris-Nice, allowing each rider to complete their effort."

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