Preview - Tour de France 2022 stage 12

The riders descended into Briançon today and will be climbing back up it tomorrow. Stage 12 of the Tour de France is the final Alpine challenge, a day with three mythical climbs that together form an extremely hard stage where the climbers will have another opportunity to deliver serious damage. 165 kilometers and 4600 meters of climbing.

This can, as today, be a crucial day for the overall classification.

The riders immediately ride into the false flat of the Col du Lautaret. It’s a long false-flat valley ascent, and will take the riders back up into the Col du Galibier. Again altitude will be a challenge, the final 8.7Km have 6.5% average gradients with the steepest ramps in sight of the summit, however at this altitude all gradients are harder than what the numbers say. It comes early in the day though, so mostly it should be the place to form a breakaway.

The next ascent will be the Col de la Croix de Fer. 29.1 kilometers at 5.2%, however with two descents in it’s bulk. It’s a hard ascent, with two short but steep sections in it’s first half. It’s a very long effort though, so most will be eyeing the final kilometers. Although altitude isn’t as high the riders will ride over 2000 meters, and see 6.5 kilometers at 8.3% near the summit – exposed and filled with hairpins, ideal for a long-range attack. It’s summit comes with 55 kilometers to go.

After a long descent and a quick valley section the riders will arrive at the base of one of the most iconic climbs of the Tour de France, Alpe d’Huez. 13.9 kilometers at 7.9% average gradient, the maximum doesn’t go much higher but it does come at the base. In several occasions the decisive attacks have happened at the base. In others it came down to a sprint. Everything is possible depending on the riders. This is a climb which will be packed with fans, packed with hairpins, exhausted riders climbing at their best whilst others try to survive, everything to see a real spectacle.

**** Jonas Vingegaard

*** Tadej Pogacar, Nairo Quintana

** Geraint Thomas, Romain Bardet, Adam Yates

* Primoz Roglic, David Gaudu, Thibaut Pinot, Aleksandr Vlasov