"We made the finish as difficult as possible" - Tour de France director Prudhomm confirms focus on keeping yellow jersey fight until final mountain day

Throughoout the day some have wondered whether it was a conscious decision that the upcoming year's Tour de France was backloaded, and the answer is yes. In Paris, Tour director Christian Prudhomme has confirmed that the race will have its most difficult stages all pointed towards the end so as to keep the race open for as long as possible, including the brutal final day up to the Alpe d'Huez.

“We made the finish as difficult as possible so that the yellow jersey won’t be secure 48 hours before the end. Anything can still happen in the final mountain stage, whatever the leader’s advantage," Prudhomme said in words to Sporza.

It makes sense taking into consideration recent editions of the race and also other Grand Tours, such as this year's Giro d'Italia where the hardest climb in the race was left to the final mountain stage - the Colle delle Finestre - and this ascent ended up deciding the race, turning the race on its head in the final competitive day. With the 20th stage of next year's Tour featuring the most climbing meters, altitude and the most difficult climb of the race (the Telegraphe/Galibier combination) then a lot can happen then, even if the gaps are big.

Under other conditions, it would be hard to imagine Tadej Pogacar would be dethroned under regular circumstances. "That’s difficult to predict (how he can be beaten, ed.), because he’s already shown he can gain time on every kind of terrain. But the course has been drawn to build gradually, stage after stage, with tension that keeps growing. Until the last mountain stage, anything is possible.”

As the face of the Tour Prudhomme also had to face questions regarding other big topics, one of them being Israel - Premier Tech. “The international situation has changed and there’s progress toward peace," he said, but ultimately the team should be able to move forward and participate in the race as Israel and its team owner Sylvan Adams are stepping away from the project.

This comes as positive news taking into consideration that previously, there was serious pressure from the Barcelona city council to prevent the team from coming to the race even though they were going to have an automatic presence due to their soon-to-be World Tour license. “The mayor of Barcelona told us he wants to make this Grand Départ the biggest in Tour history".