BRIANÇON ! COL D’IZOARD

178KM MOUNTAIN DISTANCE TERRAIN

This is the final opportunity for climbers to claw back time or consolidate their lead. The riders of the Étape du Tour tackle this stage a week earlier and will toil more than the professionals in the 100-plus km of valley prior to the first major climb, the Col du Vars, via the harder Jausiers side. The descent ends in Guillestre and though it starts climbing again straight away, it doesn’t begin in earnest until the final 14km of the Col d’Izoard. One of the most spectacular climbs in Tour folklore will, for the first time, be used as a stage finish. Logistics will be hard but the payoff, atop the Izoard’s lunar landscape, will be guaranteed and a perfect showpiece to end the 2017 edition’s mountain rendezvous.