Saint- Étienne Brioude
The Tour goes into the heart of the Massif Central with a very hilly stage that finishes in Romain Bardet’s hometown
Julian of Brioude was an obscure fourth-century saint, a Roman soldier converted to Christianity, who offered himself for martyrdom and was beheaded in Brioude following a wave of persecution. St Julian is now remembered for a handful of miracles, and the construction of a 12th-century basilica over his tomb in the town where he died. The basilica is the focal point of the town – a Romanesque brickwork monument of circular apses and an octagonal turret.
And until Romain Bardet came along, the basilica was the most famous thing about Brioude. Cycling fans of a more waspish nature might suggest that if Bardet ever wins the Tour de France it will be a miracle equal to any of the healings attributed to Saint Julian during the 400s, both before and after his death.
Bardet now lives in the more cosmopolitan environs of ClermontFérrand (where the transport links are also a lot better than in the scrubby plateaux of the Haute Loire) but he is proudly born and bred in Brioude. The town has reciprocated by hosting a Tour stage finish, even if the punchy ascents and relative paucity of long climbs in this stage are less suited to Bardet’s skill set
than the long climbs of the Alps and Pyrenees. On the positive side, there isn’t a single rider in the peloton who will know better the ups and downs of the Livradois Forest through which the second half of the stage goes.
The Tour is now at the end of its first, long, week. The climbs of the Planche des Belles Filles and SaintÉtienne stages will have sorted the GC into shape, and with a rest day in the offing in a couple of days, this stage is long breakaway territory. Of course, everybody knows that, which means there’ll be a fast start as riders fight to make the break. The final climb, the Côte de Saint-Just, may be just tempting enough for ambitious GC contenders to have a go, or it may just all come back together again at the finish. But what’s certain is that there will be several examples of martyrdom off the back of this stage.