October date for Yorkshire’s Tour de France visit

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The Tour de France is maybe over for another year but officials in Yorkshire are gearing up for a visit by tour organisers ASO in October that will see ASO inspect the region and the facilities on offer with a view to considering Yorkshire as the host of the Grand Départ in 2016.

Earlier this year, we reported that Yorkshire’s tourist organisation Welcome to Yorkshire had held several meetings with ASO. At that time, Welcome to York said it was hopeful that ASO would visit Yorkshire in the autumn to look at more detailed race routes that Welcome to Yorkshire has drawn up.

October

The October date was set following a trip by Welcome to Yorkshire to see the Grand Départ in this year’s race as guests of ASO, according to regional business magazine Yorkshire Business Insider.

Peter Dodd, marketing and sales manager for Welcome to Yorkshire, told the Insider: “We think Yorkshire would be the perfect backdrop for the Tour de France.

“The visit to the Grand Depart was very positive and made us more determined to pull out all the stops to bring it to the county, the diaries are out at the moment trying to find a mutually suitable date, likely to be early October, to bring the organisers over so we can showcase the route and Yorkshire’s fantastic facilities.”

Possible stage routes

Stage routes mooted by Welcome to Yorkshire include the race taking in parts of Leeds, the Yorkshire Dales, Scarborough, York, Hull and Sheffield over the two days the race would be in the region.

Scotland is bidding for the Grand Départ for 2017 with Glasgow or Edinburgh as possible starts, while Utrecht, Barcelona, Florence and Krakow are also looking at launching bids to hold a Grand Départ for the 2016 and 2017 editions of the race.

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