TOULOUSE
The city renowned for its pink stone featured on the route of the Tour’s first edition in 1903. A few years later, in 1908, Lucien Petit-Breton won there before going on to take his second Tour title. Gino Bartali achieved the same feat in 1948 in the midst of his victorious duel with the young Louison Bobet. The three finishes in Toulouse in the 21st century ended with victories for breakaway rider Juan-Antonio Flecha in 2003, for Mark Cavendish, the most successful sprinter in Tour history, in 2008, and for the Australian Caleb Ewan, who took the first of his five stage victories there in 2019. While France’s fourth-largest city more often reaches fever pitch thanks to the exploits of Stade Toulousain, who won their 23rd French national rugby championship last spring under the captaincy of Antoine Dupont, it’s also the home town of Jean-Christophe Péraud, who finished second in the 2014 Tour de France, six years after taking the silver medal in the mountain bike event at the Beijing Olympics.
- Stage town for the 28th time
- Prefecture of the department of Haute-Garonne (31)
- Population: 505,000 (Toulousains and Toulousaines)
