Tour de France 2024: discover the profile and timetables for the fifth stage, with a return to the plain

Tour de France 2024 – Stage 4 MAXPPP – GUILLAUME HORCAJUELO

The day after crossing the Galibier, the Tour de France returns to the plain during the fifth stage which will take the peloton over 177 km from Saint-Jean-de-Maurienne to Saint-Vulbas, in Ain.

The route ignores the surrounding tempting peaks to wind through the Maurienne valley, before passing through Chambéry and heading towards Saint-Vulbas.

The sprinters should have a second opportunity to shine after the victory of the Eritrean Biniam Girmay in Turin on Monday.

A step "in the bottom of the valleys"

"We go through the mountains but as flat as possible", explains the Tour tracer, Thierry Gouvenou, to the AFP. &amp ;quot;We stay at the bottom of the valleys between Saint-Jean-de-Maurienne and Saint-Vulbas. Normally this is no problem for sprinters."

As in Turin, the organizers will test the initiative launched by the International Cycling Union (UCI) to extend the rule to the last three kilometers where the times in the general classification are frozen in the event of a fall, four kilometers in this specific case.

A stage town for the first time, Saint-Vulbas, a town of 1,200 inhabitants, responds to the organizers' wish to offer both small villages and large towns on the Tour route .

The peloton will return to the Alps at the end of the Tour for the denouement before the final arrival in Nice on July 21.

Departure from Saint-Jean-de-Maurienne at 1:20 p.m. (actual at 1:30 p.m.) arrival in Saint-Vulbas at 5:26 p.m. (calculated timetable) on an average of 45 km/h).