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Bruxelles
224 km
Sunday 4 July
After leaving Rotterdam, riders will head for the Zeeland polders for the first part of the stage, with an itinerary sandwiched between land and sea. They will then cross Flanders and pass through Antwerp and Malines before arriving in Brussels via the town of Meise where Eddy Merckx lives. This is a stage for sprinters that should meet with massive public acclaim.
• Once a stage town
• Population: 600,000
• Second most important city in the Netherlands
It’s the first Tour Start from Rotterdam but the Tour’s second visit to the city. In 1973 Belgian rider Willy Teirlinck won there at the finish of the first stage. The day before, on the prologue in Scheveningen, Joop Zoetemelk swept across the finish line just 80 hundredths of a second ahead of Raymond Poulidor. The Netherlands rejoiced and Poupou, as Poulidor was called, had never come so close to winning the Yellow Jersey.
• 11 times a stage town
• Population: 154,000
• Région Bruxelles-Capitale: 1,000,000
• Capital of Belgium
• Capital of the European Union
Brussels is the most frequently visited international city on the Tour, which has called on its Belgian neighbour eleven times in the past. The calibre of the city’s prize winners is on a par with its status as a capital city: René Vietto in 1947, Laurent Jalabert in 1992, along with Bernard Hinault and Freddy Maertens… The Tour had the pleasure of starting from Brussels in 1958, the year of the Universal Exhibition, but has not been back for the last eighteen years. A most welcome return.
• www.bruxelles.irisnet.be
• www.brusselsinternational.be
