During the 10th stage of the race from Morzine to Megève, senior Tour de France officials were observed pulling climate change protesters into a ditch.
Despite being shackled together around the neck, tour organizers hauled a small group of young protesters off the course. On a piece of the straight road approximately 36 kilometers from the finish, the protesters sat on the route and lit red flares. Both the stage breakaway and the peloton were delayed while the route was cleared.
Climate activists from the Derniere Rénovation movement stated, “Since the government does not care about the climate problem, we must seize control of the Tour de France to redirect attention on what is essential to our existence. Our government must respond as it leads us to the abattoir.
The group stated, “Nonviolent disruption is our final chance to be heard and prevent the worst effects of global warming.”
The organizers of the Tour de France, ASO, declined to comment on the protest. Sir Bradley Wiggins, commentating on the event while riding a motorcycle during a race, told Eurosport viewers, “It was going off.” It was very bizarre. Numerous individuals became extremely enraged, and several directeur sportifs exited their vehicles to “put the boot in.”
The Derniere Renovation group disrupted the French Open when a protester jumped onto the court and tied herself to the net while wearing a T-shirt that said, “We have 1,028 days left.” They were observed sporting T-shirts with the phrase “We have 989 days left” at the Tour protest.
The Tour has long been the focus of protests, but these occurred in the context of event organizers’ effort to minimize their carbon footprint. This year’s “route book,” which is distributed to all race employees, notes that the Tour is “resolutely dedicated to being an increasingly environmentally responsible organization.”
During the upcoming Tour in 2020, recently elected “green” mayors in some of France’s main cities criticized the competition. Gregory Doucet, the mayor of Lyon, criticized the Tour as “macho and polluting” and lacking environmental consciousness, and there have been many requests for the race to decrease its carbon footprint further.
The outcome of the race was called into question after race leader Tadej Pogacar’s UAE Emirates team returned two positive Covid19 tests less than 48 hours after all riders in the peloton were pronounced virus-free.
George Bennett, one of the essential mountain support riders for the defending champion, and teammate Rafal Majka both tested positive in Morzine on Tuesday morning. Bennett withdrew from the race, although Majka was permitted to continue due to the absence of symptoms.
Vegard Stake Laengen, another member of the Pogacar team, also tested positive and withdrew on Saturday. Pogacar’s initial eight-man squad in Copenhagen has been cut to six, with Majka’s future unknown.
By our internal guidelines, Majka was tested for Covid-19 this morning and received a positive result,” the UAE Emirates squad said in a statement.
“He is asymptomatic, and after analyzing his PCR, we determined that he had a very low risk of infectiousness, comparable to Bob Jungels [the AG2R Citroen rider who tested positive in Copenhagen] earlier in the race.” Luke Durbridge (Team BikeExchange), an Australian rider, also tested positive and was forced to quit the race.
ASO decided to restrict media access to team buses and the paddock, stating that “only UCI representatives (jury, commissaries, anti-doping), team staff, and organization personnel supervising the teams would have access to the paddock.” The media’s access to the finish lines remains unaltered.
Magnus Cort Nielsen of EF Education-EasyPost won the stage in a photo finish over Durbridge’s teammate Nicholas Schultz. Bora Hansgrohe’s Lennard Kamna, one of the day’s breakaways, closed to within 11 seconds of race leader Pogacar but is anticipated to fall back in the next 48 hours, which includes summit finishes at Alpe d’Huez and Col du Granon.
