{"id":373276,"date":"2026-01-16T12:50:08","date_gmt":"2026-01-16T12:50:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/373276\/"},"modified":"2026-01-16T12:50:08","modified_gmt":"2026-01-16T12:50:08","slug":"free-to-air-tv-coverage-of-2027-tour-de-france-grand-depart-in-the-uk-a-work-in-progress-say-organisers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/373276\/","title":{"rendered":"Free-to-air TV coverage of 2027 Tour de France Grand D\u00e9part in the UK ‘a work in progress’, say organisers"},"content":{"rendered":"

The organisers of the UK\u2019s Tour de France<\/a> and Tour de France Femmes avec Zwift<\/a> Grands D\u00e9parts in 2027 have said securing free-to-air television coverage of the stages is \u201cimportant\u201d and negotiations are \u201ca work in progress\u201d.<\/p>\n

The UK will host six stages of the Tour next year<\/a>, split equally across the men\u2019s and women\u2019s events, it was announced on Thursday.<\/p>\n

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Both races currently sit behind a paywall<\/a> in the UK, after TNT Sports owner Warner Bros. Discovery signed an exclusive broadcasting deal<\/a> last year that ended 40 years of free-to-air coverage<\/a>. A TNT Sports subscription costs \u00a330.99 a month.<\/p>\n

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Speaking during a press conference in Leeds on Thursday, the managing director of the UK Grand D\u00e9part, Paul Bush, said he and his fellow organisers \u201chave a commitment to work with Christian [Prudhomme, Tour de France race director] and the ASO team to look at how we can bring the six stages in the UK to free-to-air coverage, and that is currently ongoing.\u201d<\/p>\n

Cycling Weekly then questioned Bush further on the matter. \u201cIt\u2019s still a work in progress,\u201d he said. \u201cI would hope that in the next six months we can reach some sort of conclusion on that. I think it\u2019s important, Christian knows it\u2019s important, but obviously contractual situations with current rights holders need to be negotiated carefully and sympathetically.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs John [Dutton, British Cycling<\/a> CEO] said, this is a moment for the nation. It\u2019s bigger than a sporting event, and I think that deserves to have that platform.\u201d<\/p>\n

Race director Prudhomme previously voiced his optimism<\/a> about free-to-air coverage of the two UK Grands D\u00e9parts when he first announced them last March<\/a>.<\/p>\n

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\u201cThere will be discussions, of course,\u201d Prudhomme said last year. \u201cBut I do hope \u2013 and I do believe \u2013 that the stages will be live and free-to-air in 2027 in the UK. There will be discussions and we\u2019re optimistic.\u201d<\/p>\n

The men\u2019s Tour will start in Edinburgh in 2027, with an opening day finish in Carlisle on 2 July. Stage two will then begin in Keswick in the Lake District, finishing in Liverpool, before an all-Welsh third stage between Welshpool and Cardiff.<\/p>\n

The women\u2019s race will open on 30 July in Leeds. Stage one will cross the Pennines to Manchester, where stage three will also start, before finishing in Sheffield. The third stage, still to be revealed, will start and finish in London.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The organisers of the UK\u2019s Tour de France and Tour de France Femmes avec Zwift Grands D\u00e9parts in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":373277,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[37],"tags":[4985,101,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-373276","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-cycling","tag-cycling","tag-sports","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/373276","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=373276"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/373276\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/373277"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=373276"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=373276"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=373276"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}