The great 'show' of the Tour of Spain will take Barcelona

The Belgian Remco Evenepoel, winner of the last Vuelta, on the podium in Madrid. Javier Lizón (EFE)

When the Tour arrived in Barcelona in 1965, few had a television and even fewer could watch the broadcast.

The race was a spectacle on the Paral.lel sidewalk, the alone and victorious arrival of Pérez Francés to his neighborhood and the children of Poble Sec, and Serrat with them, enjoying it and being moved by the noise and noise of the advertising caravan and the beauty of silk jerseys and steel bikes.

When, 58 years later, other days of great cycling return to Barcelona, ​​two days of bikes, August 26 and 27, Saturday and Sunday, 2023 with the great start of the Vuelta, the race will no longer be a spectacle of sidewalk, but television, monuments from a bird's eye view and teams disputing a joint time trial on Saturday through the so-called emblematic places and their streets, but not through Paral.lel, and on Sunday,

as always when there is cycling in Barcelona, ​​the inevitable ascent to Montjuïc and its circuit and final in front of the Estadi Olímpic, as in the autumns of the Ascent to Montjuïc and the springs of the Volta and the Setmana.

La Vuelta is a great show, and nostalgia, a tear.

It is the third visit of the Tour to the capital of Catalonia in the last 25 years, after stage finishes in 1999 (Fabio Roscioli's victory) and 2012 (Philippe Gilbert).

It is the first great start of the Barcelona Tour since 1962, when Anton Barrutia won on Montjuïc.

The team time trial on Saturday the 26th (14.6 kilometres) will start from Port Olímpic, border Ciutadella Park and the Arc de Triomphe, cross Poble Nou, Glòries, reach La Verneda and return south passing through La Sagrada Family, Diagonal, Passeig de Gràcia and more Gaudís, Aragón and the ruins of Modelo and Plaça Espanya and end at the foot of Montjuïc, where the fountains.

Sunday will already be a mid-mountain stage with a steep finish, one of the stylistic hallmarks of the Vuelta.

It will leave Mataró.

It will have 181.3 kilometres, Sant Bartomeu (third) and Estenalles (second) will be promoted, it will take a turn to the Formula 1 circuit of Montmeló and will end in the traditional, hard version, Montjuïc circuit, and the finish line will be in front of the Estadi as when the 2009 Tour de France stage was won by the Norwegian Thor Hushovd.

Another of the stylistic signs of the Spanish round in recent years, the gluttony for the mountains will be fulfilled quickly, first with an arrival in Andorra on Monday and then with visits, already filtered to Tourmalet, Angliru and the Laguna Negra de Soria and Machado , among others: the full tour will be revealed on January 10, at an event to be held at the Palau de la Música.

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