Tour de France 2014: Cambridge to London via...?

Well, I'd be very happy to see it start in Cambridge seeing as I live there but we'll have to wait and see. Suffolk is very pleasant to cycle in and I often go down that way when I have some time; probably a little hillier than the area around Royston previously mentioned. Great it's coming to England again though!!

Seems like a bit of a waste, to spend a third of the total time allotted to Britain riding through Essex, to finish at the former site of the world's biggest MacDonalds. I understand ASO's desire to return to London, for commercial reasons. But surely, if you are going to the trouble of starting so far north, probably for the only time for decades to come, you might as well do a decent job of seeing all that Yorkshire has to offer. And that takes more than two days. I'd have rather seen the third day race through the Moors then finish in Hull, to catch the overnight ferry.

Be it Stratford or the Mall, I reckon I'll be making the attempt to crush my way onto the trains to be able to see the start AND finish. Lets hope some extras are laid on!

Stratford International is rather uninspiring as a train station. With a view of a car park. The departure back to France has to be St Pancras for the riders.

Lots of lovely countryside between Cambridge and London, whatever the route. Living in Cambridge, I can't imagine them starting here, because if I did I'd get too excited and have a stroke, or something.

yeah, bit of speculation never hurt. I've already provisionally booked the time off with domestic management, planning to travel down from Tyneside to some convenient base in the area and ride to a spectating point on one or more days.

As said, Stratford International is a strictly pedestrian station only. The coaches/vans of bikes and all the cars would need to go down to Folkestone to get on what used to be called Le Shuttle.

However, the Olympic Park *is* big, wide, open, very easily accessible by large numbers of visitors, and in 2014 will be more or less completely transformed into its post-Games state. On a weekday it's probably the ideal location for a stage finish in London. And speaking as someone who lives near Epping Forest (the obvious route for the ride to take in through the suburbs) I'm excited already.

Sprint finish on Platform 10? Its going to be a good couple of days anyway!

The lorries and coaches can only get on trains at Folkstone; the tunnel Shuttle trains for road vehicles are too big even for the generously built channel tunnel rail link (HS1). There's definitely no way of getting a road vehicle to a train in Stratford (the station's in a deep hole) but then St Pancras isn't set out to allow vehicles (other than small service ones) to the platforms either.

Potentially you could use more standard European rolling stock, such as that used to carry road vehilces on rail lines through the Alps, but that doesn't have safety clearence for the tunnel and the site for any suitable terminal would be out in Dagenham.

Although this article is basically unsubstantiated speculation, I'm still very exited . The peleton must be looking forward to it being perfectly acceptable to smoke and text their mates whilst riding on the pavement of this fair city

Holmfirth and then up Holme Moss please!

Stage 2's the one that I'm waiting to hear about. Especially if they drop into Sheffield via Holme Moss and the Peak District.

Its going to be fun wherever it goes Given the logistics of the tour, the cyclo park even if it only adds a little is something surely? However magnificent the St Pancras station, coaches will get on the Eursostar faster from Stratford Id have thought? Maybe do a finishing lap on the 'new' road circuit at the cyclopark... LOL

so I suppose they could head north out of Leeds into the dales or NE to the moors then loop to York. Would be a shame not to get into the national parks.

The time difference between St. Pancras an Stratford is about 7 minutes. Barely a reason to despatch trains from Stratford when there is possibility to showcase one of the most beautiful stations in the country ( and actual Eurostar terminus).

I'm expecting the route of any stage starting/finishing in Leeds to head through Morley (which is pretty close to be fair) thanks to links with Beryl Burton. As one of Britain's most successful ever cyclists I expect Morley to be included in some form. Huddersfield too if they want to link in more of Yorkshire's cycling and TdF heritage with Britain's first TdF stage winner, Brian Robinson, coming from Huddersfield.

If both of those are included I'd expect the race to head south from Leeds to Morley then through to Huddersfield before looping back north via Skipton possibly then towards the coast through t'moors.

Other than that all I can think is that the race might loop north from Leeds through the likes of Otley/Harrogate/Ripon to take in some lumpy roads and some nice scenery before heading east towards the coast and through the moors.

Whatever the route, the scenery will be stunning and with a bumpy route I think stage one will be a great stage for a breakaway, maybe even set up for a break to win, especially given that it's not exactly flat around Whitby.

Wor Lass who like me is very excited re the Leeds Grand Depart, was born in Leeds....... On January 17th!!!!!!

Bawtry was rumoured as a stage finish, but I think that was just wishful thinking by locals...

re: "expected stage 2 finish in Sheffield" - so the current rumoured plan is a start and finish in Leeds for Stage 1, then from Leeds to Sheffield in stage 2? Or from Leeds to X in stage 1?