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ITV4 will show Tour de France until 2015

Broadcaster extends deal for the world's biggest bike race...

The Tour de France has been one of the success stories of ITV4, with viewing figures up 33% year-on-year for the coverage of last year's race. So it's no surprise to learn that the broadcaster has extended its deal to show the world's biggest bike race until 2015.

Finalised today, the new deal with the Aumury Sport Organisation, the owners of the Tour de France, covers rights for highlights and live coverage for the next four races. What exactly will be offered over the next few years isn't disclosed, but we'd expect to see a commitment at least equal to that of the last two years, which has seen live coverage of big stages on weekends and daily highlights shows throughout the week. ITV is also planning to "extend its digital and online coverage" of the race, although exactly what that entails isn't clear. In a perfect world it'd mean that you can watch all the stages live, online... fingers crossed, eh!

Niall Sloane, ITV’s Controller of Sport said: “ITV’s coverage of the Tour de France has a terrific reputation with viewers and sports fans and I’m delighted that, in one of the most exciting periods for British cycling, we have secured coverage on ITV4 until 2015."

Dave is a founding father of road.cc, having previously worked on Cycling Plus and What Mountain Bike magazines back in the day. He also writes about e-bikes for our sister publication ebiketips. He's won three mountain bike bog snorkelling World Championships, and races at the back of the third cats.

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mattjgregg | 12 years ago
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On a slightly different note, how many more years will Phil have before he has to retire? I know p&p they sell their commentary to Versus and others now, but I'd hate to have an American commentator as a replacement for Phil.

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Fran The Man | 12 years ago
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Gkam84 says he never watches cycling on ITV. How on earth can he get by without the Paul & Paul show?!?!!  7

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russyparkin | 12 years ago
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a jumper, it was on from 2pm until 5pm everyday as far as i remember , then higlights at 7pm,

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chris75018 | 12 years ago
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Pretty sure all / most stages were live on the itv website last year too. ITV had a live streaming mobile app for the rugby world cup - would that be too much to hope for?

I for one quite liked the boulting / boardman / rendell partnership - hope that remains for 2012

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Simon_MacMichael replied to chris75018 | 12 years ago
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chris75018 wrote:

Pretty sure all / most stages were live on the itv website last year too. ITV had a live streaming mobile app for the rugby world cup - would that be too much to hope for?

Ooh, you've got me all hopeful now - the RWC looked fantastic on the iPad app from ITV (well, apart from Scotland going out, obviously).

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a.jumper | 12 years ago
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Haven't itv shown every stage live on either itv4 or red button for a year or two now?

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mrmo | 12 years ago
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Quote:

problems with sponsors names on jerseys!

any excuse, have the beeb ever bothered when it comes to football, F1 etc.

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joemmo | 12 years ago
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Excellent. I look forward to the insightful facts and anecdotes about the local chateaux and their speciality cheeses that spice up the earlier stages.

@ Coleman - Interesting point about Sky... I suppose it is a brand that is commonly associated with yer football and yer mainstream telly so maybe it does have some part in making cycling seem more acceptable to the proverbial 'man in the street'.

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Coleman | 12 years ago
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More cycling on TV. A very good thing.

Are the chaps at Sky clever or lucky? Take the Skyrides -thousands of people voluntarily wearing Sky bibs. Sky's sponsorship of a pro team seemed to come at a time when interest in cycling was booming. How much is Sky contributing to cycling's popularity. How much will the company benefit from it?

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Gkam84 | 12 years ago
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Although i don't watch it ever on ITV, this can only be good news for cycling on TV, hopefully the BBC and Channel 4 might pick up on this and get something together for other races, BBC might pick up on things Cav is racing

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bikecellar replied to Gkam84 | 12 years ago
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Dont' hold your breath, in 1965 when Tom Simpson won the road worlds and spoty, I wrote to the beeb, asking if we could look forward to coverage of pro road racing, the reply (I wish I had kept the letter) was along the lines of having problems with sponsors names on jerseys! But on the positive side I got to see all of the Copenhagen race on the red button, so we have moved forward a long way. The only live coverage of the Tour back then, was on the radio (French stations)on long wave). We have never had it so good.  4

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