For the race’s 21st and final stage, coronavirus restrictions limited spectator numbers at the finish to 5,000 on Sunday, significantly lower than previous turnouts, Reuters reported.

But the atmosphere on the French capital’s most famous avenue remained festive, with the thinned-out spectators punctuated by Slovenian flags to honor winner Tadej Pogacar.

Few minded a downbeat finish after the dramatic upset of the Tour’s penultimate day – when 21-year-old Pogacar seized the overall lead from compatriot Primoz Roglic with a time-trial surge that surprised even himself.

“All the Slovenians who want to be here are here,” said Dehan Silar, a cycling fan who flew in from Ljubljana earlier on Sunday for the finale. “We are here with our hearts.”

As the global pandemic forced the cancelation of major sporting events, organizers agreed to a two-month postponement of the Tour, initially scheduled to start in June. Fans were barred outright from finish lines on earlier stages in French regions with high COVID-19 infection rates.

“It’s a bit of a shame for the cyclists because there are fewer people, but for us it means we can see better,” said one Parisian spectator who gave his name as Jean.

Besides a competitive final sprint, with no bearing on overall race leadership, the final ride into Paris has for years been a largely processional end to the contest, which this year followed a 3,484-kilometer (2,165 mile) course over three weeks.

The 23-year-old Colombian had remained in contention until Sunday’s stage on the Grand Colombier, when he shipped more than seven minutes on the unforgiving gradients to tumble out of the top 10 in the general classification, the Guardian reported.

After Monday’s rest day, Egan Bernal suffered again on Tuesday’s stage to Villard-de-Lans, though indicated afterward he hoped to ride to Paris out of respect for the race. But on the morning of Wednesday’s queen stage to the Col de la Loze above Méribel, the Ineos Grenadiers announced Bernal was out of the race.

Ineos team principal Sir Dave Brailsford said, “We have taken this decision with Egan’s best interests at heart. Egan is a true champion who loves to race, but he is also a young rider, with many Tours ahead of him and at this point, on balance, we feel it is wiser for him to stop racing.”

“This is obviously not how I wanted my Tour de France to end, but I agree that it is the right decision for me in the circumstances,” Bernal said. “I have the greatest respect for this race and I am already looking forward to coming back in the years ahead.”

Bernal began the Tour still suffering with a back injury that forced him to withdraw from the Critérium du Dauphiné last month, but had played down the problem until his collapse. After Tuesday’s stage, he told reporters the pain had spread to his knee and it seemed clear there was little point in him continuing.

Ineos said Bernal will now have a period of recovery before resetting his goals for the rest of the season.

President Emmanuel Macron said on Monday that restrictions on public events, including Tour de France, would continue until mid-July due to the pandemic, BBC Sport reported.

Cycling’s biggest race, won by Team Ineos’ Egan Bernal last year, is due to run from June 27 to July 19.

The Tour, due to start in Nice, is being contested by Bernal’s Ineos teammate and four-time winner Chris Froome after the Briton broke his neck, femur, elbow, hip, and ribs in a crash preparing for last year’s event.

Colombian Bernal won last year’s race following a battle with Britain’s Geraint Thomas, who won the 2018 edition.

On April 10, cycling’s governing body furloughed staff and cut leaders’ salaries as a result of the global pandemic.

 ‘Economic meltdown’

 

The “Grande Boucle,” as the Tour is known in France, is the central economic pillar supporting the 22 professional teams scheduled to compete in 2020.

An announcement is expected this week on either a postponement or an outright cancellation of the 21-day extravaganza, The Japan Times reported.

“Cancelation opens the door to a possible economic meltdown in the cycling sector,” said Jean-Francois Mignot of the French National Center for Scientific Research and author of the book “A History of the Tour de France.”

Up 12 million fans usually line the roads as the Tour makes its way through the French countryside, with the finish line in Paris, for three weeks every summer.

“It’s as simple as this. If the Tour does not take place, teams could disappear, riders and staff alike would find themselves unemployed,” said Marc Madiot, head of the French team Groupama-FDJ.

His team budget is estimated at €20 million ($21.8 million) per year and is bankrolled by the state lottery and an insurance company.

Amaury Sport Organisation (ASO), the Tour de France organizer, paid €2.3 million in total prize money for the 2019 edition.

The Tour rakes in revenue but the giant cost of staging the event, featuring logistics that are as spectacular as any mountainside showdown on two wheels, eat into the margins of all road races.

Sponsors are paying for the daily hours-long television coverage and even the smallest teams can get involved in a breakaway and hence command screen time.

“Most sponsors are in cycling for this reason alone, the whole thing is centered around the Tour de France,” Mignot claimed.

“If these sponsors invest money it is because television viewers recognize the team jerseys, it is the only cycling race watched by such a vast audience.”

Bruno Bianzina, the general manager of the agency Sport Market, said the Tour is a unique event in many ways.

“There are very few other sports with so much riding on one event,” Bianzina said.

Mignot estimated ASO’s Tour revenue has climbed from €5 million in the 1980s to €50 million today.

Another group, Sporsora, put the turnover for the 2019 Tour de France at €130 million.

Some 40-50 percent comes from sponsors, television rights make up around half, and host regions of the race also contribute around five percent.

“The Tour de France props up the whole of cycling, but the Tour needs the rest of the cycling calendar too,” said Madiot, a two-time winner of the Paris-Roubaix one-day race.

Even the smallest sponsor pays €250,000 to ASO while it is estimated that the yellow jersey sponsor, the LCL bank, pays €10 million.

“But it goes much deeper than that because the Tour de France is also a huge advert for France and French tourism,” Bianzina said.