Tour de France 2026 game guide: Tips and transfer strategy for the TNT Sports Cycling Challenge
By Ben Snowball
Published 03/07/2026 at 16:11 GMT+1
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The Tour de France is almost here - and so is your chance to prove you're smarter than everyone else in your group chat. The TNT Sports Cycling Challenge is live, and with the Grand Depart in Barcelona just days away, now's the time to get your squad sorted.
How does the team time trial work on Stage 1 of the 2026 Tour de France?
Video credit: TNT Sports
Hopefully you've already picked your team - if not, go and do that here now - because the game starts the moment the race does.
While the temptation is to load up on GC superstars and hope for the best, winning your mini league and topping the overall ranks will take a bit more thought than that.
The best way to approach it is in three blocks: week one, week two, week three. You get three transfers on each rest day (Monday, July 13 and Monday, July 20), so you can - and should - reshape your team as the race unfolds, rather than setting and forgetting.
Keep in mind that your team leader scores bonus points on the stage. You can switch your leader stage by stage, and if you know you'll be busy, you can set your captain for future stages in advance so you don't miss out.
- Tour de France game: Enter the TNT Sports Cycling Challenge
- Rules and scoring points: TNT Sports Cycling Challenge
Week one (Stages 1-9)
- Riders to target: Tadej Pogacar (ÂŁ15m), Jasper Philipsen (ÂŁ9m), Tim Merlier (ÂŁ9m), Mathieu van der Poel (ÂŁ8m) - plus UAE, Visma-Lease a Bike and Red Bull-Bora-hansgrohe riders for team time trial
| Stage | Date | Start - Finish | Distance | On-air time (BST) |
| Stage 1 | Sat 4 Jul | Barcelona - Barcelona | 19km (TTT) | 15:30 |
| Stage 2 | Sun 5 Jul | Tarragona - Barcelona | 182km (hills) | 11:45 |
| Stage 3 | Mon 6 Jul | Granollers - Les Angles | 196km (mountains) | 10:45 |
| Stage 4 | Tue 7 Jul | Carcassonne - Foix | 182km (hills) | 12:00 |
| Stage 5 | Wed 8 Jul | Lannemezan - Pau | 158km (flat) | 12:30 |
| Stage 6 | Thu 9 Jul | Pau - Gavarnie-Cèdre | 186km (mountains) | 11:00 |
| Stage 7 | Fri 10 Jul | Hagetmau - Bordeaux | 175km (flat) | 12:00 |
| Stage 8 | Sat 11 Jul | PĂ©rigueux - Bergerac | 182km (flat) | 12:00 |
| Stage 9 | Sun 12 Jul | Malemort - Ussel | 185km (hills) | 12:00 |
First things first: attack the team time trial.
A rider who finishes in the winning team gets 50 points - it doesn't matter whether they were first across the line for that team or not. Remco Evenepoel (Red Bull-Bora-hansgrohe), for example, could ride solo off the front and drop his team-mates on the final ramp, but they would still bank the full 50 points too, as long as they finish.
The rest of the opening week is nicely balanced - a mix of sprints, breakaway days and mountains. You've only got six transfers for the entire race, so the bulk of your 16-strong squad is going to be with you from start to finish. So while the TTT is worth targeting with budget-friendly riders, don't leave yourself with too many riders who will do nothing for the next 20 stages.
Three sprint stages in week one mean the likes of Tim Merlier (Soudal Quick-Step) and Jasper Philipsen (Alpecin-Premier Tech) need to be on your radar early. Tadej Pogacar (UAE Team Emirates-XRG) also looks essential, with a number of early opportunities for him to add to his 21 stage wins at the Tour.
Also consider Mathieu van der Poel (Alpecin-Premier Tech), who looked strong in the recent Tour de Suisse TT and will want to stay in contention for the yellow jersey on Stage 2's punchy finale.
Week two (Stages 10-15)
- Riders to target: Tadej Pogacar (ÂŁ15m), Jonas Vingegaard (ÂŁ14m), Paul Seixas (ÂŁ11m), Tom Pidcock (ÂŁ10m), Jasper Philipsen (ÂŁ9m), Tim Merlier (ÂŁ9m)
| Stage | Date | Start - Finish | Distance | On-air time (BST) |
| Stage 10 | Tue 14 Jul | Aurillac - Le Lioran | 167km (hills) | 12:00 |
| Stage 11 | Wed 15 Jul | Vichy - Nevers | 161km (flat) | 12:30 |
| Stage 12 | Thu 16 Jul | Magny-Cours - Châlon-sur-Saône | 181km (flat) | 12:00 |
| Stage 13 | Fri 17 Jul | Dole - Belfort | 205km (hills) | 11:45 |
| Stage 14 | Sat 18 Jul | Mulhouse - Le Markstein | 155km (mountains) | 11:45 |
| Stage 15 | Sun 19 Jul | Champagnole - Plateau de Solaison | 184km (mountains) | 11:45 |
This is where you cut loose any dead weight you picked purely for the team time trial - though if you recruited riders in the ÂŁ2-3 million bracket, your options to fix that might be limited. You may also have an injury or two to patch up by now, and the upside is you will have nine stages of real form to work with instead of guesswork.
Week two opens with an undulating stage to Le Lioran on Bastille Day, with young home hope Paul Seixas (Decathlon CMA CGM) shouldering the weight of a nation.
Two sprint stages follow, then a day built for the descenders, which is exactly where a Tom Pidcock (Pinarello Q36.5) punt could pay off. After that, it's back into the mountains and back to business for the GC men.
Week three (Stages 16-21)
- Riders to target: Tadej Pogacar (ÂŁ15m), Jonas Vingegaard (ÂŁ14m), Remco Evenepoel (ÂŁ12m), Filippo Ganna (ÂŁ4m) - plus affordable riders near the top of the overall classifications!
| Stage | Date | Start - Finish | Distance | On-air time (BST) |
| Stage 16 | Tue 21 Jul | Evian-les-Bains - Thonon-les-Bains | 26km (ITT) | 11:30 |
| Stage 17 | Wed 22 Jul | Chambery - Voiron | 175km (flat) | 12:00 |
| Stage 18 | Thu 23 Jul | Voiron - Orcières-Merlette | 185km (mountains) | 11:15 |
| Stage 19 | Fri 24 Jul | Gap - Alpe d'Huez | 128km (mountains) | 12:30 |
| Stage 20 | Sat 25 Jul | Bourg d'Oisans - Alpe d'Huez | 171km (mountains) | 10:00 |
| Stage 21 | Sun 26 Jul | Thoiry - Paris | 130km (flat) | 14:30 |
It's au revoir to the sprinters. The fast men have two shots on paper in the final week - Stages 17 and 21 - but the first begins with four categorised climbs, while the Paris finale returns to the hilly Montmartre circuit after it stole the show on its Tour debut last year.
Form permitting, Evenepoel and Filippo Ganna (Netcompany Ineos) are the obvious picks for the individual time trial, while three brutal tests in the mountains - including back-to-back days on Alpe d'Huez - mean climbing specialists are essential.
There are big points still on the table for the final classifications, so it might be smarter to save your three rest-day transfers for riders sitting near the top of the standings.
Head to our rules page for the full breakdown of scoring.
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