ITV will continue to provide extensive free-to-air coverage of the Tour de France after the broadcaster extended its commitment to cycling’s premier event by a further two years.
ITV4 will continue to broadcast daily live coverage throughout the Tour in conjuction with its popular evening highlights programme until 2015.
The broadcaster has also announced that it will ‘extend its digital and online coverage’ for this year’s race.
ITV has been the event’s terrestrial home since 2002 when it took over the rights from Channel 4, and has expanded its coverage of the Tour considerably over the past decade.
The current five-year deal signed in 2008 extended ITV’s coverage to emcompass every stage live, having only covered the weekend stages prior to that alongside its nightly highlights show.
Thanks to the success of British sprinter Mark Cavendish, who won the 2011 green jersey, the Tour de France has been one of ITV’s most successful sporting events in recent years.
Last year, nearly 1m tuned in to ITV4 to watch the Manx Missile win the final stage on the Champs-Elysee for the third successive year, and ratings for its daily highlights shows have grown year-on-year by 33%.
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.”
ITV’s growing commitment to cycling has coincided with a surge in the sport’s popularity in the UK, and viewing figures are expected to rise further in 2012, with many experts predicting more British success at the Tour de France and increased exposure in the run up to this summer’s Olympic Games in London.
Cavendish has joined Team Sky for 2012 and will link up with nine other British riders for the new season, including Bradley Wiggins, who has set his sights on becoming Britain’s first winner of the prestigious yellow jersey at this year’s race.
Sloane told VeloNation: “It’s been a great period of success for British cycling, both on the track and on the road.
“The achievements of Bradley Wiggins, Mark Cavendish and others have made them household names and contributed towards the growing interest in television coverage of cycling on television.”
The 2012 Tour de France, which will be 99th edition of the famous race, starts on June 30 in Liege, Belgium, and concludes in Paris on July 22, just five days before the opening ceremony for the London Olympic Games.
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