What should have been a standout moment in the world of sports was almost overshadowed on Sunday as 27-year-old Slovenian cyclist Tadej Pogačar took home his fifth Tour de France amid a last-minute course change in response to wildfires raging in the country’s southwest region. The disruption is one of a growing number of examples of extreme weather forcing changes to global sporting events.
For the final stage of the world’s most prestigious cycling race, what was meant to be a 133-kilometer (82-mile) ride was shortened to 89 km (55.3 miles). Riders were presented in Thoiry before being transported by team buses to Paris, where the race consisted entirely of circuits around the French capital, including two additional laps of the Champs-Élysées.
The change was announced late Saturday. Officials said it would allow emergency first responders and security personnel to shift their attention from the race to the wildfires.
"In a spirit of national solidarity with the areas and communities affected, it was decided to adapt the route for the final stage," the event's organizers said in a statement.
The disruption was just the latest in a series of extreme weather events that have altered this year’s competition. Earlier in the race, stage nine was shortened by 30 km (18 miles) due to extreme heat.
A number of the participants commented on the impact of extreme heat this year, including Pogačar, who suggested having cyclists race earlier, when the heat is less intense, or altering the race calendar.
“If I had the power I would change all the calendar and not race in July and August in hot places,” he said.
The race director replied that such a schedule shift would never be possible, as it could impact critical factors of the event, from obtaining government authorizations to negatively impacting viewership—and therefore the revenue—when the race is aired by broadcasters.
Read More: How Europe's Extreme Heat Waves Have Impacted the Tour de France
As of Saturday night, dozens of wildfires were burning in the southwest of France, near Bordeaux. Over 197,000 people had already been evacuated throughout the country, while its neighbor, Spain, saw some 80,000 evacuated.
Research shows climate change is fostering the conditions that allow wildfires to spread rapidly, as hotter temperatures and drier vegetation make many landscapes more flammable. In the last four years, the amount of land burned by wildfires across Europe increased by 57%, according to new data from the World Health Organization.
In Spain and Portugal alone, the number of wildfires has more than doubled since last year.
Europe, which is warming faster than any other continent, is in the midst of a particularly dry, hot summer, creating ideal conditions for wildfires. Following a heatwave in June, data showed that France recorded at least 5,700 excess deaths during the month.
Two weeks later, at the start of this year’s Tour de France, the average temperature along the course was 87.4°F—far surpassing the previous record of 78.6°F in 2022.
Climate Change Is Forcing Sports to Adapt
The Tour de France is not the only sporting event that’s been forced to contend with the impact of climate extremes.
“Recent years have been a turning point for sport, just because so many sporting events have been impacted by climate change,” says Madeleine Orr, assistant professor of Sport Ecology at the University of Toronto. In 2020, tennis player Dalila Jakupovic collapsed on court during the Australian Open due to poor air quality because of wildfires. Soon after, the Tokyo Olympics saw athletes sweltering in 90°F temperatures.
Extreme weather has become impossible to ignore—and organizers are being forced to adapt.
For the first time in the history of the World Cup, FIFA began mandating three-minute “hydration breaks” as games across North America carried on amid high temperatures and humidity. The tournament's final was threatened by hazardous wildfire smoke drifting over New York from hundreds of fires burning in Ontario, Canada, as well as northern Minnesota.
The NFL is increasingly favoring roofed and domed stadiums, with nearly two-thirds of league venues expected to see updates by 2030—to the tune of billions of dollars in construction. And in June, a “heat hazard” went into effect for Formula 1’s Austrian Grand Prix, meaning that drivers would be required to have a “driver cooling system” in place in order to compete.
While the organizations behind some of sports’ most popular events are looking to counteract the effects of climate change, athletes are also forced to adapt their training to better acclimate to heat. In the Tour de France, some teams prepared ice baths for riders to utilize immediately after completing a portion of the race. Laura Schifter explained in a recent opinion piece for TIME that even children’s sports will likely be impacted, reshaping the lifelong habits and mindsets young athletes develop.
And the changes ultimately affect those who attend the sporting events. There’s the added strain of attending outdoor sporting events in extreme weather—which often involves long lines leading into the events and long hours in the sun in the stands. There may also be financial consequences, as investments in new facilities or weather adaptations can increase operating costs, which in some cases wind up passed down to fans. Or they might not get to attend at all: Earlier this month, spectators were asked not to watch the last 40 km (25 miles) of the third stage of the Tour de France to reduce the demand on security personnel and free up more resources for the wildfires.
Adaptation measures are only going to become more common in our warming world, experts tell TIME.
“This is the coolest summer that's going to be in our lifetimes,” says Samuel Hampton, senior researcher at the University of Oxford’s Environmental Change Institute. “It's only going to get hotter and hotter for the rest of our lives, and I think the [Tour de France] is already straining in terms of how it can deal with this heat.”
“It's only going to become more challenging,” he added.
