Road cycling at Paris 2024 Olympics: Preview, full schedule and how to watch live
Road cycling is one of the stalwarts of the Olympic Games, having been held at the first modern Games in Athens and at every Olympic Games since Stockholm 1912.
At Paris 2024, competition will take place around the streets of the French capital as well as in the neighbouring Île-de-France.
Competition begins with the time trials on 27 July and ends with the women's road race on 4 August.
Notably, of the Tokyo 2020 champions, both men's winners – Primoz Roglic in the time trial and Richard Carapaz in the road race – will not be back to defend their titles, with neither selected by their teams. Nor will the reigning women's time trial champion, Annemiek van Vleuten, who has since retired from cycling.
Read on for the stars to watch who will be in action, schedule and how to watch the action live.
Road cycling Paris 2024 Olympic Games stars to watch
The flat time trial route appears to favour the pure time triallists, such as the likes of Italy's Filippo Ganna, Great Britain's Josh Tarling, and never count out world champion Remco Evenepoel of Belgium on the men's side, while women's contenders could include USA's Chloé Dygert, who's the current world champion, Ellen van Dijk of Netherlands, and Australia's Grace Brown.
Meanwhile, the road races will feature steep, punchy climbs, including up the Butte Montmartre with under 10km to the finish line in both races. With over 2800m of altitude gain for the men and over 1700m for the women, it will not be an easy day – certainly neither a course for the sprinters nor for pure climbers. Instead, the one-day classics riders should come to the fore.
On the men's side, that should include Evenepoel and his Belgian teammate Wout van Aert depending on who takes the leader's role, Netherlands' Mathieu van der Poel, Great Britain's Tom Pidcock, French ex-world champion Julian Alaphilippe, and the name on everyone's lips, multi-time Tour de France winner Tadej Pogacar.
Meanwhile, over on the women's side, look out for the traditional strong Dutch presence, which this year includes the London 2012 world champion Marianne Vos, but also Belgium's Lotte Kopecky, Poland's Katarzyna Niewiadoma, and Italy's Elisa Longo Borghini.
Of note, USA's Taylor Knibb will also be competing in triathlon during the Games, not just in cycling, while a number of cyclists are competing in more than one discipline at Paris 2024, including Dygert and Ganna (track) and Pidcock (mountain bike).
Slovenian Primoz Roglic won the Tokyo 2020 men's time trial held at Fuji Speedway.
Full road cycling schedule at Olympic Games 2024
Road cycling is due to take place on 27 July, 3 August, and 4 August during Paris 2024. Click here for a detailed schedule.
How to watch road cycling live at Paris 2024
All the action from Paris 2024, including road cycling, can be watched via media rights holders (MRHs).
MRHs include Nine in Australia, Globo in Brazil, CBC in Canada, CCTV in People's Republic of China, Fuji TV/NHK/Nippon TV/TBS/TV Asahi/TV Tokyo in Japan, SKY NZ in New Zealand, SuperSport in South Africa, NBC in the United States, and Discovery Eurosport across Europe, alongside France Télévisions in France, ARD/ZDF in Germany, and BBC Sport in the United Kingdom, among others.
Check listings in other regions for your local broadcaster.