The Olympic motto is pretty straightforward: “Faster, Higher, Stronger”. Well, technically, it’s had “Together” added to the end of it, but it doesn’t really change the meaning of the phrase, inaugurated at the first modern event, in 1894. It sounds a bit like an early version of Radiohead’s Fitter Happier, but it was supposed to encapsulate the Olympic ideal.
Often, it feels like the route designers of the men’s Grand Tours are trying to live up to Pierre de Coubertin’s motto, and somehow make their race harder every year. There’s something almost masochistic about how routes are designed, announced and marketed, as if what fans want is for riders to break themselves over three weeks.
