Yesterday, thirteen months before the Paris 2024 Olympic Games, the direction of the Olympic flame that will walk along the Hautes-Pyrénées branch on Sunday, May 19, 2024, was announced.
Coming from Marseille from where it will take off on Thursday, May 9, 2024 (Velodrome stadium) it will be, the day before, in the Gers with how it crossed the statue of the Musketeers of Dumas in Condom before entering Bigorre, level 11 of the route of the Olympic Flame. Several cities will host the relays that will take place in Bagnères, Lourdes, Lannemezan before arriving at night at the Tarbes Climbing Factory, the flat city where numerous animations will mark the pace.
Realized through a hundred athletes whose names will be proposed by the Olympic Committee and its partners, the Olympic Flame will take height as it will triumph in the 2,877 meters of altitude of the Pic du Midi de Bigorre selected as a junction with the majestic circus of Gavarnie, listed as a World Heritage Site by UNESCO since 1997. There is no doubt that the scenery at the foot of the parishes culminates at more than 3000m above sea level, and the wonderful waterfall that springs from its 432m summit will be beautiful.
For Jean-Yves Mouret, president of the Departmental Olympic and Sports Committee of the Hautes-Pyrénées, “it is a great joy to receive the Olympic Flame and we will have to warmly thank the Department, its President and its elected representatives because it is they who would pass through the Hautes-Pyrénées. The selected villages and places are the maximum emblem of our branch and I hope that on that day there will be a strong enthusiasm from the population but also from all sports associations to show that Hautes-Pyrénées is a vital sports branch. All classified communities will be concerned this time around. For the influence of the branch, it is something fair and for the CDOS it imposes a duty on us because we will have to get even. more concerned on the occasion and can also be a reason for a madness that would start from this date of May 19 until Paris 2024 (July 26-August 11) without forgetting the month of September with the Paralympic Games “.
For Michel Pélieu, who was looking for the passage of the Olympic flame in the department, the passes announced are a satisfaction. “In exchange for our monetary participation (€180,000, anyway), we had formulated some demands: we looked after the flame to “sweep” the apartment, from the plain to the mountain. Done is selected. We also looked for it to pass through the Usine des Sports de Tarbes, which is a remarkable facility and of course shines to the maximum sensitive to the Pic du Midi, it is the symbol of our territory. Mastery of the program, but we were heard. “