The 2022 Paris-Nice will include a 14.9km mountain finish at the Col du Tourini, a 13.4km time trial in central France, and a final 115km mountain stage around Nice.

The route for the eight-day race was announced in Versailles near Mantes-la-Ville, where the "Race to the Sun" will begin on Sunday, March 6.

As per tradition, the race route will run south from the French capital, through Orleans, Montluçon, and the eastern end of the Massif Central, to Aubagne on the Mediterranean coast near Marseille.

The first three stages appear to favor sprinters and classicists, but the risk of crosswinds on the exposed roads of Beauce could shake up the overall standings, as it has in recent years.

The 13.4km time trial on stage 4 takes place between Domera and Montluçon, Julien Alaphilippe's birthplace. Undulating country roads will be followed by a steep 700-meter climb to the finish line.

The 188.8-km fifth stage from Saint-Just-Saint-Lambert to Saint-Sauveur-de-Montagut near Saint-Etienne is a series of small climbs, as is the long distance to the coast between Courtezon and Aubagne in the sixth stage.

Stage 7, from Nice to the Col de Tourigny, is shorter at 155.4 km, but heads deeper into the Alpes-Maritimes department.

The climb to the finish is 14.9 km long with a gradient of 7.3%. The stage is well known to riders in the south of France, where Dani Martinez won the 2019 Paris-Nice race and Egan Bernal took the overall win. This was Bernal's first stage race win in Europe; he won the Tour de France a few months later.

The final stage should return to the Promenade des Anglais after two years of COVID-19 chaos; the 115-km stage has six mountain categories, plus the Côte de Berre-les-Alpes.

The Col d'Eze, once the last time trial and hilltop finish, is now the last chance to attack and shake up the overall standings.

In 2021, Maximilian Schachmann won Paris-Nice for the second year in a row after Primos Roglic crashed on the final hilly stage and lost three minutes.

Race organizer ASO decided to automatically invite Alpecin Phoenix and Arkea Samsic as professional teams in addition to the 18 WorldTour teams; B&B Hotels-KTM and Peter Sagan's TotalEnergies team received two wild cards.

François Lemarchand, Paris-Nice race director, told L'Equipe that Roglic and Bernal will return to Paris-Nice this year.

He was confident that Paris-Nice would be held despite the COVID-19 pandemic. The last two Paris-Nice races were affected by the pandemic and the final stage was shortened or changed to avoid the center of Nice.

"The pandemic is going to affect us for the third year in a row. If we have to hold Paris-Nice under the same conditions as last year, we will do so," said Le Marchand.

"Hopefully we won't have to set any restrictions that would be penalizing for spectators. Nothing has been decided yet. Meetings with the prefectures will start next week."