How TNT Sports & Eurosport are broadcasting the Tour de France

Warner Bros. Discovery Sports Europe VP of cycling Guy Voisin has lifted the lid on its production of the Tour de France. 

For the first time, the broadcaster has exclusive live rights to the cycling tour in the UK this year, showing it on TNT Sports and HBO Max. It also holds rights across continental Europe through Eurosport, and Voisin told the Broadcast Sport Podcasts about how the company manages to produce the Tour de France for such a wide range of audiences. You can listen to the full episode below. 

In addition, TNT Sports has worked with Channel 5 to bring free-to-air highlights of the race to UK viewers, after a partnership between the pair was announced earlier this summer. Voisin revealed the workings behind the deal in the podcast, and how Warner Bros. Discovery’s potential merger with 5 owner Paramount was actually a lucky coincidence. 

He said, “It was an open bid in October, and Channel Five is the one who won. Funnily enough, in February it was announced that we may become a brother/sister channel, but it had all been signed before.

“I’m glad it fell that way because I get to know the people whom maybe in the future I might work with. They’re a great gang. Raphe [Raphael Pendergast, Channel 5 head of sport] is a really nice guy and we’re able to build something with a couple of years contracted with them.”

Voisin works with Pendergast on the content, but it is Warner Bros. Discovery which produces it. He explained, “Raphael has given us the direction of what they would like to see. After that, they leave a lot in our hands because we’ve got the expertise in the cycling crew.

“It’s part of my team that produce it. It’s a producer called Michael Rees, who’s been producing our highlights for the past three, four years. He really knows the production aspect of it.

“Even though we do opening and closing presentations on the show, the idea is to give as much of the race as possible to the viewers.”

The highlights programme is now averaging over 500,000 viewers-a-day during the Tour de France, which comes to an end this weekend. The exclusive live rights are also proving a boon to TNT Sports, with average live viewership up 55% on 2025 and reach up 41% while unique streaming subscribers watching are up 22%. Voisin agreed, “I think we’ve succeeded and the numbers are showing that it’s appreciated.” 

You can listen to the full interview with Voisin below. In it, he goes into detail on the Tour de France production and Warner Bros. Discovery’s wrap-around shows across Europe, producing content for the wide range of languages and cultures across the continent, and what he thinks could be done to grow road cycling viewership. 

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