Le Tour de France will race by la Tour de Londres in July. Yesterday the route for the 2007 Tour was unveiled in Paris. The Prologue (a five-mile time trial) will take in the tourist traps of London, from Big Ben to Hyde Park.

The Mayor of London, in Paris for the unveiling, said: “The London Grand Depart underlines the capital’s status as a venue for world sporting events.” It will be a sequel to this year’s Tour of Britain, which came to total cobbles in Kent; and a prequel to the Olympic Games in 2012, where the cycling road race will be a metropolitan spectacular even for those who cannot tell an inner tube from a bicycle pump. Thousands of spectators are expected in London for what France considers the greatest sporting event in the world, and a secular religion.

The truth is that bicycle races are a tad tedious, but the bicycle itself is a wonder. Until recently, riding a bike was considered a quaint activity for nerds and old maids. But pedalling is becoming mainstream and sexy. The leader of one of the main political parties makes a point of being photographed on his saddle. More Britons are bicycling to work. Biking is keep-fit exercise in the craze for green health, which is the English secular religion. It is silent. It takes up little space on the roads. And it does not pollute, although the Tour has had a taint of dopage since it began in 1903. Alcohol and ether in those primitive days.

So here is a chance for the Government to fulfil its millennium promise to cover the land with bike paths. But it is probably too much to expect them to turn the Mall, the rest of the route and the M25 into dedicated bicycle lanes. Yet.