British Cycling has announced that stage four of the Lloyds Bank Tour of Britain Men will take place in the East Midlands this September.
The fourth stage of the shortened six day race will start in Derby on Friday 6 September before finishing in Newark-on-Trent, a town located northeast of Nottingham.
The rest of the host towns were announced by the national governing body last week. Starting in Kelso in the Scottish borders on Tuesday 3 September, the race will then finish in Felixstowe, Suffolk on Sunday 8 September.
In between the start in Scotland and the finish on the Suffolk coast, the race will also visit the likes of Darlington, Sheffield and Northampton as it gradually heads south.
Following on from the announcement that Northampton will play host to the race for the first time, Derby will now join that list as a first time host in 2024. The stage is set to start outside the Derby arena, a well-known track cycling venue, before heading through Derbyshire and across the border into Nottinghamshire.
Newark-on-Trent has hosted the race on two previous occasions. Visma-Lease a Bike’s Olav Kooij won a sprint finish in the town during last year’s race marking his fourth consecutive stage win. His teammate Wout van Aert went on to win the race overall for the second time in his career.
If Van Aert returns to the race this year, he will be familiar with the finish along the seafront in Felixstowe on the final day, after winning a sprint finish in the town last September.
The full route details for each stage are expected to follow in the weeks ahead as British Cycling gets set to stage the Tour of Britain Men for the first time. After the liquidation of the race's former organiser, SweetSpot, British Cycling took over the running of the event.
It has also been shortened to six stages with the aim of achieving parity with the newly created Tour of Britain Women moving forward.
After the success of past stages in the county, British Cycling Events managing director Jonathan Day said that he expected huge crowds of roadside fans to gather once again in Nottinghamshire for stage four.
Day said: "We have seen the great support across Nottinghamshire for recent editions of the race, so have no doubt that communities in Derby, Derbyshire and Nottinghamshire will again be out in force to welcome the riders and to make for another memorable stage of the Lloyds Bank Tour of Britain Men, coming at the end of a huge summer of cycling."
