LES HERBIERS, France, Jan 26, 2010 (AFP) – The 2011 Tour de France will start in the Atlantic coast department of the Vendee, race director Christian Prudhomme announced here on Tuesday.

The first stage will get underway on Saturday July 2 close to the approaches to the island of Noirmoutier and will end at the Mont des Alouettes next to the town of Les Herbiers.

The following day will see a 23-kilometres team time-trial around the town of Essarts with the third stage leaving from the Vendee coastal town of Olonne-sur-Mer.

It will be the fourth time in the last 20 years that world’s greatest cycle race has started in the Vendee after 1993, 1999 and 2005.

Tour organizers underlined the fact the 2011 edition will not start with any kind of time trial.

Instead, the race to the uphill finish at Mont des Alouettes will closely resemble the finish to the first stage of the Tour in 2008 when Spaniard Alejandro Valverde claimed a memorable victory at Plumelec in Brittany.

In 2010 the race will begin in Rotterdam in the Netherlands.