Paralympic Torch Relay route

The Paralympic Games kickoff
Building the route
Team Relays
Discover the Torch Bearer uniform

Paris 2024 is presenting the route for the Paralympic Torch Relay, sponsored by Coca-Cola, Banques Populaires and Caisses d’Epargne, which will run from 25 to 28 August 2024. This Relay will mark the start of the encore for Paris 2024: the first-ever Summer Paralympic Games to be held in France.

The Paralympic Games kickoff

While the Olympic Flame will be extinguished during the closing ceremony for the Olympic Games, the Flame for the Paralympic Games will be lit shortly after in Stoke Mandeville, the historic birthplace of Paralympic sport. The Paralympic Torch Relay will kick off the encore and the Paralympic celebrations.

The Paris 2024 Paralympic Torch Relay will also be the “Forerunners Relay”. These Forerunners are people who live and breathe sport each day, people who are invested in the Paris 2024 Games, and people who are looking forward to welcoming and experiencing them. The Forerunners will rekindle the celebratory spirit and officially open the Paralympic celebrations.

Over 4 days, from 25 to 28 August 2024, some 1,000 Forerunners will carry the Paralympic Flame to around 50 cities throughout France. They will once again awaken people in communities across France and generate interest in the build-up to the Paralympic Games with a message full of enthusiasm – “The Games are back!”.

Founding energy: Stoke Mandeville

The Paralympic Flame will be lit in Great Britain, in Stoke Mandeville, the historic birthplace of Paralympic sport. It was at Stoke Mandeville Hospital that the German neurologist Sir Ludwig Guttmann organised a sports competition in 1948, running parallel to the London Olympic Games, for World War II veterans with spinal cord injuries in order to accelerate their recovery.

After being lit in Stoke Mandeville, the Flame will cross the sea like its Olympic twin, but this time via the Channel Tunnel, marking the start of a legendary relay. 24 British athletes will symbolically embark on the journey through the tunnel and will be joined halfway between the United Kingdom and France by 24 French athletes to hand over the Flame and the energy of the Games.

Multiplied energy

Unlike the Olympic Flame, several Paralympic Flames can shine out alongside one another, reflecting the unique features of the Paralympic movement. When it arrives on the French coast in Calais, the Flame will be split into 12 Flames that will set off to light up the whole of France. They will symbolise the energy of the 12 days of the first Summer Paralympic Games to be held in France, with the cauldron to be lit on 28 August 2024, followed by 11 days of competition.

Day 1: 25 August 2024.

A historic crossing under the Channel Tunnel. Twelve flames converging in Paris:

Route 1: The flame will be lit in Calais, Pas-de-Calais.
Route 2: The flame will be lit in Valenciennes, in the Nord department
Route 3: The flame will be lit in Anéville, Moselle
Route 4: The flame will be lit in Strasbourg, in the European Collectivity of Alsace
Route 5: The flame will be lit in Thonon-les-Bains, Haute-Savoie
Route 6: The flame will be lit in Antibes Juan-les-Pins, in the Alpes-Maritimes region of France
Route 7: The flame will be lit in Montpellier
Route 8: The flame will be lit in Lourdes, in the Hautes-Pyrénées region of France
Route 9: The flame will be lit in La Roche-sur-Yon, Vendée
Route 10: The flame will be lit in Lorient, Morbihan
Route 11: The flame will be lit in Saint-Malo, Ille-et-Villaine
Route 12: The flame will be lit in Rouen, Seine-Maritime

Communicative energy

Reflecting the unique emotions of a return match or encore, the Paralympic Torch Relay will be exceptionally intense. The 12 Flames will each follow their own route, passing through the heart of the various regions before converging in Île-de France and becoming one again in Paris. They will head out to meet communities in all the regions across France, calling on them to get involved. All the energies of the Forerunners, who will have carried the Paralympic Flame, will symbolically unite in Paris before lighting the cauldron during the Paralympic Games opening ceremony on 28 August 2024.

Day 2: 26 August 2024.

Celebrations all over France. 1,000 Paralympic torchbearers.

The twelve flames will converge in Paris via the following towns:

Route 1: The flame will pass through Arras (Pas-de-Calais), Amiens (Somme) and Chambly (Oise).
Route 2: The flame will stop in Laon (Aisne)
Route 3: The flame will stop in Châlons-en-Champagne (Marne)
Route 4: The flame will stop in Troyes (Aube)
Route 5: The flame will stop in Châtillon-sur-Seine (Côte d’Or)
Route 6: The flame will stop in Lyon
Route 7: The flame will stop in Vichy
Route 8: The flame will stop in Limoges
Route 9: The flame will stop in Blois (Loir-et-Cher)
Route 10: The flame will stop in Chartres
Route 11: The flame will stop in Deauville (Calvados)
Route 12: The flame will stop in Louviers (Eure)

Day 3: 27 August 2024.

The twelve flames will arrive in the Île-de-France region via the following towns:

Route 1: The flame will pass through Montfermeil, Clichy-sous-Bois, Livry-Gargan and Sevran (Seine-Saint-Denis) and Épinay-sur-Seine and Villetaneuse (Hauts-de-Seine).
Route 2: The flame will stop at Sucy-en-Brie (Val-de-Marne)
Route 3: The flame will stop in Valenton (Val-de-Marne)
Route 4: The flame will stop in Trilport (Seine-et-Marne)
Route 5: The flame will stop at CNSD de Fontainebleau (Seine-et-Marne)
Route 6: The flame will stop at Louvres (Val d’Oise)
Route 7: The flame will stop at the Domaine national de Saint-Cloud (Hauts-de-Seine)
Route 8: The flame will stop at Garches Vaucresson (Hauts-de-Seine)
Route 9: The flame will stop in Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines (Yvelines)
Route 10: The flame will stop in Houdan (Yvelines)
Route 11: The flame will stop at La Roche-Guyon (Val d’Oise)
Route 12: The flame will stop in Cergy (Val d’Oise)

Paris 2024 Paralympic Torch Relay to finish with a flourish in Paris

The Paralympic Games opening ceremony will be held for the first time outside the confines of a stadium, at the heart of the capital, from the Champs-Elysées to Place de la Concorde. Paris will be transformed into a huge Para sports ground. Paris’ world-renowned sports venues and iconic monuments will be the backdrop for the performances by the Paralympic athletes. Paris will truly be the nerve centre of the Paralympic Games.

Building the route

The Paralympic Torch Relay will showcase communities that are committed to promoting inclusion in sport and building awareness of disabilities, communities that have a strong focus on sport and are closely engaged in the Games, and others that stand out through their unique history.

Promoting… access to universal sport

In consultation with the French Paralympic and Sports Committee (CPSF), Paris 2024 has identified cities that are committed to developing Para sports.

The Flame will visit places that have seen famous Para athletes grow up, such as Lorient, home to Damien Seguin, double Paralympic gold medallist in para sailing. It will visit Blois, which has a sports complex named after its Paralympic champion, Marie-Amélie Le Fur.

The Torch Relay will offer opportunities to highlight the investments made in innovative infrastructures, such as Châlons-en-Champagne, which has the only gymnasium in France designed to facilitate access to sport for people with intellectual disabilities. Very active in this field, the city of Vichy hosted the event marking the 500-day countdown to the Paralympic Games and the Virtus Global Games in June 2023 for high-level athletes with physical or mental disabilities.

Vichy, like the city of Laon, is also rolling out the Club Inclusif programme, enabling several of its clubs to benefit from sessions to build awareness of how to welcome Para athletes. The city of Bobigny in Seine Saint-Denis and its future Para sports hub PRISME will also be in the spotlight.

The Relay will stop off in these cities that actively support participation in sport for all. Rouen, Chartres and Troyes offer a wide range of disciplines, from sledge hockey to Para tennis, Para triathlon, adapted baseball and Para climbing.

Promoting… the commitment made by cities to Sport and the Games

The Flame will stop off in Lyon, which will host 11 football matches during the Games, and at the Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines Velodrome, which will also be a Paris 2024 competition venue, as well as in Chambly, which has three outstanding sports facilities adapted for Para sports and will be one of the Pre-Games Training Camp locations, alongside Deauville and Antibes. Antibes is the only French city to be twinned with Olympia, the ancient birthplace of the Olympic Games.

The Relay will stop off in Montpellier, which is known as the city of urban sports and also hosted the third annual Terre de Jeux forum. Set up in 2019, this programme offers opportunities for communities throughout France to get involved in the organisation of Paris 2024 and is relaunching the focus on sport across the country. The buzz generated will reach all the way to Moselle, and Amnéville, which will join in the celebrations with its dedicated Club 2024 Games celebration venue.

Promoting… the memory of history and heritage

The Torch Relay route will include many of the exceptional panoramas that France is renowned for. It will showcase historic architectural masterpieces, such as the Napoleonic city of La Roche-sur-Yon, Arras’ Grand Place, surrounded by majestic Baroque and Flemish facades, and the Cathedral districts in Limoges and Chartres. Often referred to as the “Capital of Europe”, Strasbourg will also be in the spotlight.

The Relay will end its journey in central Paris, highlighting some of its historical treasures, including the Nation-République-Bastille-Hôtel de Ville corridor, Invalides and the Manufacture des Gobelins.

To pay tribute to the history of France, a Flame will be lit in the capital at the start of the Relay, on 25 August, the day when the 12 Flames will be lit, to commemorate the 80^thanniversary of the Liberation of Paris.

Team Relays

To celebrate the different aspects of Para sports throughout France

Around 200 of the 1,000 Paralympic torch bearers will take part in six team relays that will each showcase one aspect of Para sports.

These six relays will each involve 24 people: a relay made up of key volunteers from the Paralympic federations, a relay of young Para athletes, two relays with former Paralympians, a relay of people involved in innovative actions, such as the programmes deployed or supported with the CPSF (Impact 2024), and a relay bringing together people who dedicate their lives to others with disabilities and people who work each day in the non-profit sector to help advance the rights of carers.

The “Paralympic Movement Volunteers” Relay: made up of key volunteers from the Paralympic federations.
The “Young Para Athletes” Relay: they are the future of the French Paralympic team and outstanding representatives because members of the public are sensitive to their voice.
The “Former Paralympians” Relay: to pay tribute to their achievements in the world of sport and ensure their visibility.
The “Innovative Actions” Relay: to showcase the people and structures that are involved in innovative actions, such as the programmes deployed or supported with the CPSF (Impact 2024).
The “Associations and Caregivers” Relay: made up of people who dedicate their lives to others with disabilities and people who work each day in the non-profit sector to help advance the rights of carers.

The Official Sponsors, Coca-Cola and the BPCE Group, will also help select participants for the Team Relays.

Discover the Torch Bearer uniform

The 11,000 Torch bearers – 10,000 Olympic Torch bearers and 1,000 Paralympic Torch bearers – will wear exactly the same uniform, designed by Decathlon, an Official Partner of Paris 2024. The only difference will be the rings on the uniforms of the Olympic torch bearers and the agitos on those of the Paralympic torch bearers. The uniforms will be unisex and white, symbolising peace, unity and fraternity among nations, which are core values of both Olympism and Paralympism.