Scroll down: The UCI World Tour will feature the first joint men’s and women’s event

The Australian Tour Down Under will be the first World Tour event to host men’s and women’s stages on the same course and same distance on the same day.

The 2027 season opener will be played from January 19 with a six-stage men’s competition, with a three-stage women’s competition opening on January 22.

In the year In 2018, the Adelaide-area event, the first in the world to offer equal prize money for both sexes, previously saw the women’s race run before the men’s race.

“The strength of our women’s peloton and our ability to do this is a great platform to reflect the growth and development of women’s cycling,” said Tour Down Under race director Carly Taylor.

In Europe, major races including Paris-Roubaix, Tour of Flanders and Tour de Suisse host men’s and women’s events on the same day, but over different distances and routes.

“The challenge given to us by the UCI (Union Cycliste Internationale) was to deliver a more intensive racing program and optimize the time the women’s teams spend in Australia,” race director Stuart O’Grady said.

“We saw it as an opportunity to do something different and bring both men’s and women’s racing together and finish off the final weekend of racing.”

The new schedule will reduce the gap between the two first season events in Australia for female drivers, the Cadel Evans Great Ocean Road Race in late January or early February.