Paris-Troyes en Champagne is a UCI-ranked one-day classic with more than a century of history. It went professional in 2007, but live television remained out of reach due to the expense associated with covering long-distance cycling events.

At Tour de France scale, that problem is solved with traditional broadcast solutions built around airborne HF relay systems and dedicated satellite infrastructure. For Paris-Troyes, Nicolas Fournier, founder of AVEO, an audiovisual production company based in Troyes, had to find another route.

“Because I held dual roles, as both a volunteer with the UV Aube cycling team and as someone looking for professional broadcast solutions, I could approach the problem from both sides,” Fournier explains. “The challenge was whether we could cover 180km of open road with a regional budget, without the kind of HF relay and satellite infrastructure used on the biggest races.”

Fournier has built the workflow incrementally since 2018, first using Aviwest cellular bonding to move live pictures from the course, then adding Starlink as a redundancy layer. More recently Blackmagic Replay replaced a vMix setup as the replay backbone. By 2026, the solution was robust enough that France Télévisions’ digital platform was able to carry the race for the first time.

Fournier invested in custom-equipped BMW motorcycles, each carrying a waterproof flight case housing camera, video encoding hardware, antennas and a dedicated power drawn from the bike itself. Blackmagic URSA Broadcast G2 cameras were chosen for the motorcycle positions after testing against alternatives from competitors.

“The deciding factor was ergonomic,” says Fournier. “With the stabilised Canon B4 broadcast lens the setup is front-heavy, so we needed a camera where the baseplate and eyepiece could be adjusted properly. I didn’t impose anything. The operators chose it, and as soon as they had the URSA, they said: that’s the one.”

The motorcycle crews are booked as pairs, driver and camera operator together, and Fournier works to keep continuity in those pairings year to year. “Operating a broadcast camera from the back of a motorcycle for four hours, through open roads, technical descents and peloton dynamics, demands physical endurance and situational awareness that take years to develop,” he adds.

A converted Mercedes Sprinter van provides the OB production, running a control and delivery solution designed around Blackmagic Design infrastructure. An ATEM Constellation 8K live production switcher handles vision mixing across four M/E banks and a Blackmagic Videohub 80×80 12G handles routing. 

For Paris-Troyes, the Sprinter gallery manages nine sources: two motorcycle cameras at the front and rear of the race, a helicopter with a Shotover B1 gyro-stabilised mount, a studio-configured URSA Broadcast G2 on a crane at the finish line, four PTZ cameras covering the final 500 metres and the post-race protocol. “We also have roving France 3 journalists providing five or six location duplex inserts across the parcours,” Fournier explains.

“The URSA Broadcast G2’s SDI return allows Fournier to shade the motorcycle cameras remotely via 4G using an RCP in the OB, meaning our bike operators can focus entirely on framing.”

Inside the Sprinter, five operators share the gallery space. Fournier directs the OB from the central position. His cutting style favours fast dissolves, managed manually via the T-bar versus lots of hard cuts. “I find a fast, instinctive dissolve much more pleasant than cut-cut-cut. When I watch back our replays, I prefer it that way.”

That live cut is only part of the production. Alongside the main programme feed, AVEO also needs to capture key race moments, turn around short highlights and play out sponsor and territorial content throughout the broadcast.

Blackmagic Replay replaced a vMix setup, providing a replay solution and a near live editing system on a single workstation. During the race, it provides slow-motion replays of crashes, attacks and sprints at the operator’s discretion packaged up in DaVinci Resolve using growing files recorded onto shared storage via HyperDeck recorders. It also allows the team to build a race summary assembled from footage captured across the production. 

The same Apple M4 workstation also functions as the primary media player for around pre-produced territorial marketing clips distributed across the four and half hour live broadcast, with a Blackmagic Media Player 10G connecting to the wider workflow.

The territorial marketing dimension is central to how Paris-Troyes funds its broadcast. Local authorities along the route finance the production in exchange for coverage of sites and landmarks within their communities, delivered either as pre-produced clips played out through Blackmagic Replay or as live helicopter aerials with live commentary. Using the ATEM SuperSource, Fournier holds the competition in one window while the marketing material plays alongside it, switching fully only when the race allows. 

During the 2026 edition, with the peloton strung out across a climb in the final hour, Fournier held a live helicopter aerial of the landscape in the left window of the SuperSource while the lead group’s motorcycle feed played in the right, the two images composited over a territorial sponsor’s graphical frame. 

Meanwhile, real-time GPS data from provider Octal, covering gaps between groups, rider speeds and kilometres remaining, are all fed into the ATEM via downstream key from a dedicated workstation.

Singal resilience remains the central challenge. Across 180km of French countryside, the motorcycles move through areas of inconsistent 4G coverage, changing terrain and weather. The helicopter provides one layer, staying connected from altitude when motorcycle signals are weaker at ground level. Starlink was added last year to bond alongside the Aviwest 4G modems, reducing gaps further. 

When no live image is available at all, Blackmagic Replay bridges the silence with highlights from earlier in the race. “Our commentary teams are experienced enough to work from Radio Tour audio, the race’s internal communications system, carrying information about breakaways, time gaps and incidents.” 

France Télévisions’ digital platform France.tv broadcast the Paris-Troyes en Champagne for the first time this year. Following a debrief with its teams, the partnership has already been renewed for 2027. “For other UCI-ranked races that sit outside the budgets of major tours, the Paris-Troyes model points to a more accessible way of producing live coverage at broadcast standard,” he concludes.