The Ruban Jaune (English; Yellow Ribbon) is a cycling title created in 1936 by Henri Desgrange, awarded to the rider recording the fastest average speed in a professional cycling race or stage longer than 200 km. The name is thought is to have come from comparison with the Blue Riband accolade awarded to the passenger liner crossing the Atlantic Ocean in record time. Desgrange changed the colour to yellow to reflect the newsprint of L'Auto, the sports newspaper he edited. The current holder of the Ruban Jaune is Philippe Gilbert.

Paris–Tours is a French one-day classic road cycling race held every October from the outskirts of Paris to the cathedral city of Tours. It is a predominantly flat course through the Chevreuse and Loire valleys; the highest point is 200 m, at Le Gault-du-Perche. It is known as a "Sprinters' Classic" because it frequently ends in a bunch sprint at the finish, in Tours. For several decades the race arrived on the 2.7 km long Avenue de Grammont, one of cycling's best-known finishing straits, particularly renowned among sprinters. Since 2011 the finish was moved to a different location because a new tram line was built on the Avenue de Grammont.