“Today, you have to speak to the media in English because the Latin-language speakers are becoming fewer and fewer and there are more English speakers,” he said in French. “Until a decade ago, riders were able to master or become functional enough in Latin languages to communicate. But if you don’t speak English now, it’s a handicap.” Tour de France organizers may not like that development, but they have been aware of it for some time.

Pierre-Yves Thouault, the deputy Tour director, recently recalled that after joining A.S.O. in 1997, he had spent a year in London improving his English. The reason? The Tour was to start in Ireland in 1998. It has embraced its neighbors across the English Channel in recent years, too: The 2007 Tour started in London; next year’s start will be in Yorkshire.

Things have also changed for Union Cycliste Internationale, cycling’s governing body, which added English as a second official language last decade. Though the dual-language policy still exists — a sign informing teams about post-race doping controls, posted near the finish line in Tours last week, was in both languages — English has dominated in recent years. The U.C.I. presidential election this autumn will pit the current leader, the Irishman Pat McQuaid, against Brian Cookson, the president of British Cycling.

That trend mirrors the decline of French in multinational institutions like the United Nations and the European Union. French, once considered a language of diplomacy, is now the ninth-most widely spoken language in the world. But where there have been loud protests by French speakers that the United Nations has become more English-centric, expressing nostalgia for the past seems to be as far as most in cycling will go.

“Historically, the language of A.S.O. and U.C.I. was French, the biggest event in the world was in France and there were many more important small races here,” said Yvon Sanquer, the general manager of the French team Cofidis, who says that even he uses English to communicate with the few non-French riders on his team.

But those who know the passé composé from the plus-que-parfait still have plenty of value at the Tour. The race still takes place, after all, in France.

Not everyone here is comfortable in English, like José Luis Arrieta, the Movistar sport director. Last week, Arrieta, a Spaniard, was asked if he spoke English by a reporter whose Spanish is, at best, a work in progress.