The 65th edition of Tour de France was held between 29 June and 23 July in 1978.
With his performance on the mountain stages (especially on the Puy de Dôme), Joop Zoetemelk seemed to be the slightly bigger favourite of the race. He led the general classification before the 20 stage, a 75 km long individual time trial.
Bernard Hinault was a better time trialist, he was already the fastest on the 59 km long 8th stage. He also won the 20th stage, took over the lead and won the Tour de France.
It was Bernard Hinault’s first Tour de France thriumph. In the subsequent half decade he won the race another four times. (1979, 1981, 1982, 1985)