National teams at the Tour de France (1930-1961)

8″ 1989 Greg LeMond vs Laurent Fignon 23″ 2007 Alberto Contador vs Cadel Evans 32″ 2006 Óscar Pereiro vs Andreas Klöden 38″ 1968 Jan Janssen vs Herman Van Springel 40″ 1987 Stephen Roche vs Pedro Delgado 48″ 1977 Bernard Thévenet vs Hennie Kuiper 54″ 2017 Chris Froome vs Rigoberto Urán 55″ 1964 Jacques Anquetil vs … Read more

In the early days of road cycling races, when the courses were over 300 km long or even longer and the riders sat in the saddle for a half a day (or even longer), it was usual, that the race started in the middle of the night or very early at dawn. It was the … Read more

Everyone, who followed Tour de France 2022 day by day, expected it, but after the last stage it’s finally official: the 109th Tour de France was the fastest edition ever. Overall winner  Jonas Vingegaard ( Jumbo-Visma) rode 3,350,1 km in 79h 33′ 20″, thus realising an overall speed of 42.457 km/h (26.381 mph).

Louis Trousselier (1881-1939), the winner of the 3rd Tour de France (1905) was an entertaining person, for sure. He even shouldn’t have been there, when he won the race, because his official leave from the French army ended days before.  But he stayed a bit longer and won the general classification of the Tour de … Read more

The 33rd Tour de France was held between 10th and 30th July 1939. This was the last Tour de France before the 2nd world war. The next edition was held 1947. Because of the tense political situation in Europe, Italy, Spain and Germany didn’t took part in the competition, which means, Gino Bartali couldn’t defend … Read more

Before Greg LeMond and Bernard Hinault on the top of Alpe d’Huez, there were André Leducq and Antonin Magne in Paris. Two dominant French riders from the first part of the 1930s, both Leducq (1930 and 1932) and Magne (1931 and 1934) won the Tour de France twice. In the very last stage of Tour … Read more

The first Tour de France without Henri Desgrange in charge since the creation of the event in 1903 didn’t go down well in the history of road cycling at all.   In 1937 Jacques Goddet was full in charge and with him came the first big change: it was the first time when gear change … Read more

In its more than 120-year-long history Tour de France, the most famous road cycling race of the world witnessed good time and bad time either. It had plenty of glourious moments, but also some shameful ones. Here are the four (arguably) most scandalous editions in the history of Tour de France . 1904 – an … Read more