Tour de France
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The Tour de France () is an annual men's multiple-stage bicycle race held primarily in France. It is the oldest and most prestigious of the three Grand Tours, which include the
Giro d'Italia The Giro d'Italia (; ), also known simply as the Giro, is an annual stage race, multiple-stage bicycle racing, bicycle race primarily held in Italy, while also starting in, or passing through, other countries. The first race was organized in 19 ...
and the
Vuelta a España The Vuelta a España (; ) is an annual stage race, multi-stage bicycle racing, bicycle race primarily held in Spain, while also occasionally making passes through nearby countries. Inspired by the success of the Tour de France and the Giro d'Ital ...
. The race was first organized in 1903 to increase sales for the newspaper '' L'Auto'' (which was an ancestor of ''
L'Équipe ''L'Équipe'' (, French for "the team") is a French nationwide daily newspaper devoted to sport, owned by Éditions Philippe Amaury. The paper is noted for coverage of association football, rugby, motorsport, and cycling. Its predecessor, '' ...
'') and has been held annually since, except when it was not held from 1915 to 1918 and 1940 to 1946 due to the two World Wars. As the Tour gained prominence and popularity, the race was lengthened and gained more international participation. The Tour is a
UCI World Tour The UCI WorldTour is the premier men's elite road cycling tour, sitting above the UCI ProSeries and various regional UCI Continental Circuits. It refers to both the tour of 38 events and, until 2019, an annual ranking system based upon perfor ...
event, which means that the teams that compete in the race are mostly UCI WorldTeams, with the exception of the teams that the organizers invite. Traditionally, the bulk of the race is held in July. While the route changes each year, the format of the race stays the same and includes time trials, passage through the mountain's chains of the
Pyrenees The Pyrenees are a mountain range straddling the border of France and Spain. They extend nearly from their union with the Cantabrian Mountains to Cap de Creus on the Mediterranean coast, reaching a maximum elevation of at the peak of Aneto. ...
and the
Alps The Alps () are some of the highest and most extensive mountain ranges in Europe, stretching approximately across eight Alpine countries (from west to east): Monaco, France, Switzerland, Italy, Liechtenstein, Germany, Austria and Slovenia. ...
, and, from 1975 to 2023, a finish on the
Champs-Élysées The Avenue des Champs-Élysées (, ; ) is an Avenue (landscape), avenue in the 8th arrondissement of Paris, France, long and wide, running between the Place de la Concorde in the east and the Place Charles de Gaulle in the west, where the Arc ...
in Paris. The modern editions of the Tour de France consist of 21 day-long stages over a 23- or 24-day period and cover approximately total. The race alternates between clockwise and counterclockwise circuits. Twenty to twenty-three teams of eight riders usually compete. All of the stages are timed to the finish, and the riders' times are compounded with their previous stage times. The rider with the lowest cumulative time is the leader of the race and wears the yellow jersey. While the general classification attracts the most attention, there are other contests held within the Tour: the points classification for the sprinters (green jersey), the mountains classification for the climbers (polka-dot jersey), young rider classification for riders under the age of 26 (white jersey), and the team classification, based on the first three finishers from each team on each stage. Achieving a stage win also provides prestige, often accomplished by a team's sprint specialist or a rider taking part in a breakaway. A similar race for women was held under various names between 1984 and 2009. Following criticism by campaigners and the professional women's peloton, a one/two-day race ( La Course by Le Tour de France) was held between 2014 and 2021. The first Tour de France Femmes was held in
2022 The year began with another wave in the COVID-19 pandemic, with SARS-CoV-2 Omicron variant, Omicron spreading rapidly and becoming the dominant variant of the SARS-CoV-2 virus worldwide. Tracking a decrease in cases and deaths, 2022 saw ...
.


History

Preset = TimeVertical_OneBar_UnitYear ImageSize = width:180 height:2000 PlotArea = bottom:350 left:40 Period = from:1903 till:2025 ScaleMajor = start:1905 increment:5 ScaleMinor = start:1903 increment:1 TimeAxis = order:reverse Colors = id:canvas value:rgb(0.976,0.976,0.976) id:France value:rgb(0.96,0.96,0.3) legend:France id:Belgium value:rgb(1,0.5,1) legend:Belgium id:Spain value:rgb(1,0.3,0.3) legend:Spain id:Italy value:rgb(0.1,0.95,0.2) legend:Italy id:GBR value:rgb(0.8,0.4,0.8) legend:United_Kingdom id:Luxembourg value:rgb(0,0.8,0.8) legend:Luxembourg id:Denmark value:rgb(0.7,0.9,0.5) legend:Denmark id:Slovenia value:rgb(0.2,0.7,0.4) legend:Slovenia id:US value:rgb(0.5,0.5,1) legend:United_States id:Netherlands value:rgb(0.9,0.5,0.2) legend:Netherlands id:Switzerland value:rgb(0.8,0.8,1) legend:Switzerland id:Australia value:rgb(0.7,0.7,0.8) legend:Australia id:Colombia value:rgb(1,1,0) legend:Colombia id:Germany value:rgb(1,0.6,0.6) legend:Germany id:Ireland value:rgb(0.1,0.6,0.3) legend:Ireland id:War value:rgb(1,1,1) id:None value:rgb(1,1,1) id:linemark value:gray(0.8) id:linemark2 value:gray(0.9) id:legend value:gray(0.5) BackgroundColors = canvas:canvas Legend = orientation:vertical columns:1 top:278 left: 45 PlotData = shift:(20,0) mark:(line,linemark) anchor:till from:1903 till:1904 text:" Maurice Garin" color:France from:1904 till:1905 text:" Henri Cornet" color:France from:1905 till:1906 text:" Louis Trousselier" color:France from:1906 till:1907 text:" René Pottier" color:France from:1907 till:1908 text:"
Lucien Petit-Breton Lucien Georges Mazan (18 October 1882 – 20 December 1917), known by the pseudonym Lucien Petit-Breton (), was a French racing cyclist best known as the first two-time winner of the Tour de France. He was born in Plessé, Loire-Atlantique ...
" color:France from:1908 till:1909 text:"Lucien Petit-Breton 2" color:France from:1909 till:1910 text:"
François Faber François Faber (; 26 January 1887 – 9 May 1915) was a Luxembourgish racing cyclist. He was born in France. He was the first foreigner to win the Tour de France in 1909, and his record of winning 5 consecutive stages still stands. He died in ...
" color:Luxembourg from:1910 till:1911 text:" Octave Lapize" color:France from:1911 till:1912 text:" Gustave Garrigou" color:France from:1912 till:1913 text:" Odile Defraye" color:Belgium from:1913 till:1914 text:" Philippe Thys" color:Belgium from:1914 till:1915 text:"Philippe Thys 2" color:Belgium from:1915 till:1919 text:"
World War I World War I or the First World War (28 July 1914 – 11 November 1918), also known as the Great War, was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War I, Allies (or Entente) and the Central Powers. Fighting to ...
" color:War shift:(30,17) from:1919 till:1920 text:" Firmin Lambot" color:Belgium from:1920 till:1921 text:"Philippe Thys 3" color:Belgium from:1921 till:1922 text:" Léon Scieur" color:Belgium from:1922 till:1923 text:"Firmin Lambot 2" color:Belgium from:1923 till:1924 text:"
Henri Pélissier Henri Pélissier (; 22 January 1889 – 1 May 1935) was a French Bicycle racing, racing cyclist from Paris and champion of the 1923 Tour de France, 1923 Tour de France. In addition to his 29 career victories, he was known for his long-standing feu ...
" color:France from:1924 till:1925 text:" Ottavio Bottecchia" color:Italy from:1925 till:1926 text:"Ottavio Bottecchia 2" color:Italy from:1926 till:1927 text:" Lucien Buysse" color:Belgium from:1927 till:1928 text:" Nicolas Frantz" color:Luxembourg from:1928 till:1929 text:"Nicolas Frantz 2" color:Luxembourg from:1929 till:1930 text:" Maurice de Waele" color:Belgium from:1930 till:1931 text:"
André Leducq André Leducq (; 27 February 1904 – 18 June 1980) was a French cyclist who won the 1930 and 1932 Tour de France, Tours de France. He also won a gold medal at the 1924 Summer Olympics in the team road race event and the 1928 Paris–Roubaix ...
" color:France from:1931 till:1932 text:" Antonin Magne" color:France from:1932 till:1933 text:"André Leducq 2" color:France from:1933 till:1934 text:" Georges Speicher" color:France from:1934 till:1935 text:"Antonin Magne 2" color:France from:1935 till:1936 text:" Romain Maes" color:Belgium from:1936 till:1937 text:" Sylvère Maes" color:Belgium from:1937 till:1938 text:" Roger Lapébie" color:France from:1938 till:1939 text:"
Gino Bartali Gino Bartali, (; 18 July 1914 – 5 May 2000), nicknamed Gino the Pious and (in Italy) Ginettaccio, was a champion road cyclist. He was the most renowned Italian cyclist before the Second World War, having won the Giro d'Italia twice, in ...
" color:Italy from:1939 till:1940 text:"Sylvère Maes 2" color:Belgium from:1940 till:1947 text:"
World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...
" color:War shift:(30, 35) from:1947 till:1948 text:" Jean Robic" color:France from:1948 till:1949 text:"Gino Bartali 2" color:Italy from:1949 till:1950 text:" Fausto Coppi" color:Italy mark:(line,linemark2) from:1950 till:1951 text:" Ferdinand Kubler" color:Switzerland from:1951 till:1952 text:" Hugo Koblet" color:Switzerland from:1952 till:1953 text:"Fausto Coppi 2" color:Italy from:1953 till:1954 text:" Louison Bobet" color:France from:1954 till:1955 text:"Louison Bobet 2" color:France from:1955 till:1956 text:"Louison Bobet 3" color:France from:1956 till:1957 text:" Roger Walkowiak" color:France from:1957 till:1958 text:"
Jacques Anquetil Jacques Anquetil (; 8 January 1934 – 18 November 1987) was a French road racing cyclist and the first cyclist to win the Tour de France five times, in 1957 and from 1961 to 1964. He stated before the 1961 Tour that he would gain the ye ...
" color:France from:1958 till:1959 text:" Charly Gaul" color:Luxembourg from:1959 till:1960 text:" Federico Bahamontes" color:Spain from:1960 till:1961 text:" Gastone Nencini" color:Italy from:1961 till:1962 text:"Jacques Anquetil 2" color:France from:1962 till:1963 text:"Jacques Anquetil 3" color:France from:1963 till:1964 text:"Jacques Anquetil 4" color:France from:1964 till:1965 text:"Jacques Anquetil 5" color:France from:1965 till:1966 text:" Felice Gimondi" color:Italy from:1966 till:1967 text:" Lucien Aimar" color:France from:1967 till:1968 text:" Roger Pingeon" color:France from:1968 till:1969 text:"
Jan Janssen Johannes Adrianus "Jan" Janssen (born 19 May 1940) is a Dutch former professional cyclist. He was UCI Road World Championships – Men's road race, world champion and winner of the Tour de France and the Vuelta a España, the first Dutch rider ...
" color:Netherlands from:1969 till:1970 text:"
Eddy Merckx Édouard Louis Joseph, Baron Merckx (born 17 June 1945), known as Eddy Merckx (, ), is a Belgian former professional road and track cyclist racer who is the most successful rider in the history of competitive cycling. His victories include an ...
" color:Belgium from:1970 till:1971 text:"Eddy Merckx 2" color:Belgium from:1971 till:1972 text:"Eddy Merckx 3" color:Belgium from:1972 till:1973 text:"Eddy Merckx 4" color:Belgium from:1973 till:1974 text:" Luis Ocaña" color:Spain from:1974 till:1975 text:"Eddy Merckx 5" color:Belgium from:1975 till:1976 text:" Bernard Thévenet" color:France from:1976 till:1977 text:" Lucien van Impe" color:Belgium from:1977 till:1978 text:"Bernard Thévenet 2" color:France from:1978 till:1979 text:"
Bernard Hinault Bernard Hinault (; born 14 November 1954) is a French former professional road bicycle racing, road cyclist. With 147 professional victories, including five times the Tour de France, he is often named among the greatest cyclists of all time. In ...
" color:France from:1979 till:1980 text:"Bernard Hinault 2" color:France from:1980 till:1981 text:" Joop Zoetemelk" color:Netherlands from:1981 till:1982 text:"Bernard Hinault 3" color:France from:1982 till:1983 text:"Bernard Hinault 4" color:France from:1983 till:1984 text:"
Laurent Fignon Laurent Patrick Fignon (; 12 August 1960 – 31 August 2010) was a French professional road bicycle racer who won the Tour de France in 1983 and 1984, as well as the Giro d'Italia in 1989. He held the title of FICP World No. 1 in 1989. Fignon came ...
" color:France from:1984 till:1985 text:"Laurent Fignon 2" color:France from:1985 till:1986 text:"Bernard Hinault 5" color:France from:1986 till:1987 text:"
Greg LeMond Gregory James LeMond (born June 26, 1961) is an American former Road bicycle racing, road racing cyclist. He won the Tour de France thrice and the UCI Road World Championships – Men's road race, Road Race World Championship twice, becoming t ...
" color:US from:1987 till:1988 text:" Stephen Roche" color:Ireland from:1988 till:1989 text:" Pedro Delgado" color:Spain from:1989 till:1990 text:"Greg LeMond 2" color:US from:1990 till:1991 text:"Greg LeMond 3" color:US from:1991 till:1992 text:"
Miguel Induráin Miguel Induráin Larraya (; born 16 July 1964) is a retired Spanish road racing cyclist. Induráin won five Tours de France from 1991 Tour de France, 1991 to 1995 Tour de France, 1995, the fourth, and last, to win five times, and the only five- ...
" color:Spain from:1992 till:1993 text:"Miguel Induráin 2" color:Spain from:1993 till:1994 text:"Miguel Induráin 3" color:Spain from:1994 till:1995 text:"Miguel Induráin 4" color:Spain from:1995 till:1996 text:"Miguel Induráin 5" color:Spain from:1996 till:1997 text:"
Bjarne Riis Bjarne Lykkegård Riis (; born 3 April 1964), nicknamed ''The Eagle from Herning'' (), is a Denmark, Danish former professional road bicycle racer who won the 1996 Tour de France. For many years he was the owner and later manager of the Oleg Tink ...
" color:Denmark from:1997 till:1998 text:"
Jan Ullrich Jan Ullrich (; born 2 December 1973) is a German former professional road bicycle racer. Ullrich won gold and silver medals in the 2000 Summer Olympics in Sydney, Australia, Sydney. He won the 1999 Vuelta a España and the HEW Cyclassics in fro ...
" color:Germany from:1998 till:1999 text:" Marco Pantani" color:Italy from:1999 till:2006 text:" No winner" color:None shift:(30, 35) from:2006 till:2007 text:" Óscar Pereiro" color:Spain from:2007 till:2008 text:" Alberto Contador" color:Spain from:2008 till:2009 text:" Carlos Sastre" color:Spain from:2009 till:2010 text:"Alberto Contador 2" color:Spain from:2010 till:2011 text:" Andy Schleck" color:Luxembourg from:2011 till:2012 text:" Cadel Evans" color:Australia from:2012 till:2013 text:"
Bradley Wiggins Sir Bradley Marc Wiggins (born 28 April 1980) is a British former professional Road bicycle racing, road and track cycling, track racing cyclist, who competed professionally between 2001 and 2016. He began his cycling career on the track, but ...
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Origins

The Tour de France was created in 1903. The roots of the Tour de France trace back to the emergence of two rival sports newspapers in the country. On one hand was ''
Le Vélo ''Le Vélo'' was the leading French sports newspaper from its inception on 1 December 1892 until it ceased publication in 1904. Mixing sports reporting with news and political comment, it achieved a circulation of 80,000 copies a day. Its use o ...
'', the first and the largest daily sports newspaper in France, on the other was '' L'Auto'', which had been set up by journalists and businesspeople including Comte
Jules-Albert de Dion Marquis Jules Félix Philippe Albert de Dion de Wandonne (; 9 March 185619 August 1946) was a French pioneer of the automobile industry. He invented a steam-powered car and used it to win the world's first auto race, but his vehicle was ...
, Adolphe Clément, and Édouard Michelin in 1899. The rival paper emerged following disagreements over the Dreyfus Affair. De Dion, Clément and Michelin were particularly concerned with ''Le Vélo''—which reported more than cycling—because its financial backer was one of their commercial rivals, the Darracq company. De Dion believed ''Le Vélo'' gave Darracq too much attention and him too little. De Dion was rich and could afford to indulge his whims. The new newspaper appointed
Henri Desgrange Henri Desgrange (; 31 January 1865 – 16 August 1940) was a French cycle sport, bicycle racer and Sports journalism, sports journalist. He set twelve world track cycling records, including the hour record of on 11 May 1893. He was the first o ...
as the editor. He was a prominent cyclist and owner with Victor Goddet of the velodrome at the
Parc des Princes The Parc des Princes (, ) is an all-seater stadium, all-seater football stadium in Paris, France. It is located in the south-west of the French capital, inside the 16th arrondissement of Paris, 16th arrondissement, near the Stade Jean-Bouin (P ...
. ''L'Auto'' sales were lower than the rival it was intended to surpass, leading to a crisis meeting on 20 November 1902 on the middle floor of ''L'Auto''s office at 10 Rue du Faubourg Montmartre, Paris. The last to speak was the chief cycling journalist, a 26-year-old named
Géo Lefèvre Géo Lefèvre (1877–1961) was a French sports journalist and the originator of the idea for the Tour de France. He suggested the idea for the Tour at a meeting with Henri Desgrange, editor of the daily newspaper '' L'Auto'' as a way to boost ci ...
. Lefèvre suggested a six-day race of the sort popular on the track but all around France. Long-distance cycle races were a popular means to sell more newspapers, but nothing of the length that Lefèvre suggested had been attempted.Giffard was the first to suggest a race that lasted several days, new to cycling but established practice in car racing. Unlike other cycle races, it would also be run largely without pacers.


The first Tour de France (1903)

The first Tour de France was staged in 1903. The plan was a five-stage race from 31 May to 5 July, starting in Paris and stopping in Lyon, Marseille, Bordeaux, and Nantes before returning to Paris. Toulouse was added later to break the long haul across
southern France Southern France, also known as the south of France or colloquially in French as , is a geographical area consisting of the regions of France that border the Atlantic Ocean south of the Marais Poitevin,Louis Papy, ''Le midi atlantique'', Atlas e ...
from the Mediterranean to the Atlantic. Stages would go through the night and finish next afternoon, with rest days before riders set off again. But this proved too daunting and the costs too great for most and only 15 competitors had entered. Desgrange had never been wholly convinced and he came close to dropping the idea. Instead, he cut the length to 19 days, changed the dates to 1 to 19 July, and offered a daily allowance to those who averaged at least on all the stages, equivalent to what a rider would have expected to earn each day had he worked in a factory. He also cut the entry fee from 20 to 10 francs and set the first prize at 12,000 francs and the prize for each day's winner at 3,000 francs. The winner would thereby win six times what most workers earned in a year. That attracted between 60 and 80 entrants – the higher number may have included serious inquiries and some who dropped out – among them not just professionals but amateurs, some unemployed, and some simply adventurous. The first Tour de France started almost outside the Café Reveil-Matin at the junction of the Melun and Corbeil roads in the village of Montgeron. It was waved away by the starter, Georges Abran, at 3:16 p.m. on 1 July 1903. ''L'Auto'' hadn't featured the race on its front page that morning.L'Auto preferred to concentrate on the Coupe Gordon-Bennett car race, even though it wasn't to start for another 48 hours. The choice reflects not only that the Tour de France was an unknown quantity – only after the first race had finished did it establish a reputation – but it hints at Desgrange's uncertainty. His position as editor depended on raising sales. That would happen if the Tour succeeded. But the paper and his employers would lose much money if it didn't. Desgrange preferred to keep a distance. He didn't drop the flag at the start and he didn't follow the riders. Reporting was left to Lefèvre, whose idea it had been, who followed the race by bike and by train. Desgrange showed a personal interest in his race only when it looked a success. Among the competitors were the eventual winner, Maurice Garin, his well-built rival Hippolyte Aucouturier, the German favourite Josef Fischer, and a collection of adventurers, including one competing as "Samson".The use of false and often colourful names was not unusual. It reflected not only the daring of the enterprise but the slight scandal still associated with riding bicycle races, enough that some preferred to use a false name. The first city-to-city race, from Paris to Rouen, included many made-up names or simply initials. The first woman to finish had entered as "Miss America", despite not being American. Many riders dropped out of the race after completing the initial stages, as the physical effort the tour required was just too much. Only a mere 24 entrants remained at the end of the fourth stage. The race finished on the edge of Paris at Ville d'Avray, outside the Restaurant du Père Auto, before a ceremonial ride into Paris and several laps of the Parc des Princes. Garin dominated the race, winning the first and last two stages, at . The last rider, Arsène Millocheau, finished 64h 47m 22s behind him. ''L'Auto'''s mission was accomplished, as circulation of the publication doubled throughout the race, making the race something much larger than Desgrange had ever hoped for.


1904–1939

Such was the passion that the first Tour created in spectators and riders that Desgrange said the 1904 Tour de France would be the last. Cheating was rife, and riders were beaten up by rival fans as they neared the top of the col de la République, sometimes called the col du Grand Bois, outside St-Étienne. The leading riders, including the winner Maurice Garin, were disqualified, though it took the Union Vélocipèdique de France until 30 November to make the decision. McGann says the UVF waited so long "...well aware of the passions aroused by the race." Desgrange's opinion of the fighting and cheating showed in the headline of his reaction in ''L'Auto'': THE END. By the following spring, Desgrange was planning a longer Tour with 11 stages instead of 6, and this time all the stages would take place during daylight hours to make cheating more noticeable. In 1905, stages started between 3:00 AM and 7:30 AM. The race captivated audiences and returned after a hiatus during World War I, continuing to grow in popularity. Desgrange and his Tour invented bicycle stage racing. Desgrange experimented with different ways of judging the winner. Initially he used total accumulated time (as used in the modern Tour de France) but from 1906 to 1912 by points for placings each day.The formula in 1905 was a combination of both time and points. Riders had points deducted for each five minutes lost. Desgrange saw problems in judging both by time and by points. By time, a rider coping with a mechanical problem—which the rules insisted he repair alone—could lose so much time that it cost him the race. Equally, riders could finish so separated that time gained or lost on one or two days could decide the whole race. Judging the race by points removed over-influential time differences but discouraged competitors from riding hard. It made no difference whether they finished fast or slow or separated by seconds or hours, so they were inclined to ride together at a relaxed pace until close to the line, only then disputing the final placings that would give them points. The format changed over time. The Tour originally ran around the perimeter of France. Cycling was an endurance sport, and the organisers realised the sales they would achieve by creating supermen of the competitors. Night riding was dropped after the second Tour in 1904, when there had been persistent cheating when judges could not see riders. That reduced the daily and overall distance, but the emphasis remained on endurance. The first mountain stages (in the
Pyrenees The Pyrenees are a mountain range straddling the border of France and Spain. They extend nearly from their union with the Cantabrian Mountains to Cap de Creus on the Mediterranean coast, reaching a maximum elevation of at the peak of Aneto. ...
) appeared in 1910. Early tours had long multi-day stages, with the format settling on 15 stages from 1910 until 1924. After this, stages were gradually shortened, such that by 1936 there were as many as three stages in a single day. Desgrange initially preferred to see the Tour as a race of individuals. The first Tours were open to whoever wanted to compete. Most riders were in teams that looked after them. The private entrants were called ''touriste-routiers—''tourists of the road—from 1923 and were allowed to take part provided they make no demands on the organisers. Some of the Tour's most colourful characters have been touriste-routiers. One finished each day's race and then performed acrobatic tricks in the street to raise the price of a hotel. Until 1925, Desgrange forbade team members from pacing each other. The
1927 Events January * January 1 – The British Broadcasting ''Company'' becomes the BBC, British Broadcasting ''Corporation'', when its Royal Charter of incorporation takes effect. John Reith, 1st Baron Reith, John Reith becomes the first ...
and
1928 Events January * January – British bacteriologist Frederick Griffith reports the results of Griffith's experiment, indirectly demonstrating that DNA is the genetic material. * January 1 – Eastern Bloc emigration and defection: Boris B ...
Tours, however, consisted mainly of team time-trials, an unsuccessful experiment which sought to avoid a proliferation of sprint finishes on flat stages. Until 1930, Desgrange demanded that riders mend their bicycles without help and that they use the same bicycle from start to end. Exchanging a damaged bicycle for another was allowed only in
1923 In Greece, this year contained only 352 days as 13 days was skipped to achieve the calendrical switch from Julian to Gregorian Calendar. It happened there that Wednesday, 15 February ''(Julian Calendar)'' was followed by Thursday, 1 March ' ...
. Desgrange stood against the use of multiple gears, and for many years insisted riders use wooden rims, fearing the heat of braking while coming down mountains would melt the glue that held the tires on metal rims (however, they were finally allowed in 1937). By the end of the 1920s, Desgrange believed he could not beat what he believed were the underhand tactics of bike factories. When in 1929 the Alcyon team contrived to get Maurice De Waele to win even though he was sick, he said, "My race has been won by a corpse". In 1930, Desgrange again attempted to take control of the Tour from teams, insisting competitors enter in national teams rather than trade teams and that competitors ride plain yellow bicycles that he would provide, without a maker's name. There was no place for individuals in the post-1930s teams, and so Desgrange created regional teams, generally from France, to take in riders who would not otherwise have qualified. The original touriste-routiers mostly disappeared, but some were absorbed into regional teams. Desgrange died at home on the Mediterranean coast on 16 August 1940. The race was taken over by his deputy, Jacques Goddet. The Tour was again disrupted by War after 1939, and did not return until
1947 It was the first year of the Cold War, which would last until 1991, ending with the dissolution of the Soviet Union. Events January * January–February – Winter of 1946–47 in the United Kingdom: The worst snowfall in the country i ...
.


1947–1969

In 1944, ''L'Auto'' was closed—its doors nailed shut—and its belongings, including the Tour, sequestrated by the state for publishing articles too close to the Germans.Libération, France, 4 July 2003. Rights to the Tour were therefore owned by the government. Jacques Goddet was allowed to publish another daily sports paper, ''L'Équipe'', but there was a rival candidate to run the Tour: a consortium of ''Sports'' and ''Miroir Sprint''. Each organised a candidate race. ''L'Équipe'' and ''Le Parisien Libéré'' had La Course du Tour de France, while ''Sports'' and ''Miroir Sprint'' had La Ronde de France. Both were five stages, the longest the government would allow because of shortages. ''L'Équipe'''s race was better organised and appealed more to the public because it featured national teams that had been successful before the war, when French cycling was at a high. ''L'Équipe'' was given the right to organise the 1947 Tour de France. However, ''L'Équipe''s finances were never sound, and Goddet accepted an advance by Émilion Amaury, who had supported his bid to run the postwar Tour. Amaury was a newspaper magnate whose sole condition was that his sports editor, Félix Lévitan, should join Goddet for the Tour. The two worked together—with Goddet running the sporting side, and Lévitan the financial. On the Tour's return, the format of the race settled on between 20 and 25 stages. Most stages would last one day, but the scheduling of 'split' stages continued well into the 1980s.
1953 Events January * January 6 – The Asian Socialist Conference opens in Rangoon, Burma. * January 12 – Estonian émigrés found a Estonian government-in-exile, government-in-exile in Oslo. * January 14 ** Marshal Josip Broz Tito ...
saw the introduction of the Green Jersey 'Points' competition. National teams contested the Tour until 1961. The teams were of different sizes. Some nations had more than one team, and some were mixed in with others to make up the number. National teams caught the public imagination but had a snag: that riders might normally have been in rival trade teams the rest of the season. The loyalty of riders was sometimes questionable, within and between teams. Sponsors were always unhappy about releasing their riders into anonymity for the biggest race of the year, as riders in national teams wore the colours of their country and a small cloth panel on their chest that named the team for which they normally rode. The situation became critical at the start of the 1960s. Sales of bicycles had fallen, and bicycle factories were closing. There was a risk, the trade said, that the industry would die if factories were not allowed the publicity of the Tour de France. The Tour returned to trade teams in 1962. In the same year, Émilion Amaury, owner of ''le Parisien Libéré'', became financially involved in the Tour. He made Félix Lévitan co-organizer of the Tour, and it was decided that Levitan would focus on the financial issues, while Jacques Goddet was put in charge of sporting issues. The Tour de France was meant for professional cyclists, but in 1961 the organisation started the Tour de l'Avenir, the amateur version. Twice, in
1949 Events January * January 1 – A United Nations-sponsored ceasefire brings an end to the Indo-Pakistani War of 1947. The war results in a stalemate and the division of Kashmir, which still continues as of 2025 * January 2 – Luis ...
and
1952 Events January–February * January 26 – Cairo Fire, Black Saturday in Kingdom of Egypt, Egypt: Rioters burn Cairo's central business district, targeting British and upper-class Egyptian businesses. * February 6 ** Princess Elizabeth, ...
, Italian rider Fausto Coppi won the Giro d'Italia and the Tour de France in the same year, the first rider to do so. Louison Bobet was the first great French rider of the post-war period and the first rider to win the Tour in three successive years,
1953 Events January * January 6 – The Asian Socialist Conference opens in Rangoon, Burma. * January 12 – Estonian émigrés found a Estonian government-in-exile, government-in-exile in Oslo. * January 14 ** Marshal Josip Broz Tito ...
,
1954 Events January * January 3 – The Italian broadcaster RAI officially begins transmitting. * January 7 – Georgetown–IBM experiment: The first public demonstration of a machine translation system is held in New York, at the head ...
and 1955.
Jacques Anquetil Jacques Anquetil (; 8 January 1934 – 18 November 1987) was a French road racing cyclist and the first cyclist to win the Tour de France five times, in 1957 and from 1961 to 1964. He stated before the 1961 Tour that he would gain the ye ...
became the first cyclist to win the Tour de France five times, in
1957 Events January * January 1 – The Saarland joins West Germany. * January 3 – Hamilton Watch Company introduces the first electric watch. * January 5 – South African player Russell Endean becomes the first batsman to be Dismissal (cricke ...
and from 1961 to
1964 Events January * January 1 – The Federation of Rhodesia and Nyasaland is dissolved. * January 5 – In the first meeting between leaders of the Roman Catholic and Orthodox churches since the fifteenth century, Pope Paul VI and Patria ...
. He stated before the 1961 Tour that he would gain the yellow jersey on day one and wear it all through the tour, a tall order with two previous winners in the field— Charly Gaul and Federico Bahamontes—but he did it. His victories in stage races such as the Tour were built on an exceptional ability to ride alone against the clock in
individual time trial An individual time trial (ITT) is a road bicycle race in which cyclists race alone against the clock (in French: ''contre la montre'' – literally "against the watch", in Italian: ''tappa a cronometro'' "stopwatch stage"). There are also trac ...
stages, which lent him the name ''"Monsieur Chrono"''. Anquetil enjoyed a rivalry with Raymond Poulidor, who was known as "''The Eternal Second''", because he never won the Tour, despite finishing in second place three times, and in third place five times (including his final Tour at the age of 40). Doping had become a serious problem, culminating in the death of Tom Simpson in
1967 Events January * January 1 – Canada begins a year-long celebration of the 100th anniversary of Canadian Confederation, Confederation, featuring the Expo 67 World's Fair. * January 6 – Vietnam War: United States Marine Corps and Army of ...
, after which riders went on strike, although the organisers suspected sponsors provoked them. The
Union Cycliste Internationale The Union Cycliste Internationale (; UCI; ) is the world governing body for sports cycling and oversees international competitive cycling events. The UCI is based in Aigle, Switzerland. The UCI issues racing licenses to riders and enforces di ...
introduced limits to daily and overall distances, imposed rest days, and tests were introduced for riders. It was then impossible to follow the frontiers, and the Tour increasingly zig-zagged across the country, sometimes with unconnected days' races linked by train, while still maintaining some sort of loop. The Tour returned to national teams for 1967 and
1968 Events January–February * January 1968, January – The I'm Backing Britain, I'm Backing Britain campaign starts spontaneously. * January 5 – Prague Spring: Alexander Dubček is chosen as leader of the Communist Party of Cze ...
as "an experiment". The Tour returned to trade teams in 1969 with a suggestion that national teams could come back every few years, but this has not happened since.


1969–1987

In the early 1970s, the race was dominated by
Eddy Merckx Édouard Louis Joseph, Baron Merckx (born 17 June 1945), known as Eddy Merckx (, ), is a Belgian former professional road and track cyclist racer who is the most successful rider in the history of competitive cycling. His victories include an ...
, who won the General Classification five times, the Mountains Classification twice, the Points Classification three times and held the record for the most stage victories (34) until overtaken by
Mark Cavendish Sir Mark Simon Cavendish (born 21 May 1985) is a Manx people, Manx retired professional cyclist. As a Track cycling, track cyclist he specialised in the Madison (cycling), madison, points race, and scratch race disciplines; as a road racer he ...
in 2024. Merckx's dominating style earned him the nickname "The Cannibal". In 1969, he already had a commanding lead when he launched a long-distance solo attack in the mountains which none of the other elite riders could answer, resulting in an eventual winning margin of nearly eighteen minutes. In
1973 Events January * January 1 – The United Kingdom, the Republic of Ireland and Denmark 1973 enlargement of the European Communities, enter the European Economic Community, which later becomes the European Union. * January 14 - The 16-0 19 ...
he did not win because he did not enter the Tour; instead, his great rival Luis Ocaña won. Merckx's winning streak came to an end when he finished 2nd to Bernard Thévenet in
1975 It was also declared the ''International Women's Year'' by the United Nations and the European Architectural Heritage Year by the Council of Europe. Events January * January 1 – Watergate scandal (United States): John N. Mitchell, H. R. ...
. During this era, race director Felix Lévitan began to recruit additional sponsors, sometimes accepting prizes in kind if he could not get cash. In
1975 It was also declared the ''International Women's Year'' by the United Nations and the European Architectural Heritage Year by the Council of Europe. Events January * January 1 – Watergate scandal (United States): John N. Mitchell, H. R. ...
, the polka-dot jersey was introduced for the winner of the Mountains Classification. This same year Levitan also introduced the finish of the Tour at the Avenue des
Champs-Élysées The Avenue des Champs-Élysées (, ; ) is an Avenue (landscape), avenue in the 8th arrondissement of Paris, France, long and wide, running between the Place de la Concorde in the east and the Place Charles de Gaulle in the west, where the Arc ...
. Since then, this stage has been largely ceremonial and is generally only contested as a prestigious sprinters' stage. (See 'Notable Stages' below for examples of non-ceremonial finishes to this stage.) Occasionally, a rider will be given the honor of leading the rest of the
peloton In a road Cycle sport, bicycle race, the peloton (, originally meaning ) is the main group or pack of riders. Riders in a group save energy by riding close (drafting (racing), drafting or slipstreaming) to (particularly behind) other riders. The ...
onto the circuit finish in their final Tour, as was the case for Jens Voigt and Sylvain Chavanel, among others. From the late 1970s and into the early 1980s, the Tour was dominated by Frenchman
Bernard Hinault Bernard Hinault (; born 14 November 1954) is a French former professional road bicycle racing, road cyclist. With 147 professional victories, including five times the Tour de France, he is often named among the greatest cyclists of all time. In ...
, who would become the third rider to win five times. Hinault was defeated by Joop Zoetemelk in
1980 Events January * January 4 – U.S. President Jimmy Carter proclaims a United States grain embargo against the Soviet Union, grain embargo against the USSR with the support of the European Commission. * January 6 – Global Positioning Sys ...
when he withdrew, and only once in his Tour de France career was he soundly defeated, and this was by
Laurent Fignon Laurent Patrick Fignon (; 12 August 1960 – 31 August 2010) was a French professional road bicycle racer who won the Tour de France in 1983 and 1984, as well as the Giro d'Italia in 1989. He held the title of FICP World No. 1 in 1989. Fignon came ...
in
1984 Events January * January 1 – The Bornean Sultanate of Brunei gains full independence from the United Kingdom, having become a British protectorate in 1888. * January 7 – Brunei becomes the sixth member of the Association of Southeas ...
. In 1986, Hinault, who had won the year before with American rider
Greg LeMond Gregory James LeMond (born June 26, 1961) is an American former Road bicycle racing, road racing cyclist. He won the Tour de France thrice and the UCI Road World Championships – Men's road race, Road Race World Championship twice, becoming t ...
supporting him, publicly pledged to ride in support of LeMond. Several attacks during the race cast doubt on the sincerity of his promise, leading to a rift between the two riders and the entire La Vie Claire team, before LeMond prevailed. It was the first ever victory for a rider from outside of Europe. The 1986 Tour is widely considered to be one of the most memorable in the history of the sport due to the battle between LeMond and Hinault. The 1987 edition was more uncertain than past editions, as previous winners Hinault and Zoetemelk had retired, LeMond was absent, and Fignon was suffering from a lingering injury. As such, the race was highly competitive, and the lead changed hands eight times before Stephen Roche won. When Roche won the World Championship Road Race later in the season, he became only the second rider (after Merckx) to win cycling's Triple Crown, which meant winning the
Giro d'Italia The Giro d'Italia (; ), also known simply as the Giro, is an annual stage race, multiple-stage bicycle racing, bicycle race primarily held in Italy, while also starting in, or passing through, other countries. The first race was organized in 19 ...
, the Tour and the Road World Cycling Championship in one calendar year. Lévitan helped drive an internationalization of the Tour de France, and cycling in general. Roche was the first winner from Ireland; however, in the years leading up to his victory, cyclists from numerous other countries began joining the ranks of the peloton. In 1982, Sean Kelly of Ireland (points) and Phil Anderson of Australia (young rider) became the first winners of any Tour classifications from outside cycling's
Continental Europe Continental Europe or mainland Europe is the contiguous mainland of Europe, excluding its surrounding islands. It can also be referred to ambiguously as the European continent, – which can conversely mean the whole of Europe – and, by som ...
heartlands, while Lévitan was influential in facilitating the participation in the 1983 Tour by amateur riders from the
Eastern Bloc The Eastern Bloc, also known as the Communist Bloc (Combloc), the Socialist Bloc, the Workers Bloc, and the Soviet Bloc, was an unofficial coalition of communist states of Central and Eastern Europe, Asia, Africa, and Latin America that were a ...
and Colombia. In 1984, for the first time, the Société du Tour de France organized the Tour de France Féminin, a version for women. It was run in the same weeks as the men's version, and it was won by Marianne Martin. While the global awareness and popularity of the Tour grew during this time, its finances became stretched. Goddet and Lévitan continued to clash over the running of the race. Lévitan launched the Tour of America as a precursor to his plans to take the Tour de France to the US. The Tour of America lost much money, and it appeared to have been cross-financed by the Tour de France. In the years before 1987, Lévitan's position had always been protected by Émilien Amaury, the then owner of ASO, but Émilien Amaury would soon retire and leave son Philippe Amaury responsible. When Lévitan arrived at his office on 17 March 1987, he found that his doors were locked and he was fired. The organisation of the 1987 Tour de France was taken over by Jean-François Naquet-Radiguet. He was not successful in acquiring more funds, and was fired within one year.


1988–1997

Months before the start of the 1988 Tour, director Jean-François Naquet-Radiguet was replaced by Xavier Louy. In 1988, the Tour was organised by Jean-Pierre Courcol, the director of ''L'Équipe'', then in 1989 by Jean-Pierre Carenso and then by Jean-Marie Leblanc, who in 1989 had been race director. The former television presenter Christian Prudhomme—he commentated on the Tour among other events—replaced Leblanc in 2007, having been assistant director for three years. In 1993 ownership of ''L'Équipe'' moved to the Amaury Group, which formed
Amaury Sport Organisation The Amaury Sport Organisation (ASO and also A.S.O.) is a private company, founded in 1992, that is part of the privately-owned French media group Éditions Philippe Amaury (EPA). ASO organises the Tour de France and other cycling races, as well a ...
(ASO) to oversee its sports operations, although the Tour itself is operated by its subsidiary the Société du Tour de France. 1988 onward was arguably the beginning of what can be referred to as the doping era. A new drug,
erythropoietin Erythropoietin (; EPO), also known as erythropoetin, haematopoietin, or haemopoietin, is a glycoprotein cytokine secreted mainly by the kidneys in response to cellular hypoxia; it stimulates red blood cell production ( erythropoiesis) in th ...
(EPO), began to be used; it could not be detected by drug tests of the time. Pedro Delgado won the 1988 Tour de France by a considerable margin, and in
1989 1989 was a turning point in political history with the "Revolutions of 1989" which ended communism in Eastern Bloc of Europe, starting in Poland and Hungary, with experiments in power-sharing coming to a head with the opening of the Berlin W ...
and 1990 Lemond returned from injury and won back-to-back Tours, with the 1989 edition still standing as the closest two-way battle in TDF history, with Lemond claiming an 8-second victory on the final time trial to best Laurent Fignon. The early 1990s was dominated by Spaniard
Miguel Induráin Miguel Induráin Larraya (; born 16 July 1964) is a retired Spanish road racing cyclist. Induráin won five Tours de France from 1991 Tour de France, 1991 to 1995 Tour de France, 1995, the fourth, and last, to win five times, and the only five- ...
, who won five Tours from
1991 It was the final year of the Cold War, which had begun in 1947. During the year, the Soviet Union Dissolution of the Soviet Union, collapsed, leaving Post-soviet states, fifteen sovereign republics and the Commonwealth of Independent State ...
to
1995 1995 was designated as: * United Nations Year for Tolerance * World Year of Peoples' Commemoration of the Victims of the Second World War This was the first year that the Internet was entirely privatized, with the United States government ...
, the fourth, and last, to win five times, and the only five-time winner to achieve those victories consecutively. He wore the race leader's yellow jersey in the Tour de France for 60 days. He holds the record for the most consecutive Tour de France wins and shares the record for most wins with
Jacques Anquetil Jacques Anquetil (; 8 January 1934 – 18 November 1987) was a French road racing cyclist and the first cyclist to win the Tour de France five times, in 1957 and from 1961 to 1964. He stated before the 1961 Tour that he would gain the ye ...
,
Bernard Hinault Bernard Hinault (; born 14 November 1954) is a French former professional road bicycle racing, road cyclist. With 147 professional victories, including five times the Tour de France, he is often named among the greatest cyclists of all time. In ...
and
Eddy Merckx Édouard Louis Joseph, Baron Merckx (born 17 June 1945), known as Eddy Merckx (, ), is a Belgian former professional road and track cyclist racer who is the most successful rider in the history of competitive cycling. His victories include an ...
. Induráin was a strong time trialist, gaining on rivals and riding defensively in the climbing stages. Induráin won only two Tour stages that were not
individual time trial An individual time trial (ITT) is a road bicycle race in which cyclists race alone against the clock (in French: ''contre la montre'' – literally "against the watch", in Italian: ''tappa a cronometro'' "stopwatch stage"). There are also trac ...
s: mountain stages to Cauterets (1989) and Luz Ardiden (1990) in the
Pyrenees The Pyrenees are a mountain range straddling the border of France and Spain. They extend nearly from their union with the Cantabrian Mountains to Cap de Creus on the Mediterranean coast, reaching a maximum elevation of at the peak of Aneto. ...
. These superior abilities in the discipline fit perfectly with the time trial heavy Tours of the era, with many featuring between 150 and 200 km of time trialling vs the more common 50–80 km today. The influx of more international riders continued through this period, as in
1996 1996 was designated as: * International Year for the Eradication of Poverty Events January * January 8 – A Zairean cargo plane crashes into a crowded market in the center of the capital city of the Democratic Republic of the Congo ...
the race was won for the first time by a rider from Denmark,
Bjarne Riis Bjarne Lykkegård Riis (; born 3 April 1964), nicknamed ''The Eagle from Herning'' (), is a Denmark, Danish former professional road bicycle racer who won the 1996 Tour de France. For many years he was the owner and later manager of the Oleg Tink ...
, who ended Miguel Induráin's reign with an attack on Hautacam. On 25 May 2007, Bjarne Riis admitted that he placed first in the Tour de France using banned substances, and he was no longer considered the winner by the Tour's organizers. In July 2008, the Tour reconfirmed his victory but with an asterisk label to indicate his doping offences. In 2013
Jan Ullrich Jan Ullrich (; born 2 December 1973) is a German former professional road bicycle racer. Ullrich won gold and silver medals in the 2000 Summer Olympics in Sydney, Australia, Sydney. He won the 1999 Vuelta a España and the HEW Cyclassics in fro ...
, the first German rider to win the Tour (in
1997 Events January * January 1 – The Emergency Alert System is introduced in the United States. * January 11 – Turkey threatens Cyprus on account of a deal to buy Russian S-300 missiles, prompting the Cypriot Missile Crisis. * January 1 ...
), admitted to blood doping.


1998–2011

During the 1998 Tour de France, a doping scandal known as the Festina Affair shook the sport to its core when it became apparent that there was systematic doping going on in the sport. Numerous riders and a handful of teams were either thrown out of the race, or left of their own free will, and in the end Marco Pantani survived to win his lone Tour in a decimated main field. The 1999 Tour de France was billed as the ‘Tour of Renewal’ as the sport tried to clean up its image following the doping fiasco of the previous year. Initially it seemed to be a
Cinderella "Cinderella", or "The Little Glass Slipper", is a Folklore, folk tale with thousands of variants that are told throughout the world.Dundes, Alan. Cinderella, a Casebook. Madison, Wis: University of Wisconsin Press, 1988. The protagonist is a you ...
story when
cancer Cancer is a group of diseases involving Cell growth#Disorders, abnormal cell growth with the potential to Invasion (cancer), invade or Metastasis, spread to other parts of the body. These contrast with benign tumors, which do not spread. Po ...
survivor Lance Armstrong stole the show on Sestriere and kept on riding to the first of his astonishing seven consecutive Tour de France victories; however, in retrospect, 1999 was just the beginning of the doping problem getting much, much worse. Following Armstrong's retirement in
2005 2005 was designated as the International Year for Sport and Physical Education and the International Year of Microcredit. The beginning of 2005 also marked the end of the International Decade of the World's Indigenous Peoples, Internationa ...
, the
2006 2006 was designated as the International Year of Deserts and Desertification. Events January * January 1– 4 – Russia temporarily cuts shipment of natural gas to Ukraine during a price dispute. * January 12 – A stampede during t ...
edition saw his former teammate Floyd Landis finally get the chance he worked so hard for with a stunning and improbable solo breakaway on Stage 17 in which he set himself up to win the Tour in the final time trial, which he then did. Not long after the Tour was over, however, Landis was accused of doping and had his Tour win revoked. Over the next few years, a new star in Alberto Contador came onto the scene; however, during the
2007 2007 was designated as the International Heliophysical Year and the International Polar Year. Events January * January 1 **Bulgaria and Romania 2007 enlargement of the European Union, join the European Union, while Slovenia joins the Eur ...
edition, a veteran Danish rider, Michael Rasmussen, was in the maillot jaune late in the Tour, in position to win, when his own team sacked him for a possible doping infraction; this allowed the rising star Contador to ride mistake-free for the remaining stages to win his first.
2008 2008 was designated as: *International Year of Languages *International Year of Planet Earth *International Year of the Potato *International Year of Sanitation The Great Recession, a worldwide recession which began in 2007, continued throu ...
saw a Tour where so many riders were doping that, when it went ten days without a single doping incident, it became news. It was during this Tour that a UCI official was quoted as saying, "These guys are crazy, and the sooner they start learning, the better." Roger Legeay, a Directeur Sportif for one of the teams noted how riders were secretly and anonymously buying doping products on the internet. Like Greg LeMond at the beginning of the EPO era, 2008 winner Carlos Sastre was a rider who went his entire career without a single doping incident and between approximately 1994 and 2011 this was the only Tour to have a winner with a clear biological passport. 2009 saw the
return Return may refer to: In business, economics, and finance * Return on investment (ROI), the financial gain after an expense. * Rate of return, the financial term for the profit or loss derived from an investment * Tax return, a blank document or t ...
of Lance Armstrong and, strangely, after Contador was able to defeat his teammate, the Danish National Anthem was mistakenly played. No Danish rider was in contention in 2009, and Rasmussen, the only Danish rider capable of winning the Tour during this era, was not even in the race. Another rider absent was Floyd Landis, who had asked Armstrong to get him back on a team to ride the Tour once more, but Armstrong refused because Landis was a convicted doper. Landis joined OUCH, an American continental team, and not long after this initiated contact with USADA to discuss Armstrong. In
2011 The year marked the start of a Arab Spring, series of protests and revolutions throughout the Arab world advocating for democracy, reform, and economic recovery, later leading to the depositions of world leaders in Tunisia, Egypt, and Yemen ...
, Cadel Evans became the first Australian to win the Tour after coming up just short several times in the previous few editions. The
2012 Tour de France The 2012 Tour de France was the 99th edition of the Tour de France, one of cycling's Grand Tour (cycling), Grand Tours. It started in the Belgian city of Liège on 30 June and finished on the Champs-Élysées stage in the Tour de France, Champs ...
was won by the first British rider to ever win the Tour,
Bradley Wiggins Sir Bradley Marc Wiggins (born 28 April 1980) is a British former professional Road bicycle racing, road and track cycling, track racing cyclist, who competed professionally between 2001 and 2016. He began his cycling career on the track, but ...
, while finishing on the podium just behind him was Chris Froome, who along with Contador became the next big stars to attempt to contest the giants of Anquetil, Merckx, Hinault, Indurain and Armstrong. Overshadowing the entire sport at this time, however, was the Lance Armstrong doping case, which finally revealed much of the truth about doping in cycling. As a result, the UCI decided that each of Armstrong's seven wins would be revoked. This decision cleared the names of many people, including lesser-known riders, reporters, team medical staff, and even the wife of a rider who had their reputations tarnished or had been forced from the sport due to pressure from Armstrong and his support staff. Much of this only became possible after Floyd Landis came forward to USADA. Also around this time, an investigation by the French government into doping in cycling revealed that way back during the 1998 Tour, close to 90% of the riders who were tested, retroactively tested positive for EPO. The result of these doping scandals being that in the case of Landis in 2006, and Contador in 2010, new winners were declared in Óscar Pereiro and Andy Schleck, respectively; however, in the case of the seven Tours revoked from Armstrong, there was no alternate winner named.


Since 2012

Team Sky dominated the event for several years, with wins for
Bradley Wiggins Sir Bradley Marc Wiggins (born 28 April 1980) is a British former professional Road bicycle racing, road and track cycling, track racing cyclist, who competed professionally between 2001 and 2016. He began his cycling career on the track, but ...
, Chris Froome (four times) and Geraint Thomas before Egan Bernal became the first Colombian winner in 2019. The streak was interrupted only by Vincenzo Nibali's
2014 The year 2014 was marked by the surge of the Western African Ebola epidemic, West African Ebola epidemic, which began in 2013, becoming the List of Ebola outbreaks, most widespread outbreak of the Ebola, Ebola virus in human history, resul ...
win. Due to the
COVID-19 Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is a contagious disease caused by the coronavirus SARS-CoV-2. In January 2020, the disease spread worldwide, resulting in the COVID-19 pandemic. The symptoms of COVID‑19 can vary but often include fever ...
outbreak, the 2020 Tour started in late August, the first time since the end of World War II that the Tour was not held in July. This saw the first of two successive victories for Tadej Pogačar of UAE Team Emirates, who was the first Slovenian winner, and the second youngest (at 21) after Henri Cornet in 1904. He also won the mountain and youth classifications, becoming the first rider since Eddy Merckx in
1972 Within the context of Coordinated Universal Time (UTC) it was the longest year ever, as two leap seconds were added during this 366-day year, an event which has not since been repeated. (If its start and end are defined using Solar time, ...
to win three jerseys in a single Tour. Pogačar repeated this triple in
2021 Like the year 2020, 2021 was also heavily defined by the COVID-19 pandemic, due to the emergence of multiple Variants of SARS-CoV-2, COVID-19 variants. The major global rollout of COVID-19 vaccines, which began at the end of 2020, continued ...
. On stage 13 of this Tour, sprinter
Mark Cavendish Sir Mark Simon Cavendish (born 21 May 1985) is a Manx people, Manx retired professional cyclist. As a Track cycling, track cyclist he specialised in the Madison (cycling), madison, points race, and scratch race disciplines; as a road racer he ...
tied the record of
Eddy Merckx Édouard Louis Joseph, Baron Merckx (born 17 June 1945), known as Eddy Merckx (, ), is a Belgian former professional road and track cyclist racer who is the most successful rider in the history of competitive cycling. His victories include an ...
for all time stage wins with 34. Danish rider Jonas Vingegaard, second in 2021, won in both
2022 The year began with another wave in the COVID-19 pandemic, with SARS-CoV-2 Omicron variant, Omicron spreading rapidly and becoming the dominant variant of the SARS-CoV-2 virus worldwide. Tracking a decrease in cases and deaths, 2022 saw ...
and
2023 Catastrophic natural disasters in 2023 included the Lists of 21st-century earthquakes, 5th-deadliest earthquake of the 21st century 2023 Turkey–Syria earthquakes, striking Turkey and Syria, leaving up to 62,000 people dead; Cyclone Freddy ...
, with Pogačar coming second both times. The 2022 race was followed by the Tour de France Femmes, the first official Tour de France for women since 1989. In
2024 The year saw the list of ongoing armed conflicts, continuation of major armed conflicts, including the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the Myanmar civil war (2021–present), Myanmar civil war, the Sudanese civil war (2023–present), Sudane ...
, Pogačar took back the Tour title, winning by more than six minutes over Vingegaard while Tour debutant, Remco Evenepoel, rounded out the podium. Pogačar won six stages, including five of the last eight stages. With his win, he became only the eighth rider, and the first since Marco Pantani in
1998 1998 was designated as the ''International Year of the Ocean''. Events January * January 6 – The ''Lunar Prospector'' spacecraft is launched into orbit around the Moon, and later finds evidence for Lunar water, frozen water, in soil i ...
, to win the
Giro d'Italia The Giro d'Italia (; ), also known simply as the Giro, is an annual stage race, multiple-stage bicycle racing, bicycle race primarily held in Italy, while also starting in, or passing through, other countries. The first race was organized in 19 ...
and the Tour de France in the same calendar year. On stage 5 of the race, sprinter
Mark Cavendish Sir Mark Simon Cavendish (born 21 May 1985) is a Manx people, Manx retired professional cyclist. As a Track cycling, track cyclist he specialised in the Madison (cycling), madison, points race, and scratch race disciplines; as a road racer he ...
won his 35th overall Tour stage win, breaking the tie between him and
Eddy Merckx Édouard Louis Joseph, Baron Merckx (born 17 June 1945), known as Eddy Merckx (, ), is a Belgian former professional road and track cyclist racer who is the most successful rider in the history of competitive cycling. His victories include an ...
, who held the record for 49 years, for the all-time stage wins record in the Tour.


Classifications

The oldest and main competition in the Tour de France is known as the "general classification", for which the yellow jersey is awarded; the winner of this is said to have won the race. A few riders from each team aim to win overall, but there are three further competitions to draw riders of all specialties: points, mountains, and a classification for young riders with general classification aspirations. The leader of each of the aforementioned classifications wears a distinctive jersey, with riders leading multiple classifications wearing the jersey of the most prestigious that he leads. In addition to these four classifications, there are several minor and discontinued classifications that are competed for during the race.


General classification

The oldest and most sought-after classification in the Tour de France is the general classification. All of the stages are timed to the finish. The riders' times are compounded with their previous stage times; so the rider with the lowest aggregate time is the leader of the race. The leader is determined after each stage's conclusion: he gains the privilege to wear the yellow jersey, presented on a podium in the stage's finishing town, for the next stage. If he is leading more than one classification that awards a jersey, he wears the yellow one, since the general classification is the most important one in the race. Between 1905 and
1912 This year is notable for Sinking of the Titanic, the sinking of the ''Titanic'', which occurred on April 15. In Albania, this leap year runs with only 353 days as the country achieved switching from the Julian to Gregorian Calendar by skippin ...
inclusive, in response to concerns about rider cheating in the 1904 race, the general classification was awarded according to a point-based system based on their placings in each stage, and the rider with the lowest total of points after the Tour's conclusion was the winner. The leader in the first Tour de France was awarded a green armband. The yellow jersey (the color was chosen as the newspaper that created the Tour, '' L'Auto'', was printed on yellow paper), was added to the race in the 1919 edition and it has since become a symbol of the Tour de France. The first rider to wear the yellow jersey was Eugène Christophe. Riders usually try to make the extra effort to keep the jersey for as long as possible in order to get more publicity for the team and its sponsors.
Eddy Merckx Édouard Louis Joseph, Baron Merckx (born 17 June 1945), known as Eddy Merckx (, ), is a Belgian former professional road and track cyclist racer who is the most successful rider in the history of competitive cycling. His victories include an ...
wore the yellow jersey for 96 stages, which is more than any other rider in the history of the Tour. Four riders have won the general classification five times in their career:
Jacques Anquetil Jacques Anquetil (; 8 January 1934 – 18 November 1987) was a French road racing cyclist and the first cyclist to win the Tour de France five times, in 1957 and from 1961 to 1964. He stated before the 1961 Tour that he would gain the ye ...
,
Eddy Merckx Édouard Louis Joseph, Baron Merckx (born 17 June 1945), known as Eddy Merckx (, ), is a Belgian former professional road and track cyclist racer who is the most successful rider in the history of competitive cycling. His victories include an ...
,
Bernard Hinault Bernard Hinault (; born 14 November 1954) is a French former professional road bicycle racing, road cyclist. With 147 professional victories, including five times the Tour de France, he is often named among the greatest cyclists of all time. In ...
, and
Miguel Induráin Miguel Induráin Larraya (; born 16 July 1964) is a retired Spanish road racing cyclist. Induráin won five Tours de France from 1991 Tour de France, 1991 to 1995 Tour de France, 1995, the fourth, and last, to win five times, and the only five- ...
.


Mountains classification

The mountains classification is the second-oldest jersey awarding classification in the Tour de France. The mountains classification was added to the Tour de France in the 1933 edition and was first won by Vicente Trueba. Prizes for the classification were first awarded in
1934 Events January–February * January 1 – The International Telecommunication Union, a specialist agency of the League of Nations, is established. * January 15 – The 8.0 1934 Nepal–Bihar earthquake, Nepal–Bihar earthquake strik ...
. During stages of the race containing climbs, points are awarded to the first riders to reach the top of each categorized climb, with points available for up to the first 10 riders, depending on the classification of the climb. Climbs are classified according to the steepness and length of that particular hill, with more points available for harder climbs. The classification was preceded by the ''meilleur grimpeur'' () which was awarded by the organising newspaper ''L'Auto'' to a cyclist who completed each race. The classification awarded no jersey to the leader until the 1975 Tour de France, when the organizers decided to award a distinctive white jersey with red dots to the leader. This is colloquially referred to in English as the "polka dot" jersey. The climbers' jersey is worn by the rider who, at the start of each stage, has the largest number of climbing points. If the race leader is also leading the Mountains classification, the polka dot jersey will be worn by the next eligible rider in the Mountains standings. At the end of the Tour, the rider holding the most climbing points wins the classification. Some riders may race with the aim of winning this particular competition, while others who gain points early on may shift their focus to the classification during the race. The Tour has five categories for ranking the mountains the race covers. The scale ranges from category 4, the easiest, to hors catégorie, the hardest. During his career Richard Virenque won the mountains classification a record seven times. The point distribution for the mountains in the 2019 event was: * Points awarded are doubled for HC climbs over 2000m of altitude.


Points classification

The points classification is the third oldest of the currently awarded jersey classifications. It was introduced in the 1953 Tour de France and was first won by Fritz Schär. The classification was added to draw the participation of the sprinters as well as celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Tour. Points are given to the first 15 riders to finish a stage, with an additional set of points given to the first 15 riders to cross a pre-determined 'sprint' point during the route of each stage. The point classification leader green jersey is worn by the rider who at the start of each stage, has the greatest number of points. In the first years, the cyclist received penalty points for not finishing with a high place, so the cyclist with the fewest points was awarded the green jersey. From 1959 on, the system was changed so the cyclists were awarded points for high place finishes (with first place getting the most points, and lower placings getting successively fewer points), so the cyclist with the most points was awarded the green jersey. The number of points awarded varies depending on the type of stage, with flat stages awarding the most points at the finish and time trials and high mountain stages awarding the fewest points at the finish. This increases the likelihood of a sprinter winning the points classification, though other riders can be competitive for the classification if they have a sufficient number of high-place finishes. The winner of the classification is the rider with the most points at the end of the Tour. In case of a tie, the leader is determined by the number of stage wins, then the number of intermediate sprint victories, and finally, the rider's standing in the general classification. The classification has been won a record seven times by Peter Sagan. The first year the points classification was used it was sponsored by La Belle Jardinière, a lawn mower producer, and the jersey was made green. In
1968 Events January–February * January 1968, January – The I'm Backing Britain, I'm Backing Britain campaign starts spontaneously. * January 5 – Prague Spring: Alexander Dubček is chosen as leader of the Communist Party of Cze ...
the jersey was changed to red to please the sponsor. However, the color was changed back the following year. For almost 25 years the classification was sponsored by Pari Mutuel Urbain, a state betting company. However they announced in November 2014 that they would not be continuing their sponsorship, and in March 2015 it was revealed that the green jersey would now be sponsored by German automaker Volkswagen AG's Škoda brand. As of
2015 2015 was designated by the United Nations as: * International Year of Light * International Year of Soil __TOC__ Events January * January 1 – Lithuania officially adopts the euro as its currency, replacing the litas, and becomes ...
, the points awarded are:


Young rider classification

The leader of the classification is determined the same way as the general classification, with the riders' times being added up after each stage and the eligible rider with lowest aggregate time is dubbed the leader. The Young rider classification is restricted to the riders that will stay under the age of 26 in the calendar year the race is held. Originally the classification was restricted to neo-professionals – riders that are in their first three years of professional racing – until
1983 1983 saw both the official beginning of the Internet and the first mobile cellular telephone call. Events January * January 1 – The migration of the ARPANET to TCP/IP is officially completed (this is considered to be the beginning of the ...
. In 1983, the organizers made it so that only first time riders were eligible for the classification. In
1987 Events January * January 1 – Bolivia reintroduces the Boliviano currency. * January 2 – Chadian–Libyan conflict – Battle of Fada: The Military of Chad, Chadian army destroys a Libyan armoured brigade. * January 3 – Afghan leader ...
, the organizers changed the rules of the classification to what they are today. This classification was added to the Tour de France in the 1975 edition, with Francesco Moser being the first to win the classification after placing seventh overall. The Tour de France awards a white jersey to the leader of the classification, although this was not done between 1989 and 2000. Six riders have won both the young rider classification and the general classification in the same year:
Laurent Fignon Laurent Patrick Fignon (; 12 August 1960 – 31 August 2010) was a French professional road bicycle racer who won the Tour de France in 1983 and 1984, as well as the Giro d'Italia in 1989. He held the title of FICP World No. 1 in 1989. Fignon came ...
(1983),
Jan Ullrich Jan Ullrich (; born 2 December 1973) is a German former professional road bicycle racer. Ullrich won gold and silver medals in the 2000 Summer Olympics in Sydney, Australia, Sydney. He won the 1999 Vuelta a España and the HEW Cyclassics in fro ...
(
1997 Events January * January 1 – The Emergency Alert System is introduced in the United States. * January 11 – Turkey threatens Cyprus on account of a deal to buy Russian S-300 missiles, prompting the Cypriot Missile Crisis. * January 1 ...
), Alberto Contador (
2007 2007 was designated as the International Heliophysical Year and the International Polar Year. Events January * January 1 **Bulgaria and Romania 2007 enlargement of the European Union, join the European Union, while Slovenia joins the Eur ...
), Andy Schleck (
2010 The year saw a multitude of natural and environmental disasters such as the 2010 Haiti earthquake, the Deepwater Horizon oil spill, and the 2010 Chile earthquake. The 2009 swine flu pandemic, swine flu pandemic which began the previous year ...
), Egan Bernal (
2019 This was the year in which the first known human case of COVID-19 was documented, preceding COVID-19 pandemic, the pandemic which was declared by the World Health Organization the following year. Up to that point, 2019 had been described as ...
) and Tadej Pogačar (
2020 The year 2020 was heavily defined by the COVID-19 pandemic, which led to global Social impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, social and Economic impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, economic disruption, mass cancellations and postponements of even ...
and
2021 Like the year 2020, 2021 was also heavily defined by the COVID-19 pandemic, due to the emergence of multiple Variants of SARS-CoV-2, COVID-19 variants. The major global rollout of COVID-19 vaccines, which began at the end of 2020, continued ...
). Three riders have won the young rider classification three times in their respective careers: Jan Ullrich, Andy Schleck and Tadej Pogačar. As of 2015 Jersey sponsor is Optician company Krys, replacing Škoda who moved to the Green Jersey.


Minor classifications and prizes

The '' prix de la combativité'' goes to the rider who most animates the day, usually by trying to break clear of the field. The most combative rider wears a number printed white-on-beige instead of black-on-white next day. An award goes to the most aggressive rider throughout the Tour. Already in 1908 a sort of combativity award was offered, when ''Sports Populaires'' and ''L'Éducation Physique'' created ''Le Prix du Courage'', 100 francs and a silver gilt medal for "the rider having finished the course, even if unplaced, who is particularly distinguished for the energy he has used." The modern competition started in 1958. In 1959, a Super Combativity award for the most combative cyclist of the Tour was awarded. It was initially not awarded every year, but since 1981 it has been given annually. Eddy Merckx has the most wins (4) for the overall award. The team classification is assessed by adding the time of each team's best three riders each day. The competition does not have its own jersey but since 2006 the leading team has worn numbers printed black-on-yellow. Until 1990, the leading team would wear yellow caps. As of 2012, the riders of the leading team wear yellow helmets. During the era of national teams, France and Belgium won 10 times each. From 1973 up to 1988, there was also a team classification based on points (stage classification); members of the leading team would wear green caps.


Historical classifications

There has been an intermediate sprints classification, which from 1984 awarded a red jersey for points awarded to the first three to pass intermediate points during the stage. These sprints also scored points towards the points classification and bonuses towards the general classification. The intermediate sprints classification with its red jersey was abolished in 1989, but the intermediate sprints have remained, offering points for the points classification and, until 2007, time bonuses for the general classification. From 1968 there was a combination classification, scored on a points system based on standings in the general, points and mountains classifications. The design was originally white, then a patchwork with areas resembling each individual jersey design. This was also abolished in 1989.


Lanterne rouge

The rider who has taken most time is called the '' lanterne rouge'' (''red lantern, as in the red light at the back of a vehicle so it can be seen in the dark'') and in past years sometimes carried a small red light beneath his
saddle A saddle is a supportive structure for a rider of an animal, fastened to an animal's back by a girth. The most common type is equestrian. However, specialized saddles have been created for oxen, camels and other animals. It is not know ...
. Such was sympathy that he could command higher fees in the races that previously followed the Tour. In 1939 and 1948 the organisers excluded the last rider every day, to encourage more competitive racing.Jacques Goddet said in his autobiography that teams were using the rule to eliminate rivals. A rider in last position knew he would be disqualified at the end of the stage. If he dropped out before or during the stage, another competitor became the last and he would leave the race as well. That weakened a rival team, which now had fewer helpers.


Prizes

Prize money has always been awarded. From 20,000
francs The franc is any of various units of currency. One franc is typically divided into 100 centimes. The name is said to derive from the Latin inscription ''francorum rex'' ( King of the Franks) used on early French coins and until the 18th centur ...
the first year, prize money has increased each year, although from 1976 to 1987 the first prize was an apartment offered by a race sponsor. The first prize in 1988 was a car, a studio-apartment, a work of art, and 500,000 francs in cash. Prizes only in cash returned in 1990. Prizes and bonuses are awarded for daily placings and final placings at the end of the race. In 2009, the winner received €450,000, while each of the 21 stage winners won €8,000 (€10,000 for the team time-trial stage). The winners of the points classification and mountains classification each win €25,000, the young rider competition and the combativity prize €20,000 ; the winner of the team classification (calculated by adding the cumulative times of the best three riders in each team) receives €50 000 . The Souvenir Henri Desgrange, in memory of the founder of the Tour, is awarded to the first rider over the Col du Galibier where his monument stands, or to the first rider over the highest col in the Tour. A similar award, the Souvenir Jacques Goddet, is made at the summit of the
Col du Tourmalet Col du Tourmalet (; elevation ) is one of the highest paved mountain passes in the French Pyrenees, in the department of Hautes-Pyrénées. Sainte-Marie-de-Campan is at the foot on the eastern side and the ski station La Mongie two-thirds ...
, at the memorial to Jacques Goddet, Desgrange's successor.


Trophy

The winner of general classification is the recipient of ''Coupe Omnisports'', presented by the president of the French Republic. The Trophy is realized by the Manufacture nationale de Sèvres and was used since 1975, the first time Tour finished on the Champs-Élysées. Škoda, the green jersey sponsor, have given, since 2011 a glass trophy in green to the winner of that competition. More recently, similar trophies in clear glass have been awarded to the other jersey winners. After every stage, the general classification leader receive the yellow jersey and, since 1987, a toy lyon offered by the yellow jersey sponsor, Crédit Lyonnais.


Stages

The modern tour typically has 21 stages, one per day.


Mass-start stages

The Tour directors categorise mass-start stages into 'flat', 'hilly', or 'mountain'. This affects the points awarded in the sprint classification, whether the 3 kilometer rule is operational, and the permitted disqualification time in which riders must finish (which is the winners' time plus a pre-determined percentage of that time). Time bonuses of 10, 6, and 4 seconds are awarded to the first three finishers, though this was not done from 2008 to 2014. Bonuses were previously also awarded to winners of intermediate sprints.


Time trials

The first time trial in the Tour was between La Roche-sur-Yon and Nantes (80 km) in 1934. The first stage in modern Tours is often a short trial, a ''prologue'', to decide who wears yellow on the opening day. The first prologue was in 1967. The 1988 event, at La Baule, was called "la préface". There are usually two or three time trials. The final time trial has sometimes been the final stage, more recently often the penultimate stage.


Notable stages

Since 1975 the race has finished with laps of the Champs-Élysées. As the peloton arrives in downtown Paris the
French Air Force The French Air and Space Force (, , ) is the air force, air and space force of the French Armed Forces. Formed in 1909 as the ("Aeronautical Service"), a service arm of the French Army, it became an independent military branch in 1934 as the Fr ...
does a three-jet flyover with the three colors of the French flag in smoke behind them. This stage rarely challenges the leader because it is flat and the leader usually has too much time in hand to be denied. In modern times, there tends to be a gentlemen's agreement: while the points classification is still contended if possible, the overall classification is not fought over; because of this, it is not uncommon for the ''de facto'' winner of the overall classification to ride into Paris holding a glass of champagne. The only time the maillot jaune was attacked in a manner that lasted all the way through the end of this stage was during the 1979 Tour de France. In 1987, Pedro Delgado vowed to attack during the stage to challenge the 40-second lead held by Stephen Roche. He was unsuccessful and he and Roche finished in the peloton. In 2005, controversy arose when Alexander Vinokourov attacked and won the stage, in the process taking fifth place overall from Levi Leipheimer. This attack was not a threat to the overall lead, but was a long-shot at the Podium standings, as Vinokourov was about five minutes behind third place. In 1989, the last stage was a time trial.
Greg LeMond Gregory James LeMond (born June 26, 1961) is an American former Road bicycle racing, road racing cyclist. He won the Tour de France thrice and the UCI Road World Championships – Men's road race, Road Race World Championship twice, becoming t ...
overtook
Laurent Fignon Laurent Patrick Fignon (; 12 August 1960 – 31 August 2010) was a French professional road bicycle racer who won the Tour de France in 1983 and 1984, as well as the Giro d'Italia in 1989. He held the title of FICP World No. 1 in 1989. Fignon came ...
to win by eight seconds, the closest margin in the Tour's history. The final stage has since only been held as a time trial once, in 2024. The climb of
Alpe d'Huez L'Alpe d'Huez () is a ski resort in Southeastern France at . It is a mountain pasture in the central French Western Alps, in the Communes of France, commune of Huez, which is part of the Isère Departments of France, department in the Auvergne-R ...
has become one of the more noted mountain stages. During the 2004 Tour de France it was the scene of a mountain time trial on the 16th stage. Riders complained of abusive spectators who threatened their progress up the climb. On this stage it is not uncommon for a low end estimate of the spectators in attendance to number 300,000. During a famous head-to-head battle between Anquetil and Raymond Poulidor on Puy de Dôme it was estimated that at least a half a million people were on hand.
Mont Ventoux Mont Ventoux (; ) is a mountain in the Provence region of southern France, located some northeast of Carpentras, Vaucluse. On the north side, the mountain borders the department of Drôme. At , it is the highest mountain in the region and h ...
is often claimed to be the hardest in the Tour because of the harsh conditions. Another notable mountain stage frequently featured climbs the
Col du Tourmalet Col du Tourmalet (; elevation ) is one of the highest paved mountain passes in the French Pyrenees, in the department of Hautes-Pyrénées. Sainte-Marie-de-Campan is at the foot on the eastern side and the ski station La Mongie two-thirds ...
, the most visited mountain in the history of the Tour. Col du Galibier is the most visited mountain in the Alps. The 2011 Tour de France stage to Galibier marked the 100th anniversary of the mountain in the Tour and also boasted the highest finish altitude ever: . Some mountain stages have become memorable because of the weather. An example is a stage in 1996 Tour de France from
Val-d'Isère Val-d'Isère (, literally ''Valley of Isère (river), Isère'') is a Communes of France, commune of the Tarentaise Valley, in the Savoie Departments of France, department (Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes Regions of France, region) in southeastern France. It ...
to Sestriere. A snowstorm at the start area led to a shortening of the stage from to just . During the 2019 Tour de France multiple landslides and hail storms forced two critical mountain stages to be considerably shortened. Authorities made every effort to plow the road and make the course safe, but the volume of hail, mud and debris proved too much.


Deciding the route

To host a stage start or finish brings prestige and business to a town. The prologue and first stage ( Grand Départ) are particularly prestigious. The race may start with a prologue (too short to go between towns) in which case the start of the next day's racing, which would be considered stage 1, usually in the same town. In 2007 director Christian Prudhomme said that "in general, for a period of five years we have the Tour start outside France three times and within France twice." In the local towns and cities that the Tour visits for stage starts and finishes, it is a spectacle that usually shuts these towns down for the day, resulting in a very festive atmosphere, and these events usually require months of planning and preparation. ASO employs around 70 people full-time, in an office facing—but not connected to—''L'Équipe'' in the Issy-les-Moulineaux area of outer western Paris. That number expands to about 220 during the race itself, not including the 500-odd contractors employed to move barriers, erect stages, signpost the route, and other work. ASO now also operates several other major bike races throughout the year.


Advertising caravan

With the switch to the use of national teams in 1930, the costs of accommodating riders fell to the organizers instead of the sponsors and Henri Desgrange raised the money by allowing advertisers to precede the race. The procession of often colourfully decorated trucks and cars became known as the publicity caravan. It formalised an existing situation, companies having started to follow the race. The first to sign to precede the Tour was the chocolate company, Menier, one of those who had followed the race. Its head of publicity, Paul Thévenin, had first put the idea to Desgrange. It paid 50,000 francs. Preceding the race was more attractive to advertisers because spectators gathered by the road long before the race or could be attracted from their houses. Advertisers following the race found that many who had watched the race had already gone home. Menier handed out tons of chocolate in that first year of preceding the race, as well as 500,000 policemen's hats printed with the company's name. The success led to the caravan's existence being formalised the following year. The caravan was at its height between 1930 and the mid-1960s, before television and especially television advertising was established in France. Advertisers competed to attract public attention. Motorcycle acrobats performed for the Cinzano apéritif company and a toothpaste maker, and an accordionist, Yvette Horner, became one of the most popular sights as she performed on the roof of a
Citroën Traction Avant The Citroën Traction Avant () is the world's first mass-produced, semi-monocoque bodied, front-wheel drive car. A range of mostly four-door saloon (automobile), saloons and executive cars, as well as longer wheelbased ''"Commerciale"'', and thre ...
. The modern Tour restricts the excesses to which advertisers are allowed to go but at first anything was allowed. The writer Pierre BostPierre Bost was a journalist and playwright known for the prolific film and stage scripts he wrote in the 1940s. He died in 1975. lamented: "This caravan of 60 gaudy trucks singing across the countryside the virtues of an apéritif, a make of underpants or a dustbin is a shameful spectacle. It bellows, it plays ugly music, it's sad, it's ugly, it smells of vulgarity and money." Advertisers pay the Société du Tour de France approximately €150,000 to place three vehicles in the caravan.Le Tour Guide, France, 2000 Some have more. On top of that come the more considerable costs of the commercial samples that are thrown to the crowd and the cost of accommodating the drivers and the staff—frequently students—who throw them. The number of items has been estimated at 11 million, each person in the procession giving out 3,000 to 5,000 items a day. A bank, GAN, gave out 170,000 caps, 80,000 badges, 60,000 plastic bags, and 535,000 copies of its race newspaper in 1994. Together, they weighed . The vehicles also have to be decorated on the morning of each stage and, because they must return to ordinary highway standards, disassembled after each stage. Numbers vary but there are normally around 250 vehicles each year. Their order on the road is established by contract, the leading vehicles belonging to the largest sponsors. The procession sets off two hours before the start and then regroups to precede the riders by an hour and a half. It spreads and takes 40 minutes to pass at between and . Vehicles travel in groups of five. Their position is logged by GPS and from an aircraft and organised on the road by the caravan director—Jean-Pierre LachaudJean-Pierre Lachaud joined the Tour de France caravan in 1983 to distribute publicity for Crédit Lyonnais, the bank that sponsors the yellow jersey. The experience led to his starting his own company, Newsport, which now administers the caravan for the Société du Tour de France—an assistant, three motorcyclists, two radio technicians, and a breakdown and medical crew. Six motorcyclists from the Garde Républicaine, the élite of the gendarmerie, ride with them.GAN Spécial Tour de France, 1994


Politics

The first three Tours from 1903 to 1905 stayed within France. The 1906 race went into Alsace-Lorraine, territory annexed by the
German Empire The German Empire (),; ; World Book, Inc. ''The World Book dictionary, Volume 1''. World Book, Inc., 2003. p. 572. States that Deutsches Reich translates as "German Realm" and was a former official name of Germany. also referred to as Imperia ...
in 1871 after the
Franco-Prussian War The Franco-Prussian War or Franco-German War, often referred to in France as the War of 1870, was a conflict between the Second French Empire and the North German Confederation led by the Kingdom of Prussia. Lasting from 19 July 1870 to 28 Janua ...
. Passage was secured through a meeting at
Metz Metz ( , , , then ) is a city in northeast France located at the confluence of the Moselle (river), Moselle and the Seille (Moselle), Seille rivers. Metz is the Prefectures in France, prefecture of the Moselle (department), Moselle Departments ...
between Desgrange's collaborator, Alphonse Steinès, and the German governor. No teams from Italy, Germany, or Spain rode in 1939 because of tensions preceding the Second World War (after German assistance to the Nationalists in the
Spanish Civil War The Spanish Civil War () was a military conflict fought from 1936 to 1939 between the Republican faction (Spanish Civil War), Republicans and the Nationalist faction (Spanish Civil War), Nationalists. Republicans were loyal to the Left-wing p ...
it was widely expected Spain would join Germany in a European war, though this did not come to pass). Henri Desgrange planned a Tour for 1940, after war had started but before France had been invaded. The route, approved by military authorities, included a route along the
Maginot Line The Maginot Line (; ), named after the Minister of War (France), French Minister of War André Maginot, is a line of concrete fortifications, obstacles and weapon installations built by French Third Republic, France in the 1930s to deter invas ...
.The Bicycle, UK, 8 July 1943, p6 Teams would have been drawn from military units in France, including the British, who would have been organised by a journalist, Bill Mills. Then the Germans invaded and the race was not held again until 1947 (see Tour de France during the Second World War). The first German team after the war was in 1960, although individual Germans had ridden in mixed teams. The Tour has since started in Germany four times: in
Cologne Cologne ( ; ; ) is the largest city of the States of Germany, German state of North Rhine-Westphalia and the List of cities in Germany by population, fourth-most populous city of Germany with nearly 1.1 million inhabitants in the city pr ...
in 1965, in
Frankfurt Frankfurt am Main () is the most populous city in the States of Germany, German state of Hesse. Its 773,068 inhabitants as of 2022 make it the List of cities in Germany by population, fifth-most populous city in Germany. Located in the forela ...
in 1980, in
West Berlin West Berlin ( or , ) was a political enclave which comprised the western part of Berlin from 1948 until 1990, during the Cold War. Although West Berlin lacked any sovereignty and was under military occupation until German reunification in 1 ...
on the city's 750th anniversary in 1987, and in
Düsseldorf Düsseldorf is the capital city of North Rhine-Westphalia, the most populous state of Germany. It is the second-largest city in the state after Cologne and the List of cities in Germany with more than 100,000 inhabitants, seventh-largest city ...
in 2017. Plans to enter
East Germany East Germany, officially known as the German Democratic Republic (GDR), was a country in Central Europe from Foundation of East Germany, its formation on 7 October 1949 until German reunification, its reunification with West Germany (FRG) on ...
in 1987 were abandoned.


Corsica

Prior to 2013, the Tour de France had visited every region of
Metropolitan France Metropolitan France ( or ), also known as European France (), is the area of France which is geographically in Europe and chiefly comprises #Hexagon, the mainland, popularly known as "the Hexagon" ( or ), and Corsica. This collective name for the ...
except
Corsica Corsica ( , , ; ; ) is an island in the Mediterranean Sea and one of the Regions of France, 18 regions of France. It is the List of islands in the Mediterranean#By area, fourth-largest island in the Mediterranean and lies southeast of the Metro ...
. Jean-Marie Leblanc, when he was organiser, said the island had never asked for a stage start there. It would be difficult to find accommodation for 4,000 people, he said.L'Équipe Magazine, France, 23 October 2004 The spokesman of the Corsican nationalist party Party of the Corsican Nation, François Alfonsi, said: "The organisers must be afraid of terrorist attacks. If they are really thinking of a possible terrorist action, they are wrong. Our movement, which is nationalist and in favour of self-government, would be delighted if the Tour came to Corsica." The opening three stages of the 2013 Tour de France were held on Corsica as part of the celebrations for the 100th edition of the race.


Start and finish of the Tour

Most stages are in mainland France, although since the mid-1950s it has become common to visit nearby countries. The Tour has visited thirteen different countries in its history: Andorra, Belgium, Denmark, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, Monaco, the Netherlands, San Marino, Spain, Switzerland, and the United Kingdom, all of which have hosted stages or part of a stage. Since 1975 the finish has been on the
Champs-Élysées The Avenue des Champs-Élysées (, ; ) is an Avenue (landscape), avenue in the 8th arrondissement of Paris, France, long and wide, running between the Place de la Concorde in the east and the Place Charles de Gaulle in the west, where the Arc ...
in Paris; from 1903 to 1967 the race finished at the
Parc des Princes The Parc des Princes (, ) is an all-seater stadium, all-seater football stadium in Paris, France. It is located in the south-west of the French capital, inside the 16th arrondissement of Paris, 16th arrondissement, near the Stade Jean-Bouin (P ...
stadium in western Paris and from 1968 to 1974 at the Piste Municipale south of the capital. In the 111th edition, because of the
2024 Summer Olympics The 2024 Summer Olympics (), officially the Games of the XXXIII Olympiad () and branded as Paris 2024, were an international multi-sport event held in France from 26 July to 11 August 2024, with several events started from 24 July. P ...
in Paris, the race ended outside Paris for the first time, on the Place Masséna in
Nice Nice ( ; ) is a city in and the prefecture of the Alpes-Maritimes department in France. The Nice agglomeration extends far beyond the administrative city limits, with a population of nearly one million1954 Events January * January 3 – The Italian broadcaster RAI officially begins transmitting. * January 7 – Georgetown–IBM experiment: The first public demonstration of a machine translation system is held in New York, at the head ...
:
Amsterdam Amsterdam ( , ; ; ) is the capital of the Netherlands, capital and Municipalities of the Netherlands, largest city of the Kingdom of the Netherlands. It has a population of 933,680 in June 2024 within the city proper, 1,457,018 in the City Re ...
, Netherlands * 1958:
Brussels Brussels, officially the Brussels-Capital Region, (All text and all but one graphic show the English name as Brussels-Capital Region.) is a Communities, regions and language areas of Belgium#Regions, region of Belgium comprising #Municipalit ...
, Belgium *
1965 Events January–February * January 14 – The First Minister of Northern Ireland and the Taoiseach of the Republic of Ireland meet for the first time in 43 years. * January 20 ** Lyndon B. Johnson is Second inauguration of Lynd ...
:
Cologne Cologne ( ; ; ) is the largest city of the States of Germany, German state of North Rhine-Westphalia and the List of cities in Germany by population, fourth-most populous city of Germany with nearly 1.1 million inhabitants in the city pr ...
, West Germany *
1973 Events January * January 1 – The United Kingdom, the Republic of Ireland and Denmark 1973 enlargement of the European Communities, enter the European Economic Community, which later becomes the European Union. * January 14 - The 16-0 19 ...
:
The Hague The Hague ( ) is the capital city of the South Holland province of the Netherlands. With a population of over half a million, it is the third-largest city in the Netherlands. Situated on the west coast facing the North Sea, The Hague is the c ...
, Netherlands *
1975 It was also declared the ''International Women's Year'' by the United Nations and the European Architectural Heritage Year by the Council of Europe. Events January * January 1 – Watergate scandal (United States): John N. Mitchell, H. R. ...
:
Charleroi Charleroi (, , ; ) is a city and a municipality of Wallonia, located in the province of Hainaut, Belgium. It is the largest city in both Hainaut and Wallonia. The city is situated in the valley of the Sambre, in the south-west of Belgium, not ...
, Belgium *
1978 Events January * January 1 – Air India Flight 855, a Boeing 747 passenger jet, crashes off the coast of Bombay, killing 213. * January 5 – Bülent Ecevit, of Republican People's Party, CHP, forms the new government of Turkey (42nd ...
:
Leiden Leiden ( ; ; in English language, English and Archaism, archaic Dutch language, Dutch also Leyden) is a List of cities in the Netherlands by province, city and List of municipalities of the Netherlands, municipality in the Provinces of the Nethe ...
, Netherlands *
1980 Events January * January 4 – U.S. President Jimmy Carter proclaims a United States grain embargo against the Soviet Union, grain embargo against the USSR with the support of the European Commission. * January 6 – Global Positioning Sys ...
:
Frankfurt Frankfurt am Main () is the most populous city in the States of Germany, German state of Hesse. Its 773,068 inhabitants as of 2022 make it the List of cities in Germany by population, fifth-most populous city in Germany. Located in the forela ...
, West Germany * 1982:
Basel Basel ( ; ), also known as Basle ( ), ; ; ; . is a city in northwestern Switzerland on the river Rhine (at the transition from the High Rhine, High to the Upper Rhine). Basel is Switzerland's List of cities in Switzerland, third-most-populo ...
, Switzerland *
1987 Events January * January 1 – Bolivia reintroduces the Boliviano currency. * January 2 – Chadian–Libyan conflict – Battle of Fada: The Military of Chad, Chadian army destroys a Libyan armoured brigade. * January 3 – Afghan leader ...
:
West Berlin West Berlin ( or , ) was a political enclave which comprised the western part of Berlin from 1948 until 1990, during the Cold War. Although West Berlin lacked any sovereignty and was under military occupation until German reunification in 1 ...
, West Germany *
1989 1989 was a turning point in political history with the "Revolutions of 1989" which ended communism in Eastern Bloc of Europe, starting in Poland and Hungary, with experiments in power-sharing coming to a head with the opening of the Berlin W ...
:
Luxembourg City Luxembourg (; ; ), also known as Luxembourg City ( or ; ; or ), is the capital city of Luxembourg and the Communes of Luxembourg, country's most populous commune. Standing at the confluence of the Alzette and Pétrusse rivers in southern Luxe ...
, Luxembourg *
1992 1992 was designated as International Space Year by the United Nations. Events January * January 1 – Boutros Boutros-Ghali of Egypt replaces Javier Pérez de Cuéllar of Peru as United Nations Secretary-General. * January 6 ** The Republ ...
:
San Sebastián San Sebastián, officially known by the bilingual name Donostia / San Sebastián (, ), is a city and municipality located in the Basque Autonomous Community, Spain. It lies on the coast of the Bay of Biscay, from the France–Spain border ...
, Spain *
1996 1996 was designated as: * International Year for the Eradication of Poverty Events January * January 8 – A Zairean cargo plane crashes into a crowded market in the center of the capital city of the Democratic Republic of the Congo ...
:
Den Bosch s-Hertogenbosch (), colloquially known as Den Bosch (), is a List of cities in the Netherlands by province, city and List of municipalities of the Netherlands, municipality in the Netherlands with a population of 160,783. It is the capital of ...
, Netherlands *
1998 1998 was designated as the ''International Year of the Ocean''. Events January * January 6 – The ''Lunar Prospector'' spacecraft is launched into orbit around the Moon, and later finds evidence for Lunar water, frozen water, in soil i ...
:
Dublin Dublin is the capital and largest city of Republic of Ireland, Ireland. Situated on Dublin Bay at the mouth of the River Liffey, it is in the Provinces of Ireland, province of Leinster, and is bordered on the south by the Dublin Mountains, pa ...
, Ireland *
2002 The effects of the September 11 attacks of the previous year had a significant impact on the affairs of 2002. The war on terror was a major political focus. Without settled international law, several nations engaged in anti-terror operation ...
:
Luxembourg City Luxembourg (; ; ), also known as Luxembourg City ( or ; ; or ), is the capital city of Luxembourg and the Communes of Luxembourg, country's most populous commune. Standing at the confluence of the Alzette and Pétrusse rivers in southern Luxe ...
, Luxembourg *
2004 2004 was designated as an International Year of Rice by the United Nations, and the International Year to Commemorate the Struggle Against Slavery and Its Abolition (by UNESCO). Events January * January 3 – Flash Airlines Flight 60 ...
:
Liège Liège ( ; ; ; ; ) is a City status in Belgium, city and Municipalities in Belgium, municipality of Wallonia, and the capital of the Liège Province, province of Liège, Belgium. The city is situated in the valley of the Meuse, in the east o ...
, Belgium *
2007 2007 was designated as the International Heliophysical Year and the International Polar Year. Events January * January 1 **Bulgaria and Romania 2007 enlargement of the European Union, join the European Union, while Slovenia joins the Eur ...
:
London London is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of both England and the United Kingdom, with a population of in . London metropolitan area, Its wider metropolitan area is the largest in Wester ...
, United Kingdom *
2009 2009 was designated as the International Year of Astronomy by the United Nations to coincide with the 400th anniversary of Galileo Galilei's first known astronomical studies with a telescope and the publication of Astronomia Nova by Joha ...
:
Monte Carlo Monte Carlo ( ; ; or colloquially ; , ; ) is an official administrative area of Monaco, specifically the Ward (country subdivision), ward of Monte Carlo/Spélugues, where the Monte Carlo Casino is located. Informally, the name also refers to ...
, Monaco *
2010 The year saw a multitude of natural and environmental disasters such as the 2010 Haiti earthquake, the Deepwater Horizon oil spill, and the 2010 Chile earthquake. The 2009 swine flu pandemic, swine flu pandemic which began the previous year ...
:
Rotterdam Rotterdam ( , ; ; ) is the second-largest List of cities in the Netherlands by province, city in the Netherlands after the national capital of Amsterdam. It is in the Provinces of the Netherlands, province of South Holland, part of the North S ...
, Netherlands *
2012 2012 was designated as: *International Year of Cooperatives *International Year of Sustainable Energy for All Events January *January 4 – The Cicada 3301 internet hunt begins. * January 12 – Peaceful protests begin in the R ...
:
Liège Liège ( ; ; ; ; ) is a City status in Belgium, city and Municipalities in Belgium, municipality of Wallonia, and the capital of the Liège Province, province of Liège, Belgium. The city is situated in the valley of the Meuse, in the east o ...
, Belgium *
2014 The year 2014 was marked by the surge of the Western African Ebola epidemic, West African Ebola epidemic, which began in 2013, becoming the List of Ebola outbreaks, most widespread outbreak of the Ebola, Ebola virus in human history, resul ...
:
Leeds Leeds is a city in West Yorkshire, England. It is the largest settlement in Yorkshire and the administrative centre of the City of Leeds Metropolitan Borough, which is the second most populous district in the United Kingdom. It is built aro ...
, United Kingdom *
2015 2015 was designated by the United Nations as: * International Year of Light * International Year of Soil __TOC__ Events January * January 1 – Lithuania officially adopts the euro as its currency, replacing the litas, and becomes ...
:
Utrecht Utrecht ( ; ; ) is the List of cities in the Netherlands by province, fourth-largest city of the Netherlands, as well as the capital and the most populous city of the Provinces of the Netherlands, province of Utrecht (province), Utrecht. The ...
, Netherlands *
2017 2017 was designated as the International Year of Sustainable Tourism for Development by the United Nations General Assembly. Events January * January 1 – Istanbul nightclub shooting: A gunman dressed as Santa Claus opens fire at the ...
:
Düsseldorf Düsseldorf is the capital city of North Rhine-Westphalia, the most populous state of Germany. It is the second-largest city in the state after Cologne and the List of cities in Germany with more than 100,000 inhabitants, seventh-largest city ...
, Germany *
2019 This was the year in which the first known human case of COVID-19 was documented, preceding COVID-19 pandemic, the pandemic which was declared by the World Health Organization the following year. Up to that point, 2019 had been described as ...
:
Brussels Brussels, officially the Brussels-Capital Region, (All text and all but one graphic show the English name as Brussels-Capital Region.) is a Communities, regions and language areas of Belgium#Regions, region of Belgium comprising #Municipalit ...
, Belgium *
2022 The year began with another wave in the COVID-19 pandemic, with SARS-CoV-2 Omicron variant, Omicron spreading rapidly and becoming the dominant variant of the SARS-CoV-2 virus worldwide. Tracking a decrease in cases and deaths, 2022 saw ...
:
Copenhagen Copenhagen ( ) is the capital and most populous city of Denmark, with a population of 1.4 million in the Urban area of Copenhagen, urban area. The city is situated on the islands of Zealand and Amager, separated from Malmö, Sweden, by the ...
, Denmark *
2023 Catastrophic natural disasters in 2023 included the Lists of 21st-century earthquakes, 5th-deadliest earthquake of the 21st century 2023 Turkey–Syria earthquakes, striking Turkey and Syria, leaving up to 62,000 people dead; Cyclone Freddy ...
:
Bilbao Bilbao is a city in northern Spain, the largest city in the Provinces of Spain, province of Biscay and in the Basque Country (greater region), Basque Country as a whole. It is also the largest city proper in northern Spain. Bilbao is the List o ...
, Spain *
2024 The year saw the list of ongoing armed conflicts, continuation of major armed conflicts, including the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the Myanmar civil war (2021–present), Myanmar civil war, the Sudanese civil war (2023–present), Sudane ...
:
Florence Florence ( ; ) is the capital city of the Italy, Italian region of Tuscany. It is also the most populated city in Tuscany, with 362,353 inhabitants, and 989,460 in Metropolitan City of Florence, its metropolitan province as of 2025. Florence ...
, Italy


Future

*'' 2026'':
Barcelona Barcelona ( ; ; ) is a city on the northeastern coast of Spain. It is the capital and largest city of the autonomous community of Catalonia, as well as the second-most populous municipality of Spain. With a population of 1.6 million within c ...
, Spain *'' 2027'':
Edinburgh Edinburgh is the capital city of Scotland and one of its 32 Council areas of Scotland, council areas. The city is located in southeast Scotland and is bounded to the north by the Firth of Forth and to the south by the Pentland Hills. Edinburgh ...
, United Kingdom


Broadcasting

The Tour was first followed only by journalists from ''L'Auto'', the organisers. The race was founded to increase sales of a floundering newspaper and its editor, Desgrange, saw no reason to allow rival publications to profit. The first time papers other than ''L'Auto'' were allowed was 1921, when 15 press cars were allowed for regional and foreign reporters. The Tour was shown first on cinema newsreels a day or more after the event. The first live radio broadcast was in 1929, when Jean Antoine and Alex Virot of the newspaper ''L'Intransigeant'' broadcast for Radio Cité. They used telephone lines. In 1932 they broadcast the sound of riders crossing the col d'Aubisque in the Pyrenees on 12 July, using a recording machine and transmitting the sound later. The first television pictures were shown a day after a stage. The national TV channel used two 16mm cameras, a Jeep, and a motorbike. Film was flown or taken by train to Paris, where it was edited and then shown the following day. The first live broadcast, and the second of any sport in France, was the finish at the
Parc des Princes The Parc des Princes (, ) is an all-seater stadium, all-seater football stadium in Paris, France. It is located in the south-west of the French capital, inside the 16th arrondissement of Paris, 16th arrondissement, near the Stade Jean-Bouin (P ...
in Paris on 25 July 1948. Rik Van Steenbergen of Belgium led in the bunch after a stage of from Nancy. The first live coverage from the side of the road was from the Aubisque on 8 July 1958. Proposals to cover the whole race were abandoned in 1962 after objections from regional newspapers whose editors feared the competition. The dispute was settled, but not in time for the race, and the first complete coverage was the following year in 1963. In 1958 the first mountain climbs were broadcast live on television for the first time, and in 1959 helicopters were first used for the television coverage. The leading television commentator in France was a former rider, Robert Chapatte. At first he was the only commentator. He was joined in following seasons by an analyst for the mountain stages and by a commentator following the competitors by motorcycle. Broadcasting in France was largely a state monopoly until 1982, when the
socialist Socialism is an economic ideology, economic and political philosophy encompassing diverse Economic system, economic and social systems characterised by social ownership of the means of production, as opposed to private ownership. It describes ...
president
François Mitterrand François Maurice Adrien Marie Mitterrand (26 October 19168 January 1996) was a French politician and statesman who served as President of France from 1981 to 1995, the longest holder of that position in the history of France. As a former First ...
allowed private broadcasters and privatised the leading television channel. Competition between channels raised the broadcasting fees paid to the organisers from 1.5 per cent of the race budget in 1960 to more than a third by the end of the century. Broadcasting time also increased as channels competed to secure the rights. The two largest channels to stay in public ownership, Antenne 2 and FR3, combined to offer more coverage than its private rival,
TF1 TF1 (; standing for ''Télévision Française 1'') is a French commercial television network owned by TF1 Group, controlled by the Bouygues conglomerate. TF1's average market share of 24% makes it the most popular domestic network. TF1 is part ...
. The two stations, renamed France 2 and France 3, still hold the domestic rights and provide pictures for broadcasters around the world. The stations use a staff of 300 with four helicopters, two aircraft, two motorcycles, 35 other vehicles including trucks, and 20 podium cameras.A podium camera is not one focused on the winner's podium but a full-scale camera on a mount, or podium. French aviation company Hélicoptères de France (HdF) has provided aerial filming services for the Tour since 1999. HdF operates
Eurocopter Airbus Helicopters SAS (formerly Eurocopter S.A., trade name, trading as Eurocopter Group) is the helicopter manufacturer, helicopter manufacturing division of Airbus. It is the largest in the industry in terms of revenues and turbine helicopte ...
AS355 Écureuil 2 and AS350 Écureuil helicopters for this purpose, and the pilots undergo training along the course for six months before the race. Domestic television covers the most important stages of the Tour, such as those in the mountains, from mid-morning until early evening. Coverage typically starts with a survey of the day's route, interviews along the road, discussions of the difficulties and tactics ahead, and a 30-minute archive feature. The biggest stages are shown live from start to end, followed by interviews with riders and others and features such an edited version of the stage seen from beside a team manager following and advising riders from his car. Radio covers the race in updates throughout the day, particularly on the national news channel, France Info, and some stations provide continuous commentary on long wave. The 1979 Tour was the first to be broadcast in the United States. In the United Kingdom, ITV obtained the
rights Rights are law, legal, social, or ethics, ethical principles of freedom or Entitlement (fair division), entitlement; that is, rights are the fundamental normative rules about what is allowed of people or owed to people according to some legal sy ...
to the Tour de France in 2002, replacing
Channel 4 Channel 4 is a British free-to-air public broadcast television channel owned and operated by Channel Four Television Corporation. It is state-owned enterprise, publicly owned but, unlike the BBC, it receives no public funding and is funded en ...
as the UK terrestrial broadcaster. Channel 4 coverage had been broadcast for the previous 15 years with episodes introduced with a theme written by Pete Shelley. The coverage is shown on ITV4, having aired in previous years on
ITV2 ITV2 is a Television in the United Kingdom, British free-to-air television channel owned by ITV Digital Channels, a division of ITV plc. It was launched on 7 December 1998. For a number of years, it had the largest audience share after the fiv ...
and
ITV3 ITV3 is a Television in the United Kingdom, British free-to-air television channel owned by ITV Digital Channels, a division of ITV plc. The channel was first launched on Monday 1 November 2004 at 9 pm, replacing Plus (British TV channel), Plus ...
. Initially, live coverage was only broadcast at the weekend but since the 2010 Tour de France, ITV4 has broadcast daily live coverage of every stage except the final which is shown on
ITV1 ITV1 (formerly known as ITV) is a British free-to-air Public service broadcasting in the United Kingdom, public broadcast television channel owned and operated by the British media company ITV plc. It provides the ITV (TV network), Channel 3 ...
, ITV4 have the nightly highlights show. It was reported in January 2025 that the 2025 Tour de France would be the last to be broadcast on ITV, and the last to be broadcast live on
free-to-air Free-to-air (FTA) services are television (TV) and radio services broadcast in unencrypted form, allowing any person with the appropriate receiving equipment to receive the signal and view or listen to the content without requiring a subscri ...
television in the UK, with Warner Bros. Discovery (WBD)'s
pay television Pay television, also known as subscription television, premium television or, when referring to an individual service, a premium channel, refers to Subscription business model, subscription-based television services, usually provided by multichan ...
channel group TNT Sports having acquired the Tour's UK broadcasting rights from 2026 onwards. As part of the change, the highlights show would move to WBD's free-to-air channel Quest. In the United States, the Tour de France has been
broadcast Broadcasting is the data distribution, distribution of sound, audio audiovisual content to dispersed audiences via a electronic medium (communication), mass communications medium, typically one using the electromagnetic spectrum (radio waves), ...
by the NBC Sports Group since 1999, under a contract most recently renewed in 2023 to last through 2029. Currently, all stages stream exclusively on its streaming platform
Peacock Peafowl is a common name for two bird species of the genus '' Pavo'' and one species of the closely related genus '' Afropavo'' within the tribe Pavonini of the family Phasianidae (the pheasants and their allies). Male peafowl are referred t ...
, with selected stages simulcast on the NBC broadcast network. The rights were first acquired by Outdoor Life Network (OLN) in 1999; buoyed by Lance Armstrong's performance in the race, OLN considered the Tour to be its flagship program, and its coverage helped expand the then-fledging cable channel to over 60 million households. However, critics raised concerns over the extensive focus OLN placed on Armstrong during its coverage, with some jokingly stating that "OLN" stood for "Only Lance Network". The Tour would remain part of its programming through OLN's relaunch as mainstream sports channel Versus, and became integrated with NBC Sports after Versus parent company
Comcast Comcast Corporation, formerly known as Comcast Holdings,Before the AT&T Broadband, AT&T merger in 2001, the parent company was Comcast Holdings Corporation. Comcast Holdings Corporation now refers to a subsidiary of Comcast Corporation, not th ...
acquired
NBC Universal NBCUniversal Media, LLC (abbreviated as NBCU and doing business as NBCUniversal or Comcast NBCUniversal since 2013) is an American multinational mass media and entertainment conglomerate that is a subsidiary of Comcast and headquartered at 30 ...
(rebranding Versus as the NBC Sports Network afterward), The combination of unprecedented rigorous doping controls and almost no positive tests helped restore fans' confidence in the 2009 Tour de France. This led directly to an increase in global popularity of the event. The most watched stage of 2009 was stage 20, from Montélimar to Mont Ventoux in Provence, with a global total audience of 44 million, making it the 12th most watched sporting event in the world in 2009.


Culture

The Tour is an important cultural event for fans in Europe. Millions line the route, some having camped for a week to get the best view. The Tour de France appealed from the start not just for the distance and its demands but because it played to a wish for national unity, a call to what Maurice Barrès called the France "of earth and deaths" or what Georges Vigarello called "the image of a France united by its earth". The image had been started by the 1877 travel/school book .A school book written by Augustine Fouillée under the name G. Bruno and published in 1877, it sold 6 million by 1900, 7 million by 1914 and 8.4 million by 1976. It was used in schools until the 1950s and is still available. It told of two boys, André and Julien, who "in a thick September fog left the town of Phalsbourg in
Lorraine Lorraine, also , ; ; Lorrain: ''Louréne''; Lorraine Franconian: ''Lottringe''; ; ; is a cultural and historical region in Eastern France, now located in the administrative region of Grand Est. Its name stems from the medieval kingdom of ...
to see France at a time when few people had gone far beyond their nearest town". The book sold six million copies by the time of the first Tour de France, the biggest selling book of 19th-century France (other than the Bible). It stimulated a national interest in France, making it "visible and alive", as its preface said. There had already been a car race called the Tour de France but it was the publicity behind the cycling race, and Desgrange's drive to educate and improve the population, that inspired the French to know more of their country. The academic historians Jean-Luc Boeuf and Yves Léonard say most people in France had little idea of the shape of their country until began publishing maps of the race.


Arts

The Tour has inspired several popular songs in France, notably (1932), (1936) and (1950). German electronic group
Kraftwerk Kraftwerk (, ) is a Germany, German Electronic music, electronic band formed in Düsseldorf in 1970 by Ralf Hütter and Florian Schneider. Widely considered innovators and pioneers of electronic music, Kraftwerk was among the first successful a ...
composed "
Tour de France The Tour de France () is an annual men's multiple-stage cycle sport, bicycle race held primarily in France. It is the oldest and most prestigious of the three Grand Tour (cycling), Grand Tours, which include the Giro d'Italia and the Vuelta a ...
" in 1983 – described as a minimalistic "melding of man and machine"Chris Jones
Kraftwerk, Tour De France Soundtracks
(), BBC, 4 August 2003.
 – and produced an album '' Tour de France Soundtracks'' in 2003, the centenary of the Tour. The Tour and its first Italian winner, Ottavio Bottecchia, are mentioned at the end of
Ernest Hemingway Ernest Miller Hemingway ( ; July 21, 1899 – July 2, 1961) was an American novelist, short-story writer and journalist. Known for an economical, understated style that influenced later 20th-century writers, he has been romanticized fo ...
's '' The Sun Also Rises''. From 2011 to 2015, American
letterpress Letterpress printing is a technique of relief printing for producing many copies by repeated direct impression of an inked, raised surface against individual sheets of paper or a continuous roll of paper. A worker composes and locks movable t ...
studio Lead Graffiti experimented with handset wood and
metal type In physical typesetting, a sort or type is a block with a typographic character etched on it, used—when lined up with others—to print text. In movable-type printing, the sort or type is cast from a matrix mold and assembled by hand wit ...
to print same-day posters documenting events of each stage of the Tour de France. The designers called the project "endurance letterpress". A 2013 article on the poster series appeared in ''
Sports Illustrated ''Sports Illustrated'' (''SI'') is an American sports magazine first published in August 1954. Founded by Stuart Scheftel, it was the first magazine with a circulation of over one million to win the National Magazine Award for General Excellen ...
'' magazine's "Sports in Media" issue. In 2014 the
British Library The British Library is the national library of the United Kingdom. Based in London, it is one of the largest libraries in the world, with an estimated collection of between 170 and 200 million items from multiple countries. As a legal deposit li ...
celebrated the Tour's fourth '' Grand Départ'' from the U.K. with an exhibition of ''Tour de Lead Graffiti'' posters. In films, the Tour was background for '' Five Red Tulips'' (1949) by Jean Stelli, in which five riders are murdered. A burlesque in 1967, by
Alex Joffé Alex Joffé (18 November 1918 – 18 August 1995) was a French film director and screenwriter, known for ''Les cracks'' (1968), ''Fortunat'' (1960) and ''La grosse caisse'' (1965). He was the father of the director Arthur Joffé, as well as Mari ...
, with Bourvil and Monique Tarbès, also featured it. Footage of the 1970 Tour de France is shown in Jorgen Leth's experimental short '' Eddy Merckx in the Vicinity of a Cup of Coffee''. Patrick Le Gall made (1996). The comedy, (2001), featured the Tour of 1974. In 2005, three films chronicled a team. The German , translated as '' Hell on Wheels'', recorded 2003 from the perspective of Team Telekom. The film was directed by Pepe Danquart, who won an Academy Award for live-action short film in 1993 for ''Black Rider'' (). The Danish film ''Overcoming'' by Tómas Gislason recorded the 2004 Tour from the perspective of
Team CSC Tinkoff () was a Russian-registered professional cycling team from Russia and previously Denmark. It competed in the UCI World Tour. The team was owned by former Tour de France winner Bjarne Riis from 2000 until 2013 and Russian banker Oleg T ...
. ''Wired to Win'' chronicles Française des Jeux riders Baden Cooke and Jimmy Caspar in 2003. By following their quest for the points classification, won by Cooke, the film looks at the working of the brain. The film, made for IMAX theaters, appeared in December 2005. It was directed by Bayley Silleck, who was nominated for an Academy Award for documentary short subject in 1996 for '' Cosmic Voyage''. A fan, Scott Coady, followed the 2000 Tour with a handheld video camera to make ''The Tour Baby!'' which raised $160,000 to benefit the Lance Armstrong Foundation, and made a 2005 sequel, ''Tour Baby Deux!'' by Louis Malle is an 18-minute short of 1962. The 1965 Tour was filmed by
Claude Lelouch Claude Barruck Joseph Lelouch (; born 30 October 1937) is a French film director, writer, cinematographer, actor and producer. Lelouch grew up in an Algerian Jewish family. He emerged as a prominent director in the 1960s. Lelouch gained critical ...
in . This 30-minute documentary has no narration and relies on sights and sounds of the Tour. In fiction, the 2003 animated feature (''
The Triplets of Belleville ''The Triplets of Belleville'' () is a 2003 animated adventure comedy-drama film written and directed by Sylvain Chomet. It was released as ''Belleville Rendez-vous'' in the United Kingdom and Ireland. The film is Chomet's first feature film a ...
'') ties into the Tour de France.
Netflix Netflix is an American subscription video on-demand over-the-top streaming service. The service primarily distributes original and acquired films and television shows from various genres, and it is available internationally in multiple lang ...
, partnered with the organizer Amaury Sport Organisation, has produced a documentary series about the eight major teams across the 2022 Tour de France named '' Tour de France: Unchained''. It was released in June 2023.


Post-Tour criteriums

After the Tour de France there are criteriums in the Netherlands and Belgium. These races are public spectacles where thousands of people can see their heroes from the Tour de France race. The budget of a criterium is over 100,000 euros, with most of the money going to the riders. Jersey winners or big-name riders earn between 20 and 60 thousand euros per race in start money.


Doping

Allegations of doping have plagued the Tour almost since it began in 1903. Early riders consumed
alcohol Alcohol may refer to: Common uses * Alcohol (chemistry), a class of compounds * Ethanol, one of several alcohols, commonly known as alcohol in everyday life ** Alcohol (drug), intoxicant found in alcoholic beverages ** Alcoholic beverage, an alco ...
and used
ether In organic chemistry, ethers are a class of compounds that contain an ether group, a single oxygen atom bonded to two separate carbon atoms, each part of an organyl group (e.g., alkyl or aryl). They have the general formula , where R and R ...
to dull the pain. Over the years they began to increase performance and the
Union Cycliste Internationale The Union Cycliste Internationale (; UCI; ) is the world governing body for sports cycling and oversees international competitive cycling events. The UCI is based in Aigle, Switzerland. The UCI issues racing licenses to riders and enforces di ...
and governments enacted policies to combat the practice. In 1924,
Henri Pélissier Henri Pélissier (; 22 January 1889 – 1 May 1935) was a French Bicycle racing, racing cyclist from Paris and champion of the 1923 Tour de France, 1923 Tour de France. In addition to his 29 career victories, he was known for his long-standing feu ...
and his brother
Charles Charles is a masculine given name predominantly found in English language, English and French language, French speaking countries. It is from the French form ''Charles'' of the Proto-Germanic, Proto-Germanic name (in runic alphabet) or ''* ...
told the journalist Albert Londres they used
strychnine Strychnine (, , American English, US chiefly ) is a highly toxicity, toxic, colorless, bitter, crystalline alkaloid used as a pesticide, particularly for killing small vertebrates such as birds and rodents. Strychnine, when inhaled, swallowed, ...
,
cocaine Cocaine is a tropane alkaloid and central nervous system stimulant, derived primarily from the leaves of two South American coca plants, ''Erythroxylum coca'' and ''Erythroxylum novogranatense, E. novogranatense'', which are cultivated a ...
,
chloroform Chloroform, or trichloromethane (often abbreviated as TCM), is an organochloride with the formula and a common solvent. It is a volatile, colorless, sweet-smelling, dense liquid produced on a large scale as a precursor to refrigerants and po ...
,
aspirin Aspirin () is the genericized trademark for acetylsalicylic acid (ASA), a nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drug (NSAID) used to reduce pain, fever, and inflammation, and as an antithrombotic. Specific inflammatory conditions that aspirin is ...
, "horse ointment" and other drugs. The story was published in ''
Le Petit Parisien ''Le Petit Parisien'' () was a prominent France, French newspaper during the Third French Republic, Third Republic. It was published between 1876 and 1944, and its circulation was over two million after the First World War. Publishing Despite its ...
'' under the title ''Les Forçats de la Route'' ('The Convicts of the Road') On 13 July 1967, British cyclist Tom Simpson died climbing
Mont Ventoux Mont Ventoux (; ) is a mountain in the Provence region of southern France, located some northeast of Carpentras, Vaucluse. On the north side, the mountain borders the department of Drôme. At , it is the highest mountain in the region and h ...
after taking
amphetamine Amphetamine (contracted from Alpha and beta carbon, alpha-methylphenethylamine, methylphenethylamine) is a central nervous system (CNS) stimulant that is used in the treatment of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), narcolepsy, an ...
. In 1998, the "Tour of Shame", Willy Voet, soigneur for the Festina team, was arrested with
erythropoietin Erythropoietin (; EPO), also known as erythropoetin, haematopoietin, or haemopoietin, is a glycoprotein cytokine secreted mainly by the kidneys in response to cellular hypoxia; it stimulates red blood cell production ( erythropoiesis) in th ...
(EPO),
growth hormone Growth hormone (GH) or somatotropin, also known as human growth hormone (hGH or HGH) in its human form, is a peptide hormone that stimulates growth, cell reproduction, and cell regeneration in humans and other animals. It is thus important in ...
s,
testosterone Testosterone is the primary male sex hormone and androgen in Male, males. In humans, testosterone plays a key role in the development of Male reproductive system, male reproductive tissues such as testicles and prostate, as well as promoting se ...
and amphetamine. Police raided team hotels and found products in the possession of the cycling team TVM. Riders went on strike. After mediation by director Jean-Marie Leblanc, police limited their tactics and riders continued. Some riders had dropped out and only 96 finished the race. It became clear in a trial that management and health officials of the Festina team had organised the doping. Further measures were introduced by race organisers and the UCI, including more frequent testing and tests for
blood doping Blood doping is a form of Doping in sport, doping in which the number of red blood cells in the bloodstream is boosted in order to enhance athletic performance. Because such blood cells carry oxygen from the lungs to the muscles, a higher concentr ...
( transfusions and EPO use). This would lead the UCI to becoming a particularly interested party in an
International Olympic Committee The International Olympic Committee (IOC; , CIO) is the international, non-governmental, sports governing body of the modern Olympic Games. Founded in 1894 by Pierre de Coubertin and Demetrios Vikelas, it is based i ...
initiative, the
World Anti-Doping Agency The World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA; , AMA) is an international organization co-founded by the governments of over 140 nations along with the International Olympic Committee based in Canada to promote, coordinate, and monitor the fight against d ...
(WADA), created in 1999. In 2002, the wife of Raimondas Rumšas, third in the 2002 Tour de France, was arrested after EPO and anabolic steroids were found in her car. Rumšas, who had not failed a test, was not penalised. In 2004, Philippe Gaumont said doping was endemic to his Cofidis team. Fellow Cofidis rider David Millar confessed to EPO after his home was raided. In the same year, Jesús Manzano, a rider with the Kelme team, alleged he had been forced by his team to use banned substances. From 1999 to 2005, seven successive tours were declared as having been won by Lance Armstrong. In August 2005, one month after Armstrong's seventh apparent victory, ''L'Équipe'' published documents it said showed Armstrong had used EPO in the 1999 race. At the same Tour, Armstrong's urine showed traces of a glucocorticosteroid hormone, although below the positive threshold. He said he had used skin cream containing triamcinolone to treat saddle sores. Armstrong said he had received permission from the UCI to use this cream. Further allegations ultimately culminated in the United States Anti Doping Agency ( USADA) disqualifying him from all his victories since 1 August 1998, including his seven consecutive Tour de France victories, and a lifetime ban from competing in professional sports. The ASO declined to name any other rider as winner in Armstrong's stead in those years. The 2006 Tour had been plagued by the Operación Puerto doping case before it began. Favourites such as
Jan Ullrich Jan Ullrich (; born 2 December 1973) is a German former professional road bicycle racer. Ullrich won gold and silver medals in the 2000 Summer Olympics in Sydney, Australia, Sydney. He won the 1999 Vuelta a España and the HEW Cyclassics in fro ...
and Ivan Basso were banned by their teams a day before the start. Seventeen riders were implicated. American rider Floyd Landis, who finished the Tour as holder of the overall lead, had tested positive for
testosterone Testosterone is the primary male sex hormone and androgen in Male, males. In humans, testosterone plays a key role in the development of Male reproductive system, male reproductive tissues such as testicles and prostate, as well as promoting se ...
after he won stage 17, but this was not confirmed until some two weeks after the race finished. On 30 June 2008 Landis lost his appeal to the
Court of Arbitration for Sport The Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS; , TAS) is an international body established in 1984 to settle disputes related to sport through arbitration. Its headquarters are in Lausanne, Switzerland, and its courts are located in New York City, Sy ...
, and Óscar Pereiro was named as winner. On 24 May 2007, Erik Zabel admitted using EPO during the first week of the 1996 Tour, when he won the points classification. Following his plea that other cyclists admit to drugs, former winner
Bjarne Riis Bjarne Lykkegård Riis (; born 3 April 1964), nicknamed ''The Eagle from Herning'' (), is a Denmark, Danish former professional road bicycle racer who won the 1996 Tour de France. For many years he was the owner and later manager of the Oleg Tink ...
admitted in
Copenhagen Copenhagen ( ) is the capital and most populous city of Denmark, with a population of 1.4 million in the Urban area of Copenhagen, urban area. The city is situated on the islands of Zealand and Amager, separated from Malmö, Sweden, by the ...
on 25 May 2007 that he used EPO regularly from 1993 to 1998, including when he won the 1996 Tour. His admission meant the top three in 1996 were all linked to doping, two admitting cheating. On 24 July 2007 Alexander Vinokourov tested positive for a blood transfusion (
blood doping Blood doping is a form of Doping in sport, doping in which the number of red blood cells in the bloodstream is boosted in order to enhance athletic performance. Because such blood cells carry oxygen from the lungs to the muscles, a higher concentr ...
) after winning a time trial, prompting his Astana team to pull out and police to raid the team's hotel. The next day
Cristian Moreni Cristian Moreni (born 21 November 1972 in Asola) is an Italian former road racing cyclist who competed as a professional from 1998 to 2000. He took eight wins in his career, including stages of the Giro d'Italia and Vuelta a España, the Ita ...
tested positive for
testosterone Testosterone is the primary male sex hormone and androgen in Male, males. In humans, testosterone plays a key role in the development of Male reproductive system, male reproductive tissues such as testicles and prostate, as well as promoting se ...
. His Cofidis team pulled out. The same day, leader Michael Rasmussen was removed for "violating internal team rules" by missing random tests on 9 May and 28 June. Rasmussen claimed to have been in Mexico. The Italian journalist Davide Cassani told Danish television he had seen Rasmussen in Italy. The alleged lying prompted Rasmussen's firing by Rabobank. On 11 July 2008, Manuel Beltrán tested positive for EPO after the first stage. On 17 July 2008, Riccardo Riccò tested positive for continuous erythropoiesis receptor activator, a variant of EPO, after the fourth stage. In October 2008, it was revealed that Riccò's teammate and Stage 10 winner
Leonardo Piepoli Leonardo Piepoli (born 29 September 1971 in La Chaux-de-Fonds, Switzerland) is a former Italy, Italian professional Bicycle road racing, road racing cyclist. He most recently rode for on the UCI ProTour, but had his contract suspended in July 20 ...
, as well as Stefan Schumacher – who won both time trials – and Bernhard Kohl – third on general classification and King of the Mountains – had tested positive. After winning the 2010 Tour de France, it was announced that Alberto Contador had tested positive for low levels of clenbuterol on 21 July rest day. On 26 January 2011, the Spanish Cycling Federation proposed a 1-year ban but reversed its ruling on 15 February and cleared Contador to race. Despite a pending appeal by the UCI, Contador finished fifth overall in the 2011 Tour de France, but in February 2012, Contador was suspended and stripped of his 2010 victory. During the 2012 Tour, the 3rd placed rider from 2011, Fränk Schleck, tested positive for the banned diuretic Xipamide and was immediately disqualified from the Tour. In October 2012, the United States Anti-Doping Agency released a report on doping by the U.S. Postal Service cycling team, implicating, amongst others, Armstrong. The report contained
affidavit An ( ; Medieval Latin for "he has declared under oath") is a written statement voluntarily made by an ''affiant'' or ''deposition (law), deponent'' under an oath or affirmation which is administered by a person who is authorized to do so by la ...
s from riders including Frankie Andreu, Tyler Hamilton,
George Hincapie George Anthony Hincapie (born June 29, 1973) is an American former racing cycle sport, cyclist, who competed professionally between 1994 and 2012. Hincapie was a key domestique of Lance Armstrong. Hincapie was also a domestique for Alberto Contad ...
, Floyd Landis, Levi Leipheimer, and others describing widespread use of
Erythropoietin Erythropoietin (; EPO), also known as erythropoetin, haematopoietin, or haemopoietin, is a glycoprotein cytokine secreted mainly by the kidneys in response to cellular hypoxia; it stimulates red blood cell production ( erythropoiesis) in th ...
(EPO), blood transfusion, testosterone, and other banned practices in several Tours. In October 2012 the UCI acted upon this report, formally stripping Armstrong of all titles since 1 August 1998, including all seven Tour victories, and announced that his Tour wins would not be reallocated to other riders. While no Tour winner has been convicted, or even seriously accused of doping in order to win the Tour in the past decade, due to the previous era, questions frequently arise when a strong performance exceeds expectations. While four-time champion Froome has been involved in a doping case, it is out of an abundance of caution that modern riders are kept under a microscope with bike inspections to check for "mechanical doping" as well as Biological Passports as officials try not to have a repeat of EPO with 'H7379 Haemoglobin Human'. Despite initially beginning as an operation to investigate the winter sport of Nordic Skiing, Operation Aderlass is of particular interest to this sport because it involved people formerly and presently involved in cycling. Including the since vacated 2008 podium finisher Bernhard Kohl, who made accusations that a team doctor instructed riders how to dope, which prompted further investigation into this matter by authorities.


Deaths

Cyclists who have died during the Tour de France: * 1910: French racer Adolphe Hélière drowned at the French Riviera during a rest day. * 1935: Spanish racer Francisco Cepeda plunged down a ravine on the Col du Galibier. * 1967: 13 July, Stage 13: Tom Simpson died of heart failure during the ascent of Mont Ventoux.
Amphetamine Amphetamine (contracted from Alpha and beta carbon, alpha-methylphenethylamine, methylphenethylamine) is a central nervous system (CNS) stimulant that is used in the treatment of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), narcolepsy, an ...
s were found in Simpson's jersey and blood. * 1995: 18 July, Stage 15: Fabio Casartelli crashed at while descending the Col de Portet d'Aspet. Another seven fatal accidents have occurred: * 1934: A motorcyclist giving a demonstration in the velodrome of La Roche-sur-Yon, to entertain the crowd before the cyclists arrived, died after he crashed at high speed. * 1957: 14 July: Motorcycle rider Rene Wagner and passenger Alex Virot, a journalist for Radio Luxembourg, went off a mountain road in the Spanish Pyrenees. * 1958: An official, Constant Wouters, died from injuries received after sprinter André Darrigade collided with him at the
Parc des Princes The Parc des Princes (, ) is an all-seater stadium, all-seater football stadium in Paris, France. It is located in the south-west of the French capital, inside the 16th arrondissement of Paris, 16th arrondissement, near the Stade Jean-Bouin (P ...
. * 1964: Nine people died when a supply van hit a bridge in the
Dordogne Dordogne ( , or ; ; ) is a large rural departments of France, department in south west France, with its Prefectures in France, prefecture in Périgueux. Located in the Nouvelle-Aquitaine region roughly half-way between the Loire Valley and ...
region, resulting in the highest tour-related death toll. * 2000: A 12-year-old from Ginasservis, known as Phillippe, was hit by a car in the Tour de France publicity caravan. * 2002: A seven-year-old boy, Melvin Pompele, died near Retjons after running in front of a car in the publicity caravan. * 2009: 18 July, Stage 14: A spectator in her 60s was struck and killed by a police motorcycle while crossing a road along the route near Wittelsheim.


Records and statistics

One rider has been King of the Mountains, won the combination classification, combativity award, the points competition, and the Tour in the same year—
Eddy Merckx Édouard Louis Joseph, Baron Merckx (born 17 June 1945), known as Eddy Merckx (, ), is a Belgian former professional road and track cyclist racer who is the most successful rider in the history of competitive cycling. His victories include an ...
in 1969, which was also the first year he participated. The following year he came close to repeating the feat, but was five points behind the winner in the points classification. The only other rider to come close to this achievement is Bernard Hinault in
1979 Events January * January 1 ** United Nations Secretary-General Kurt Waldheim heralds the start of the ''International Year of the Child''. Many musicians donate to the ''Music for UNICEF Concert'' fund, among them ABBA, who write the song ...
, who won the overall and points competitions and placed second in the mountains classification. Twice the Tour was won by a racer who never wore the yellow jersey until the race was over. In 1947, Jean Robic overturned a three-minute deficit on the final stage into Paris. In 1968,
Jan Janssen Johannes Adrianus "Jan" Janssen (born 19 May 1940) is a Dutch former professional cyclist. He was UCI Road World Championships – Men's road race, world champion and winner of the Tour de France and the Vuelta a España, the first Dutch rider ...
of the Netherlands secured his win in the individual time trial on the last day. The Tour has been won three times by racers who led the general classification on the first stage and holding the lead all the way to Paris. Maurice Garin did it during the Tour's first edition, 1903; he repeated the feat the next year, but the results were nullified by the officials as a response to widespread cheating. Ottavio Bottecchia completed a GC start-to-finish sweep in 1924. And in 1928, Nicolas Frantz held the GC for the entire race, and at the end, the podium consisted solely of members of his racing team. While no one has equalled this feat since 1928, four times a racer has taken over the GC lead on the second stage and carried that lead all the way to Paris.
Jacques Anquetil Jacques Anquetil (; 8 January 1934 – 18 November 1987) was a French road racing cyclist and the first cyclist to win the Tour de France five times, in 1957 and from 1961 to 1964. He stated before the 1961 Tour that he would gain the ye ...
predicted he would wear the yellow jersey as leader of the general classification from start to finish in 1961, which he did. That year, the first day had two stages, the first part from Rouen to Versailles and the second part from Versailles to Versailles. André Darrigade wore the yellow jersey after winning the opening stage but Anquetil was in yellow at the end of the day after the time trial. The most appearances record is held by Sylvain Chavanel, who rode his 18th and final Tour in 2018. Prior to Chavanel's final Tour, he shared the record with
George Hincapie George Anthony Hincapie (born June 29, 1973) is an American former racing cycle sport, cyclist, who competed professionally between 1994 and 2012. Hincapie was a key domestique of Lance Armstrong. Hincapie was also a domestique for Alberto Contad ...
with 17. In light of Hincapie's suspension for use of performance-enhancing drugs, before which he held the mark for most consecutive finishes with sixteen, having completed all but his first, Joop Zoetemelk and Chavanel share the record for the most finishes at 16, with Zoetemelk having completed all 16 of the Tours that he started. Of these 16 Tours Zoetemelk came in the top five 11 times, a record, finished 2nd six times, a record, and won the 1980 Tour de France. Between 1920 and 1985, Jules Deloffre (1885–1963) was the record holder for the number of participations in the Tour de France, and even sole holder of this record until 1966, when André Darrigade rode in his 14th Tour. In the early years of the Tour, cyclists rode individually, and were sometimes forbidden to ride together. This led to large gaps between the winner and the number two. Since the cyclists now tend to stay together in a
peloton In a road Cycle sport, bicycle race, the peloton (, originally meaning ) is the main group or pack of riders. Riders in a group save energy by riding close (drafting (racing), drafting or slipstreaming) to (particularly behind) other riders. The ...
, the margins of the winner have become smaller, as the difference usually originates from time trials, breakaways or on mountain top finishes, or from being left behind the peloton. The smallest margins between the winner and the second placed cyclists at the end of the Tour is 8 seconds between winner
Greg LeMond Gregory James LeMond (born June 26, 1961) is an American former Road bicycle racing, road racing cyclist. He won the Tour de France thrice and the UCI Road World Championships – Men's road race, Road Race World Championship twice, becoming t ...
and
Laurent Fignon Laurent Patrick Fignon (; 12 August 1960 – 31 August 2010) was a French professional road bicycle racer who won the Tour de France in 1983 and 1984, as well as the Giro d'Italia in 1989. He held the title of FICP World No. 1 in 1989. Fignon came ...
in
1989 1989 was a turning point in political history with the "Revolutions of 1989" which ended communism in Eastern Bloc of Europe, starting in Poland and Hungary, with experiments in power-sharing coming to a head with the opening of the Berlin W ...
. The largest margin, by comparison, remains that of the first Tour in 1903: 2h 49m 45s between Maurice Garin and Lucien Pothier. The most podium places by a single rider is eight by Raymond Poulidor, followed by Bernard Hinault and Joop Zoetemelk with seven. Poulidor never finished in 1st place and neither Hinault nor Zoetemelk ever finished in 3rd place. Lance Armstrong finished on the podium eight times, and
Jan Ullrich Jan Ullrich (; born 2 December 1973) is a German former professional road bicycle racer. Ullrich won gold and silver medals in the 2000 Summer Olympics in Sydney, Australia, Sydney. He won the 1999 Vuelta a España and the HEW Cyclassics in fro ...
seven times, however they both had results voided and now officially have zero and six podiums respectively. Three riders have won 8 stages in a single year: Charles Pélissier ( 1930),
Eddy Merckx Édouard Louis Joseph, Baron Merckx (born 17 June 1945), known as Eddy Merckx (, ), is a Belgian former professional road and track cyclist racer who is the most successful rider in the history of competitive cycling. His victories include an ...
(
1970 Events January * January 1 – Unix time epoch reached at 00:00:00 UTC. * January 5 – The 7.1 1970 Tonghai earthquake, Tonghai earthquake shakes Tonghai County, Yunnan province, China, with a maximum Mercalli intensity scale, Mercalli ...
, 1974), and Freddy Maertens (
1976 Events January * January 2 – The International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights enters into force. * January 5 – The Pol Pot regime proclaims a new constitution for Democratic Kampuchea. * January 18 – Full diplomatic ...
).
Mark Cavendish Sir Mark Simon Cavendish (born 21 May 1985) is a Manx people, Manx retired professional cyclist. As a Track cycling, track cyclist he specialised in the Madison (cycling), madison, points race, and scratch race disciplines; as a road racer he ...
has the most mass finish stage wins with 35 as of 2024, ahead of André Darrigade and
André Leducq André Leducq (; 27 February 1904 – 18 June 1980) was a French cyclist who won the 1930 and 1932 Tour de France, Tours de France. He also won a gold medal at the 1924 Summer Olympics in the team road race event and the 1928 Paris–Roubaix ...
with 22,
François Faber François Faber (; 26 January 1887 – 9 May 1915) was a Luxembourgish racing cyclist. He was born in France. He was the first foreigner to win the Tour de France in 1909, and his record of winning 5 consecutive stages still stands. He died in ...
with 19, and Eddy Merckx with 18. The youngest Tour de France stage winner is Fabio Battesini, who was 19 when he won one stage in the 1931 Tour de France. The fastest massed-start stage was in 1999 from Laval to Blois (), won by Mario Cipollini at . The fastest time-trial is
Rohan Dennis Rohan Craig Dennis (born 28 May 1990) is an Australian former cyclist, who competed professionally in the track cycling, track and road bicycle racing, road disciplines of the sport for five different teams. Having been a member of the Australi ...
's stage 1 of the 2015 Tour de France in
Utrecht Utrecht ( ; ; ) is the List of cities in the Netherlands by province, fourth-largest city of the Netherlands, as well as the capital and the most populous city of the Provinces of the Netherlands, province of Utrecht (province), Utrecht. The ...
, won at an average of . The fastest stage win was by the 2013 Orica GreenEDGE team in a team time-trial. It completed the in Nice (stage 5) at . The longest successful post-war breakaway by a single rider was by Albert Bourlon in the 1947 Tour de France. In the Carcassonne–Luchon stage, he stayed away for .Tour 09, Procycling (UK) summer 2009 It was one of seven breakaways longer than , the last being
Thierry Marie Thierry Marie (born 25 June 1963) is a French former cyclist. Marie often performed well in prologue stages: he won the Tour de France prologue three times in his career, and because of that he wore the yellow jersey in those three years, for ...
's escape in 1991. Bourlon finished 16 m 30s ahead. This is one of the biggest time gaps but not the greatest. That record belongs to José-Luis Viejo, who beat the peloton by just over 23:00 and the second place rider by 22 m 50s in the Montgenèvre-Manosque stage in 1976. He was the fourth and most recent rider to win a stage by more than 20 minutes. The record for total number of days wearing the yellow jersey is 96, held by Eddy Merckx. Bernard Hinault, Miguel Induráin, Chris Froome and Jacques Anquetil are the only other riders who have worn it 50 days or more.


Record winners

Four riders have won five times:
Jacques Anquetil Jacques Anquetil (; 8 January 1934 – 18 November 1987) was a French road racing cyclist and the first cyclist to win the Tour de France five times, in 1957 and from 1961 to 1964. He stated before the 1961 Tour that he would gain the ye ...
(FRA),
Eddy Merckx Édouard Louis Joseph, Baron Merckx (born 17 June 1945), known as Eddy Merckx (, ), is a Belgian former professional road and track cyclist racer who is the most successful rider in the history of competitive cycling. His victories include an ...
(BEL),
Bernard Hinault Bernard Hinault (; born 14 November 1954) is a French former professional road bicycle racing, road cyclist. With 147 professional victories, including five times the Tour de France, he is often named among the greatest cyclists of all time. In ...
(FRA), and
Miguel Induráin Miguel Induráin Larraya (; born 16 July 1964) is a retired Spanish road racing cyclist. Induráin won five Tours de France from 1991 Tour de France, 1991 to 1995 Tour de France, 1995, the fourth, and last, to win five times, and the only five- ...
(ESP). Indurain achieved the mark with a record five consecutive wins.


Related events

L'Étape du Tour (French for 'stage of the Tour') is an organised mass participation
cyclosportive A cyclosportive, or often simply sportive, is a short to long distance, organised, mass-participation cycling event, typically held annually. The Italian term ''Gran Fondo'' is commonly used for these events in the United States, Australia and som ...
event that allows amateur cyclists to race over the same route as a Tour de France stage. First held in 1993, and now organised by the ASO, in conjunction with ''Vélo Magazine'', it takes place each July, normally on a Tour rest day. Several different versions of a Tour de France for women were held between the 1980s and 2000s, however these races failed for a variety of reasons such as high costs, lack of sponsorship and inability to use the Tour de France branding. Following a campaign by the professional women's peloton, La Course by Le Tour de France was launched by ASO in 2014 as a one-day classic held in conjunction with the men's race. The first edition was held on the Champs-Élysées prior to the final stage of the men's race, with La Course subsequently using other stages of the Tour prior to the men's race – with locations such as Pau, Col de la Colombière and Col d'Izoard. The race was part of the UCI Women's World Tour. From 2022, Tour de France Femmes – an 8-day stage race in the UCI Women's World Tour – was held following the Tour, replacing La Course. The Tour de France Femmes had its first stage on the Champs-Élysées prior to the final stage of the men's race. The announcement of the race was praised by the professional peloton and campaigners. The first edition was won by Dutch rider
Annemiek van Vleuten Annemiek van Vleuten (; born 8 October 1982) is a retired Dutch professional Bicycle racing, road racing cyclist, who most recently rode for UCI Women's Team, UCI Women's WorldTeam . Van Vleuten is twice a winner of both the UCI Road World Cha ...
, completing a Giro – Tour double in the same year. On the other hand, some events related to Tour de France have been held by ASO, around the world. Tour de France Saitama criterium has been held in Saitama,
Japan Japan is an island country in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean off the northeast coast of the Asia, Asian mainland, it is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan and extends from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea ...
since 2013. After the success in Japan, Tour de France Singapore criterium has been held in
Singapore Singapore, officially the Republic of Singapore, is an island country and city-state in Southeast Asia. The country's territory comprises one main island, 63 satellite islands and islets, and one outlying islet. It is about one degree ...
since 2022.


Notes


References


Bibliography

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Further reading

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External links

* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Tour De France Cycle races in France Grand Tour (cycling) Recurring sporting events established in 1903 UCI ProTour races UCI World Tour races 1903 establishments in France Annual sporting events in France July in sports Summer in France Challenge Desgrange-Colombo races Super Prestige Pernod races