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Terms
Tour de France
Cyclists

Cycling

Terms

Small motorised bicycle, used to set the pace in cycling events (e.g. the Keirin) – originally a make, first built in Paris 1938 Click to show or hide the answer
Event where riders are paced for about 2/3 of the distance, then sprint for victory; originated in Japan 1948, becoming an Olympic event for Sydney 2000 Click to show or hide the answer
Event where teams (usually of two) take it in turns to ride; developed in the USA to circumvent laws restricting the length of events, and named after a prominent venue in New York Click to show or hide the answer
Multi–race event that replaced the individual pursuit, the points race and the Madison at the Olympic Games, starting at London 2012 Click to show or hide the answer
Main body of riders in a road race (French word for a military unit – 'platoon' in English) Click to show or hide the answer
Vehicle that follows road events to pick up riders who drop out Click to show or hide the answer

Tour de France

First staged Click to show or hide the answer
(Title) awarded to the rider currently in last place Click to show or hide the answer
Number of stages (every year since 2008) Click for more information Click to show or hide the answer
Notorious mountain climb on which Tommy Simpson died in 1967 Click to show or hide the answer
English city in which the first stage started in 2014 Click to show or hide the answer

Most wins

Four men have each won the Tour de France five times:

1957 1961 1962 1963 1964 (France) Click to show or hide the answer
1969 1970 1971 1972 1974 (Belgium) Click to show or hide the answer
1978 1979 1981 1982 1985 (France) Click to show or hide the answer
1991 1992 1993 1994 1995 (Spain) Click to show or hide the answer

The last of these four is the only one to have won it five times in a row.

Lance Armstrong was stripped of his seven consecutive wins (1999–2005) in 2012.

British winners

2012 Click to show or hide the answer
2013, 2015, 2016 and 2017 Click to show or hide the answer
2018 Click to show or hide the answer

Note that of these three, only the third was actually born in Great Britain. The first was born in Belgium, and the second in Kenya.

Italian rider whose 2014 win interrupted a run of six British wins out of seven Click to show or hide the answer

Jerseys

Once upon a time it was enough to know the colours of the jerseys worn by the leaders of the various classifications in the Tour de France. Then British riders started to achieve success in the Giro d'Italia and the Vuelta a España; so now we need to know the equivalent colours for those as well.

Tour de France Giro d'Italia Vuelta a España
Leader Click to show or hide the answer Click to show or hide the answer Click to show or hide the answer
Best climber (a.k.a. 'King of the Mountains') Click to show or hide the answer Click to show or hide the answer Click to show or hide the answer
Points leader Click to show or hide the answer Click to show or hide the answer Click to show or hide the answer
Young rider Click to show or hide the answer Click to show or hide the answer

From 1974 until 2012, the points leader in the Giro wore a green jersey.

For many years the points leader in the Vuelta wore a blue jersey with a yellow fish (for sponsorship reasons).

The so–called 'rainbow jersey' is worn (in various disciplines) by the Click for more information Click to show or hide the answer

Cyclists

First to win the Tour de France 5 times, 1958–64 – including 4 in a row 1961–4 Click to show or hide the answer
US rider, retired after a record seven consecutive Tour de France wins (1999–2005) – first to win more than 5 times; stripped of all seven wins in 2012 after a protracted doping scandal (even though he never actually failed a drug test) Click to show or hide the answer
2019 Tour de France winner: from Colombia, the first winner from South America Click to show or hide the answer
Second UK rider to wear the yellow jersey in the Tour de France (1994; see Tom Simpson); crashed out in 1998 while wearing it for the third time Click to show or hide the answer
Dominated women's cycle racing in the UK throughout the 1960s and 70s, winning 7 world titles (including the world road race championship in 1960 and 1967), and more than 90 domestic championships; set a women's record for the 12–hour time–trial in 1967, which exceeded the men's record for two years; UK all–round time trial champion in 25 consecutive years, 1959–83; died of heart failure in 1996, while out delivering invitations for her 59th birthday party (on her bicycle) Click to show or hide the answer
Italian rider: died in the 1995 Tour de France – first since Tommy Simpson in 1967 Click to show or hide the answer
British cyclist (born Douglas, IoM, 1985): 34 stage wins in the Tour de France, 2008–21 – equalling Eddy Merckx's record) Click to show or hide the answer
Spanish rider: Tour de France winner 2007, 2009 and 2010; stripped of the 2010 title after being found guilty of accidentally ingesting the prohibited substance Clenbuterol Click to show or hide the answer
British (Welsh) rider, won the World Cup in 2003 and 2006, and the Grand Boucle (Women's Tour de France) 2006; also won Britain's first gold medal in the 2008 (Beijing) Olympics Click to show or hide the answer
Australian winner of the 2011 Tour de France – only the second from outside Europe (not including Lance Armstrong), and the first from the Southern Hemisphere Click to show or hide the answer
French cyclist: Tour de France winner in 1983 and 1984; narrowly missed out on a third win in 1989, when he finished second to Greg Lemond by the narrowest ever margin (8 seconds); died in 2010 of cancer, aged 50 Click to show or hide the answer
Second British winner of the Tour de France (2013); also won in 2015, 2016 and 2017; also won the Vuelta a España in 2017 and the Giro d'Italia in 2018 (born in Kenya) Click to show or hide the answer
Five Tour de France wins, 1978–85 – the last French rider to win (up to and including 2019); nicknamed Le blaireau (the Badger) Click for more information Click to show or hide the answer
Spanish rider: won the Tour de France a record 5 consecutive times (1991–5) Click to show or hide the answer
Successful Irish rider of the 1980s – won the Paris–Nice race seven times in a row, 1982–8, but never won the Tour de France or a World Championship Click to show or hide the answer
US rider, stripped of the Tour de France title in 2006 after failing a drugs test Click to show or hide the answer
US rider, first non–European to win the Tour de France (1986, 1989, 1990) Click to show or hide the answer
Belgian who won the Tour de France five times 1969–74, including four successive years 1969–72; won 34 stages – a record, equalled by Mark Cavendish in 2021 Click to show or hide the answer
Born in Yorkshire, 1930: first British rider to finish the Tour de France (1955) and first to win a stage (1958) Click to show or hide the answer
Irish rider, won the Tour de France in 1987 Click to show or hide the answer
First UK rider to wear the yellow jersey in the Tour de France; second rider to die in it (1967) Click to show or hide the answer
Six times British track cycling champion; and the most successful female British Paralympian of all time, with a total of 14 gold medals in cycling and swimming; appointed a Dame (DBE) in 2013 Click to show or hide the answer
The only German winner of the Tour de France (1997); retroactively banned from 2011, after being found guilty of a doping offence in 2012; admitted to blood doping in 2013 Click to show or hide the answer
Second British winner of the Vuelta a España (2018 – the year after Chris Froome) Click to show or hide the answer

Other

Italian equivalent of the Tour de France (first held in 1909) Click to show or hide the answer
Spanish equivalent of the Tour de France (first held in 1935) – won in 2017 by Chris Froome Click to show or hide the answer
British chemicals company, led by Sir James ('Jim') Ratcliffe – said to be Britain's richest man – which took over sponsorship of Team Sky following the latter's withdrawal in 2019 Click to show or hide the answer

© Haydn Thompson 2017–22