Now that Tour de France is over, we have gathered some interesting facts and figures about this three-week long spectacle.
The organizers have prepared no less than 20 different images for the yellow jersey this year. The jersey of the leader of the general classification, worn by Primož Roglič (Jumbo Visma) for more than a half of this year’s edition of the race, might look the same from the distance every day, but it is not. The finish of each stage, that is the host town or municipality, contributed its own image, a silhouette, for the yellow jersey. Roglič therefore exchanged eleven different images on the leader’s jersey, while Pogačar only wore one: the one with the Arc de Triomphe de l’Étoile.
Slovenia is only the 15th country with a win at le Tour. In the 117 years of history of the race, it was the hosts who collected the most wins (France has 36 wins), followed by Belgium (18), Spain (12) and Italy (10). Slovenia, along with Germany, Denmark, Ireland, Australia and Columbia, has one win.
The average speed at this year’s tour was 39.59 km/h. This is around one km/h slower than last year. The average speed at the previous five editions of the race is also slightly higher than this year’s (40.09 km/h).
At this year’s edition of le Tour, the riders used around 45,000 water bottles, most of them collected as souvenirs by the spectators along the route.
On average, each rider has burnt 124,000 calories over the course of the three weeks, that is from 5,000 to 6,000 calories per stage. In food or beverage, this amounts to 200 bottles of champagne, 500 croissants or 155 full English breakfasts.
From the start in Nice to the finish in Paris, each rider made almost 500,000 pedal strokes. At the average 90 revolutions per minute, the final number is 490,000 pedal strokes.
The peloton of this year’s edition of le Tour, with 176 riders at the start (and 146 crossing the finishing line) and 3,470 kilometres covered, has used 850 bicycle tyres in the three-week race. Beside six (cycling) teams which ride on Continental tyres, all the official vehicles of the tour are equipped with Continental tyres as well.
This year’s winner, Tadej Pogačar (Team UAE Emirates), received a cash prize of 623,930 € for his victory, including all stage, mountain and intermediate sprint wins. Most of the money will be distributed evenly to his teammates.
Around 1,800 journalists were issued press passes and the tour was broadcast on 100 TV stations all over the world. On average, 6.3 million French people watched the stage 15 with the climb on the Colombier, and as many as 40 million, that is almost two thirds of the inhabitants, have watched at least a part of a stage in this year’s edition of the race.
In Slovenia, le Tour achieved the highest rating during the penultimate stage – the time-trial, when the finish and the competition between Tadej Pogačar and Primož Roglič took place. At 18h10, 17.5 percent or 332,400 spectators watched the race on TV Slovenia 2, which is more than 60 percent of all TV viewers. The final stage as a whole had the highest rating. On average, 11.5 percent or 218,900 spectators watched it, which is 41 percent of all TV viewers during that time slot.
The official website letour.fr recorded 14.5 million unique visitors during the three-week race, and the picture of Primož Roglič and Tadej Pogačar hugging at the end of the time-trial at stage 20, which was posted on the Tour’s official Instagram profile, collected more than a million likes.