Tour de France

The Tour de France is a three-week men's bike race, one of cycling's three Grand Tours, held each summer, usually in July, across France and, in some years, neighboring countries. First run in 1903, it has 21 stages, and its overall leader has worn the yellow jersey since 1919.

The Tour de France is a three-week stage race, first run in 1903, and the biggest race in cycling. Its history runs through a newspaper’s yellow paper, the Pyrenean passes added in 1910, the five riders who have each won it five times and a few finishes decided by seconds.

How long is the Tour de France?

The Tour de France covers about 3,300 to 3,500 kilometers, which is roughly 2,050 to 2,175 miles, in 21 stages over 23 days. The route is new every year: from 2021 to 2026 it measured between about 3,320 and 3,490 kilometers.

How many stages are in the Tour de France?

The Tour de France has 21 stages, one a day, with two rest days in between. The mix changes with the route: in 2026 there were seven flat stages, four hilly stages, eight mountain stages, a team time trial and an individual time trial.

How does the Tour de France work?

The Tour de France is raced by teams of eight riders, and 23 teams with 184 riders started in 2026. Each rider’s time is added up from stage to stage, and the rider with the lowest total after the last stage wins. The first three riders at each stage finish have 10, 6 and 4 seconds taken off their total.

What do the Tour de France jerseys mean?

Four jerseys mark the leaders of the Tour’s classifications after each stage. Yellow is for the leader of the general classification, the rider with the lowest overall time, and green for the leader on points, which are scored at stage finishes and intermediate sprints. The polka dot jersey is for the best climber, on points scored at the top of classified climbs, and white for the best-placed rider aged 25 or under.

Why the Tour de France leader wears yellow

The newspaper L’Auto organized the first Tours, and the leader’s jersey is yellow because L’Auto was printed on yellow paper. The jersey arrived sixteen years after the race. Henri Desgrange, the race director, introduced it in 1919, when the Tour started again after the First World War with 67 riders, most of them former soldiers. Eugène Christophe was the first to wear it, on July 19, the morning of the stage from Grenoble to Geneva. He led until the day before the finish and never won the Tour.

The green jersey followed in 1953, the race’s 50th anniversary, for the leader of a new classification on points. Fritz Schaer of Switzerland was its first winner. Points were not new to the Tour: from 1905 to 1912 they had decided the overall winner in place of time.

The Tourmalet in 1910 and Merckx’s ride to Mourenx in 1969

The Col du Tourmalet first appeared in 1910, on a stage of 326 kilometers that also crossed the Peyresourde, the Aspin and the Aubisque. Octave Lapize was first to the top, after walking much of the dirt road. He called the race officials “assassins” that day, won the stage and went on to win the Tour. By 2019 the race had climbed the Tourmalet 82 times.

Perhaps the most famous ride over the Tourmalet was Eddy Merckx’s in 1969, in the first Tour he started. Already in the yellow jersey, he went clear at the last hairpin before the summit, carried on alone over the Aubisque and reached Mourenx nearly eight minutes ahead of the rest. Michele Dancelli was second on the stage. Mourenx was a new town then, built twelve years earlier for the workers of the Lacq gas complex.

The five-time Tour de France winners

Five riders have won the Tour five times. Jacques Anquetil was the first, in 1957 and then four years running from 1961 to 1964, the last of them by 55 seconds. Merckx won his fifth in 1974, from five starts. Bernard Hinault’s five came between 1978 and 1985, and he is still the last French winner. Miguel Indurain won his five in a row, from 1991 to 1995, which no one else has done.

Tadej Pogačar became the fifth member of the group in 2026. He won in 2020, 2021, 2024, 2025 and 2026, and Jonas Vingegaard took the two Tours in between.

The list of winners also has a gap. Lance Armstrong finished first in the seven Tours from 1999 to 2005 and was later stripped of all of them for doping, and those editions have no winner.

Eight seconds in Paris: LeMond beats Fignon in 1989

The smallest winning margin in the Tour’s history is eight seconds. The 1989 race ended with a time trial, and Greg LeMond beat Laurent Fignon by 58 seconds that day to take the yellow jersey from him and win his second Tour. The yellow jersey has not changed hands on the final day since.

The finish moved around Paris before it reached the Champs-Élysées. Maurice Garin, the first winner, crossed the last finish line at Ville-d’Avray, outside the city, and was celebrated afterward at the Parc des Princes. That velodrome held the finish until 1967 and the Cipale velodrome in the Bois de Vincennes followed, before the race moved to the Champs-Élysées in 1975.

How Pogačar won the 2020 Tour at La Planche des Belles Filles

Pogačar’s first Tour also turned in a late time trial, 31 years after LeMond’s. The penultimate stage in 2020 was a time trial of 36.2 kilometers from Lure to the top of La Planche des Belles Filles. Primož Roglič was expected to win the Tour that day. Pogačar, 21 years old, was already faster after the 14 flat kilometers at the start, won the stage and went into the last day 59 seconds ahead, after Roglič had lost almost two minutes. He became the youngest winner since the yellow jersey was introduced.

Cavendish’s 35th stage win and the 2024 finish in Nice

Merckx’s 34 Tour stage wins, the last of them in 1975, stood as the record for nearly half a century. Mark Cavendish, who had shared it with him, won his 35th at Saint-Vulbas on stage 5 in 2024, ahead of Jasper Philipsen and Alexander Kristoff.

That Tour started in Florence, the first Grand Départ in Italy, and ended with a time trial from Monaco to Nice, because the Champs-Élysées was needed for the Paris Olympic Games. It was the first Tour to finish far from Paris. Pogačar won that last stage by 1 minute 2 seconds from Vingegaard, his sixth stage win of the race.

Montmartre and Pogačar’s fifth Tour in 2026

The finish returned to the Champs-Élysées in 2025, with three ascents of the cobbled climb of Montmartre added before it. Wout van Aert dropped Pogačar near the top of the third ascent and won alone. Pogačar finished fourth on the stage and won his fourth Tour, which put him level with Chris Froome.

A year later he attacked on Montmartre again and went clear on the last ascent with Mathieu van der Poel. Van der Poel held off the sprinters to win the stage, and Pogačar was caught inside the final kilometer. No rider in yellow has won the final stage in Paris since Hinault in 1982. Pogačar won his fifth Tour by 6 minutes 26 seconds from Remco Evenepoel.

Four jerseys are at stake every day: yellow for the overall lead, green for points, polka dots for the best climber and white for the best young rider. The overall race is decided on total time, and in 1989 Greg LeMond won it by eight seconds. No rider in yellow has won the final stage in Paris since Bernard Hinault in 1982.