Tour Down Under

The Tour Down Under, run as the Santos Tour Down Under since 2010 after its naming sponsor, is a six-day WorldTour cycling stage race held in South Australia each January. It serves as the opening round of the men's WorldTour calendar and has anchored the professional season since joining the top tier in 2008.

The Tour Down Under brought the international peloton to Adelaide in 1999 and became the first race outside Europe to join the UCI ProTour in 2008. Its history follows the roads out of the city, from sprint finishes in South Australian towns to the summit of Willunga Hill.

Tour Down Under history: the first race in 1999

For the first evening circuit race in Adelaide’s East End, race director Mike Turtur hoped for 10,000 to 15,000 spectators. He later told Cyclingnews that 40,000 turned up. South Australia’s Stuart O’Grady won the inaugural Tour Down Under, giving the new event a local champion before it had acquired much history of its own.

Adelaide also gave the race a practical shape. The peloton could use the city as a base while racing in the surrounding countryside. European riders arrived early to train and adjust to the southern summer. The UCI described that arrangement as one of the event’s strengths: the city simplified accommodation and logistics, while the nearby roads offered racing through vineyards and along the coast.

That compact geography matters to the racing. Organizers can put a sprint finish and a selective hill stage within reach of the same base. The terrain gives them room to change the balance between fast finishers and climbers without moving the whole event across the country.

Michael Rogers’s borrowed bike at the 2002 Tour Down Under

In 2002, Michael Rogers’s race almost ended on the road to Tanunda. An official motorbike knocked him down on Menglers Hill. A spectator had a bicycle that matched his own apart from its color. Rogers borrowed it, rejoined the leaders before the summit and finished second on the stage behind Cadel Evans. He took the leader’s jersey from Fabio Sacchi that afternoon and won the race overall the next day in Adelaide. The organizer preserves the episode in its history of the event.

When did the Tour Down Under join the WorldTour?

The leader’s jersey changed from yellow to ochre in 2006. Two years later, the Tour Down Under became the first event outside Europe to join the UCI ProTour. The WorldTour name followed in 2011. Adelaide now had a place in the same series as the major European stage races.

André Greipel won that first ProTour edition, taking four stages as well as the overall classification. He repeated the overall victory in 2010 with another three stage wins. A sprinter who survived the hills could collect enough time bonuses at the finishes to win the whole race.

Greipel’s relationship with South Australia lasted through nine appearances, from 2008 to 2020. He finished with 18 Tour Down Under stage wins. Looking back on his career, he told the organizer: “That race had a big impact in my career and without that race I wouldn’t have had the same career.” For a European professional, Adelaide could be the place to establish a reputation as well as begin a season.

Willunga Hill: Richie Porte’s six consecutive stage wins

Willunga Hill appeared in the route from the first edition, but the organizers made a decisive change in 2012: they put a stage finish at the top. Alejandro Valverde won that first summit finish, and Simon Gerrans won the next. A climb that riders once had to cross now offered a place to win the day.

Richie Porte then won the Willunga stage six years in succession, from 2014 to 2019. Year after year, his rivals arrived knowing where he was likely to attack and still failed to beat him to the line.

With the finish at the summit, a gap opened on Willunga could survive all the way to the line. There was no descent or flat run-in for a dropped rider to chase back. The climbers had their opportunity, though the time bonuses available on other stages still gave a fast finisher a way to win overall.

Simon Gerrans’s four Tour Down Under victories

Simon Gerrans won four editions, in 2006, 2012, 2014 and 2016. His second victory came in GreenEdge’s debut season, giving the new Australian team an overall win at home. He and Valverde finished level on time, with Gerrans winning on stage placings.

The 2014 contest was almost as close. Cadel Evans attacked on the Corkscrew climb and took the lead; Gerrans fought back through bonus seconds and reclaimed the ochre jersey on Willunga. At the end of the race, one second separated them. In 2016, Gerrans crashed on the stage into Stirling, won the next two stages and held off Porte to take his fourth title. His victories spanned a decade of changes to the race, from the years before the ProTour to the uphill finishes that became its signature.

How Daryl Impey beat Richie Porte in 2018 and 2019

In 2018, Porte won on Willunga again, but Daryl Impey reached the top close enough to take the overall lead. After time bonuses, they were level on accumulated time. Impey had already finished second on two earlier stages and did so again behind Porte on the hill. He went on to win the Tour Down Under on countback, through his better stage placings.

The following year, Impey won a stage at Campbelltown and arrived at the final climb with another overall victory within reach. Porte took his sixth consecutive Willunga win; Impey finished third on the same time and became the first man to win successive editions of the race.

Impey’s speed in a reduced-group sprint let him gather bonus seconds on days when Porte could only finish with the bunch. By Willunga, those seconds were already in the bank. Porte could win the most recognizable stage and still lose the week.

In 2020, their positions changed again. Matthew Holmes survived from the breakaway to beat Porte on Willunga, ending his run of stage victories there. Porte nevertheless took his second overall title, overturning Impey’s lead on the final climb.

Mount Lofty and the Tour Down Under’s return in 2023

The international Tour Down Under paused in 2021 and 2022. South Australia instead held the Santos Festival of Cycling, including domestic National Road Series races. Those events kept racing on local roads, but their results belong to a separate competition. The international race returned in 2023.

The men’s return ended at Mount Lofty, where Simon Yates attacked on the final ascent and Jay Vine followed him into the sprint. The stage went to Yates; Vine crossed the line alongside him with the ochre jersey secured.

This is where the season starts. While northern Europe sleeps through winter, the peloton convenes in Adelaide for six days of racing through wine country, coastal roads, and the hills east of the city. The heat matters, the climbs are short and steep, and January form is unpredictable enough to make the racing more open than the start lists suggest. It is also a rare chance to watch WorldTour racing in the southern summer.