- As you know, we love our stats here at GCN.
So as it's July, and Tour de France time,
we've rustled up a whole host of fascinating
Tour de France stats for you to absorb and enjoy.
- Yeah, in the form of a Tour de France Stat Attack.
In terms of stage victories,
it is the great Eddy Merckx
who leads the way with a staggering 34 to his name,
which of course helped him on his way
to five overall victories at the race.
However, the Briton Mark Cavendish is well on his way
to that mark.
He now sits on 30 stage victories throughout his career.
Can he beat the record of Merckx?
Well given he's only 32 years of age at the moment,
you wouldn't put it past him
rewriting the record books over the next few years.
- It is worth mentioning though, Dan, that Cav
actually has the record for the amount of road wins
because Eddie's tally includes TT victories.
- Oh okay.
- Now the record number of wins in the green jersey
points competition goes to German rider Erik Zabel,
who achieved six wins back-to-back
between 1996 and 2001,
overtaking the previous record
held by Sean Kelly of Ireland with four.
- That's right. However, there is a rider
in the current pro peloton
who does stand a very good chance of equaling
and perhaps bettering that record.
Because Pete Sagan has won the green points jersey
in every Tour de France in which he has started,
which is the last five,
starting all the way back in 2012.
The mountains competition has been around
as an official Tour de France classification
since 1937,
as an incentive to the best climbers in the race.
Now the record holder in this classification
is the slightly controversial,
housewives' favourite of France, Richard Virenque.
Now he did admit to using performing enhancing drugs
through his career, but nevertheless,
he took the win in that competition
on no less than seven occasions.
- Hmm. Beating by one, both Federico Bahamontes of Spain
and Lucien Van Impe of Belgium,
who both had six wins apiece.
And, in fact, none of the current generation of pros
anywhere near that tally.
And, in fact, it's only Rafal Majka,in 2014 and 2016,
who's won it twice, out of the recent crop of pros.
Now the rider who spent the most days in the maillot jaune,
the yellow jersey, is kind of unsurprising,
the legend that is Eddie Merckx.
His total, 96 days - Whoa. Really?
- In yellow.
- That is really quite incredible.
Over three months consecutively.
- Yeah.
- All right, if you want another record,
the record for the most different wearers
of the yellow jersey within a single Tour de France
is eight.
But it happened on two occasions,
in both 1958 and 1987.
But we should also give a shout out
to one Fabian Cancellara.
He wore the yellow jersey on 29 days.
And that is a record for someone
that never actually won the Tour de France.
According to the record books,
the record for the most number of overall victories
at the Tour de France stands at five.
And it's held by four individual riders.
They being Jacques Anquetil, Eddy Merckx,
Bernard Hinault, and also Miguel Indurain.
- Indeed, but Lance Armstrong won an incredible seven
Tours de France successively.
Although, justifiably so, his name's been scrubbed
from the record books by the organisers.
But the same can't be said of Richard Virenque
and Erik Zabel, who laterally admitted to using
performing enhancing drugs.
Now the record for the most number of starts
or participations in the Tour de France
is actually shared by three riders.
George Hincapie, Jens Voigt, and Stuart O'Grady.
All with 17 starts apiece.
- Yeah, and two of those I think held the yellow jersey
at a point in their career as well.
- They did.
- And the mark at which they overtook
was that of Joop Zoetemelk.
He started 16 Tours de France,
and he finished all of them,
giving him a 100% record through his career.
And incredibly, he finished in the top 10
on 12 of those occasions.
- And he won in 1980.
- Wow.
- Go, Joop.
- The record for the most elderly rider
ever to take part in La Grande Boucle.
goes to Henri Paret.
He was 50 years old when he took part in the race
back in 1904, 113 years ago.
- Wow. Well, the accolade for the oldest rider ever to win
the Tour de France would have to go all the way back
to 1922 when Firmin Lambot, who won the Tour,
age 36 years and four months.
Phew. Sorry about that.
It's just started to rain out there.
Now, the fastest ever road stage in the Tour de France,
well that was held in 1999
from Laval to Blois
over a distance of 190.4 kilometres.
On that particular occasion,
the stage was one by none other,
you all right?
Than Mario Cipollini.
His average speed then, 50.4 kilometres an hour.
- Wow, that is fast.
But the individual time to record is even faster.
It was held for a long time by the American Greg LeMond.
He won the final stage of the 1989 Tour de France,
24.5 kilometre individual time trial
with an incredible average speed
of 54.545 kilometres per hour.
That was enough to give him the overall victory that year
by a slender eight seconds over Laurent Fignon.
However, that mark has been eclipsed recently
by the Australian Rohan Dennis.
Back in 2015, he won the opening individual time trial
of the race.
A 14.5 kilometre time trial with an average speed
of 55.466 kilometres per hour.
- You can't say that...
That is rapid.
But, the undisputed heavyweight of high speed
in the Tour de France is this.
Back in 2013, it was a team time trial in Nice,
won by Orica GreenEdge.
Their speed, 57.8 kilometres an hour.
I mean, it's hard enough to get up to that speed,
let alone hold it!
I need a piece of ham.
- Now the country with the most overall wins to their name,
as you can probably guess, is France.
As of 2017, they have 36 overall wins
at the Tour de France.
Which is exactly double that of the second place country,
which is Belgium, who stand at 18.
- Right. Currently, Dan, I mean, both those countries
have experienced a remarkably long drought between
the last Tour de France victories.
In fact, let's go all the way back to 1985
to see the last Frenchman that stood atop of the podium.
And on that particular occasion,
it was none other than Bernard Hinault.
And then for the Belgians,
well, you have to go even further back to 1976
when Lucien Van Impe stood atop the podium
adorned in yellow.
- Now, arguably, the early editions of the Tour de France
were far tougher than the Tours of today.
And to justify that, I've got a stat for you, okay?
In the 1919 edition of the Tour,
there were 67 starters.
But get this, only 10 riders actually finished
that edition of the Tour.
Only 14.9 % in fact.
- Yeah, in contrast to that,
the record came in 2016 where 174 finishers came
from the initial 198 starters.
That is a percentage of 87.8.
- Well, there you go.
We hope you've enjoyed these Tour de France stats.
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- Yeah. Now a couple more videos
which you might to like watch right now.
Down here are the top 10 rules of the Tour de France.
And down here, Matt and I have a Tour de France fact off.