How many racers in tour de france

If you finish the gruelling Tour, you could burn off up to , calories. That's the equivalent of 26 chocolate bars per day! The race is broken up into 21 different parts or 'stages' and it isn't just flat roads.

The Tour takes the riders up into the mountains too. The different stages have different names:. Prologue : Each rider races against the clock in a short usually under six miles time trial. Flat : Despite the name, it doesn't necessarily mean it's perfectly flat. Usually it's big packs of competitors riding together in a big group or 'peloton' for around miles. These end in one of two ways - a 'breakaway' victory by an individual or small group, or typically with a hair-raising bunch sprint.

Time trial: A race against the clock. Similar to a prologue but a little longer. These are shorter stages of around 30 miles as opposed to miles. Sometimes riders do it by themselves, sometimes they ride as a team. Mountain: These come in all shapes and sizes, climbing from sea level to 2, metres sometimes more than once in a day. The race was started by Henri Desgrange as a publicity stunt back in He came up with the crazy idea of a bike race around France in order to raise the profile of L'Auto, the newspaper he worked for.

The first race was a huge success with 60 riders covering an amazing 1, miles. The Tour is now like one big race with lots of smaller races going on inside it. Riders might race for each stage win or to earn the right to wear one of the famous jerseys, which can change hands many times during the race:. The green jersey is the points prize. You get points for being one of the first riders over the line on each stage. It's usually won by a sprinter.

But the tour isn't just about reaching the highest speeds - it's also known for its uphill struggles. The riders climb thousands of metres up Alpine mountains, with the best rider on those stages winning a snazzy red and white polka dot jersey. The white jersey is given to the best young rider - that's someone who's under 25 years old. But the prize everyone dreams of is the yellow jersey. Riders compete fiercely to even have the chance to wear it for one day during the race, let alone to be wearing it as the winner at the end.

If you are wearing the Maillot Jaune Yellow Jersey it means you are the overall race leader on total time since the start of the Tour.

Tour champions are often strong at everything - climbing, sprinting and time-trialling. It's a big team event but each team has a leader who is very important. Today's Top Stories. Are Wider Tires Always Faster? Tim de Waele Getty Images. Advertisement - Continue Reading Below. Harry Pot via Wikimedia. Risorgimento via Wikipedia Commons. JeanBono via Wikipedia Commons.

Has anyone ever died in the Tour? Kei Tsuji Getty Images. How much prize money does the Tour de France winner get? Jean Catuffe Getty Images. Do racers make their stage data public? What tire pressure do the pros run at the Tour?

LB Getty Images. Molly Hurford Molly writes about cycling, nutrition and training, with an emphasis on women in sport. This content is created and maintained by a third party, and imported onto this page to help users provide their email addresses.

Biking is much more amusing when it is being done in a form of competition as people may argue or rather want to know who is the best rider among the group of riders. It is for that reason that several bicycle riding competitions have since been introduced to give bicycle riders an important platform to compete. Of all the platforms, the Tour de France is without a doubt the most outstanding and highly respected bike riding competition in the world. This is a sport that garners 3.

Tour de France is a team sport that features a total of cyclists in 22 teams of nine. Over the course of 21 days, usually in July, cyclists cover a race course extending 3, kilometers. Tour de France is split into 21 stages: Nine flat stages, three hilly stages, seven mountain stages including five summit finishes , two individual time trials and two rest days. One stage is performed every day, covers roughly kilometers, and takes about five and a half hours to complete. Each stage has a winner, and the rider that completes the most stages in the shortest amount of time goes onto win the overall title.

They tend to cycle in a main group called a peloton, and have smaller groups break away to the front at almost every stage. The peloton will allow cyclists to stay ahead for a few minutes before rejoining them when they have lost momentum.