Tour Xtra |
Time Trials in the Tour de France |
The Individual Time Trial (ITT) In an ITT, the riders dont start together but one after one. The fastest rider wins the stage. The first ITT in the history of the Tour de France, was the 22nd stage of the 1934 Tour de France, around Nantes, won by Frenchman Antonin Magne, who also won the Tour that year. The longest ITT was won by Belgian Raymond Impanis in 1947: 139 km. The first rider to exceed an average speed of 50 km per hour, was Dutchman Gerrie Knetemann, in 1977. His average speed was 50.058 km/h. The fastest ITT so far was set by Christopher Boardman. In the prologue of the 1994 Tour, he reached an average of 55.152 km/h. In the lists below, I have seperated prologues from the longer ITTs. A combined list would show almost only prologue wins. |
1 Christopher Boardman (GBr) 2 Christopher Boardman (GBr) 3 Fabian Cancellara (Sui) |
55.152 km/h 54.193 km/h 53.660 km/h |
1994 1998 2007 |
7.2 km 5.6 km 7.9 km |
1 David Millar (GBr) 2 Lance Armstrong (USA) 3 Jan Ullrich (Ger) |
54.359 km/h 53.986 km/h 53.642 km/h |
2003/stage 19 2000/stage 19 2000/stage 19 |
49.0 km 58.5 km 58.5 km |
The Team Time Trial (TTT) In a TTT, the riders start team by team. When a team crosses the finish line, the time of the fifth rider counts as the team time; the team with the fastest time wins the stage. Actual times will be taken per rider for the general individual classification.
In 2004 and 2005, the organisers used a system, in which the actual time of the winning team counted for that team, with the team setting the second time losing a maximum of 020, adding 010 per team until the 15th team losing a maximum of 230, the 16th team 235 until a maximum of 300 for the 21st and last team. Before 2004, a rider or a team losing more than 7 minutes, would only lose those 7 minutes for the General Classification (this used to be 5 mins in the years up to and including 1995). Another rule that has been used in the past, amongst others, was based on a special time bonus system, in which teams lost 030, 100, 130 and so on to the winners. The first TTTs were scheduled in the mid-1930s, but from 1954 they have been organised in the way we still know it. In the early period of TTTing (1935-1937), the riders did start in teams, but the actual times per rider counted for the General Classification. Also, the stage winner was not a team, but one of the riders. Most confusing factor was the place of the individual riders, who were seemingly at a random base added to teams, in order to fill them up. Thanks to Tom James for some of the historical info. |
All TTT winners 1954-2011
1954 Switzerland 1955 the Netherlands 1957 France 1962 Faema (Bel) 1963 Pelforth (Fra) 1964 Kas (Esp) 1965 Ford (Fra) 1966 TeleVizier (Ned) 1967 Belgium 1968 Belgium 1969 Faema (Bel) 1970 Faema (Bel) 1971 Molteni (Bel) 1972 Molteni (Bel) 1973 Watney (Bel) 1974 Molteni (Bel) 1976 Raleigh (Ned) 1977 Fiat (Bel) 1978 Raleigh (Ned) 1979 Raleigh (Ned) & Raleigh (Ned) * 1980 Raleigh (Ned) & Raleigh (Ned) * 1981 Raleigh (Ned) & Raleigh (Ned) * 1982 Raleigh (Ned) 1983 Coφp-Mercier (Fra) |
1984 Renault (Fra) 1985 La Vie Claire (Fra) 1986 Systθme U (Fra) 1987 Carrera (Ita) 1988 Panasonic (Ned) 1989 Super U (Fra) 1990 Panasonic (Ned) 1991 Ariostea (Ita) 1992 Panasonic (Ned) 1993 GB-MG (Ita) 1994 GB-MG (Ita) 1995 Gewiss (Ita) 2000 ONCE (Esp) 2001 Crιdit Agricole (Fra) 2002 ONCE (Esp) 2003 US Postal Service (USA) 2004 US Postal Service (USA) 2005 Discovery Channel (USA) 2009 Astana (Kaz) 2011 Garmin (USA) 2012
* = two TTTs in 1979, 1980 and 1981 |
1 Discovery Channel (USA) 2 Garmin (USA) 3 Gewiss (Ita) |
57.324 km/h 55.645 km/h 54.943 km/h |
2005 2011 1995 |
67.5 km 23.0 km 67.0 km |
Fastest TTTs |
1 David Zabriskie (USA) 2 Greg Lemond (USA) |
54.676 km/h 54.545 km/h |
2005/stage 1 1989/stage 21 |
19.0 km 24.5 km |
Fastest prologues (less than 8 km) |
Fastest ITTs 8-30 km (not often scheduled) |
Fastest ITTs 30+ km |