Business News Tour de France | Page 28

Tour de France

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Part of the crowd during most days of the Tour is Didi Senft who, in a red devil costume, has been the Tour devil since 1993.

* 2000: A 12-year-old from Ginasservis, known as Phillippe, was hit by a car in the Tour de France publicity caravan.
* 2002: A seven-year-old boy, Melvin Pompele, died near Retjons after running in front of the caravan.
* 2009: 18 July, Stage 14: A spectator in her 60s was struck and killed by a police motorcycle while crossing a road along the route near Wittelsheim.



Statistics

One rider has been King of the Mountains, won the points competition, and the Tour in the same year - Eddy Merckx in 1969.

The most appearances have been by Joop Zoetemelk with 16, which includes 1 win of GC, 12 top ten finishes and no abandonments. Three riders, Lucien van Impe

(one Tour win), Guy Nulens, and Viatcheslav Ekimov have made 15 appearances; van Impe and Ekimov finished all 15 whereas Nulens abandoned twice. George Hincapie holds the mark for most consecutive finishes with thirteen.

In the early years of the Tour, cyclists rode individually, and were sometimes forbidden to ride together. This led to large gaps between the winner and the number two. Since the cyclists now tend to stay together in a peloton, the margins of the winner have become smaller, as the difference can only originate from time trials, breakaways or on mountain top finishes. In the table below, the ten smallest margins between the winner and the second placed cyclists at the end of the Tour are given. The largest margin, by comparison, remains that of the first Tour in 1903: 2h 49m 45s between Maurice Garin and Lucien Pothier.



Stage wins

Six riders have won 20 or more stages:

*  Eddy Merckx (BEL) – 34
*  Bernard Hinault (FRA) – 28
*  André Leducq (FRA) – 25 (including half-stages)
*  Nicolas Frantz (LUX) – 25
*  Lance Armstrong (USA) – 25
*  André Darrigade (FRA) – 22

Three riders have won 8 stages in a single year: