The 2012 Tour de France was the 99th edition of the greatest sporting spectacular on earth.
It started in the city of Liege in Belgium on the 30th June and finished 23 gruelling days later in Paris on the 22nd July.
It had moved forward a couple of weeks to make way for the 2012 London Olympics.
This year’s tour consisted of 21 stages and 2 rest days and would cover a distance of 3,497kms (2,173mls).
The first 3 stages were in Belgium, including a (very) short 6.4km (4ml) Prologue or opening Individual Time Trial.
The 2012 race was contested by 22 professional teams, each team consisting of 9 riders. 18 were ProTeam’s, and the guest entry of 4 Continental Teams were at the Start Line, a total of 198 Riders.
35 Riders were riding the Tour de France for the first, and the riders came from 31 different countries.
The average age was 30years, ranging from 22-year-old Thibaut Pinot (FDJ-Big Mat) to the 40-year-old Jen Voight.
The bookies favourite for this year’s General Classification (Winner) was Bradley Wiggins of Team Sky.
His closet rivals were Cadel Evans (Australia – Riding for the BMC Racing Team) and Vincenzo Nibali (Italy – with the Liquigas-Cannondale Team).
Andy Schleck, the winner of the 2011 Tour, was not able to compete, as he had not fully recovered from an injury sustained at the Criterium du Dauphine.
Prior to the 2012 Tour, Wiggins’s highest finishes in any of the Grand Tours was 3rd in the 2011 Vuelta a Espana and 4th in the 23009 Tour.
For the Sprinters, there were 8 Flat Stages this year and Mark Cavendish was favourite the points for the Green (Points) Jersey. Cavendish is current World Road Race Champion and was defending his 2011 Green Jersey.
Bradley Wiggins secured the overall General Classification (Yellow Jersey) on the 20th Stage – a 53.5km (33.2ml) Individual Time Trial. Chris Froome his team mate at Team Sky was placed second overall.
Mark Cavendish won his fourth consecutive Champs-Elysee stage to record his third win of this year’s race.
Wiggins finished the race to become the first ever British Rider to win the Tour de France. He finished 3mins 21sec clear of team mate Chris Froome.
Vincenzo Nibali was placed third at 6mins 19sec behind Wiggins. Peter Sagan won the Points Classification.
Of the 198 starters, 153 (77.2%) reached the finish line in Paris – about average for the length and severity of the race.
There were a couple of drug raids during the race. On the Tour’s first Rest Day (Monday 10th July), French Police searched the team hotel of the Cofidis squad. One of the teams’ riders, Remy Di Gregorio, was arrested in relation to an ongoing doping case and was immediately suspended by his team.
The second Rest Day (Monday 17th July) was marked by a positive drugs test on Frank Schleck. He was withdrawn from the race by his team and subsequently given a one-year ban.
Overall a very hard, but entertaining Tour de France, with a very worthy and the first British Winner – Bradley Wiggins.