Cycling at the 2012 Summer Olympics – Men's individual road race

The men's road race, one of the cycling events at the 2012 Olympic Games in London, took place on 28 July at 10 a.m. in central and southwest London and north Surrey, starting and finishing on The Mall.

This was the 19th appearance of the event at the Olympics, first held in 1896 and then at every Summer Olympics since 1936. It replaced the individual time trial event that had been held from 1912 to 1932; the time trial was re-introduced in 1996 alongside the road race.

Samuel Sánchez of Spain, who would have been the defending champion, was unable to compete due to an injury incurred at the 2012 Tour de France.

The race was won by Kazakhstan's Alexander Vinokourov. He sprinted clear of Colombia's Rigoberto Urán, who claimed the silver medal. Alexander Kristoff of Norway won the sprint from the following group to take bronze. Vinokourov was the first man (and, through the 2016 Games, only; multiple women have done so) to win multiple medals in the event; he had previously taken silver in 2000.

Qualification

The top ten ranked countries in the final standings of the 2011 UCI World Tour qualified to have five riders to represent their respective country in the race. The nations with five-man squads were: Spain, Belgium, Italy, Australia, Great Britain, Germany, Netherlands, United States and Switzerland; although Luxembourg placed ninth in the rankings, their roster was reduced to two men. Of the other nations on the World Tour, France and Denmark had four riders, Norway and Ireland three, Kazakhstan two and Slovakia, Costa Rica and Latvia one rider each. The top six countries on the UCI Europe Tour – Slovenia, Russia, Portugal, Poland, Turkey and Belarus – in addition to Colombia, Venezuela, Brazil, the UCI America Tour top three, UCI Asia Tour leaders Iran and UCI Africa Tour leaders Morocco, had three riders. The remaining nations in the race were represented by either two or one rider. Eritrea, Georgia, and Syria competed in the event for the first time. There were a total of 144 participants.

Pre-race favourites The Belfast Telegraph columnist The Punter considered the 2011 World Road Race champion, Mark Cavendish of Great Britain to be the favourite for the race, although his chances were likely dependent on whether the race ended in a sprint finish. Cavendish was expected to be greatly assisted by his four-man British team which he labelled his 'dream team' prior to the race and regarded by Bradley Wiggins as 'possibly the strongest fielded in an Olympic road race'. The race did not go as planned as Ian Stannard, David Millar, Chris Froome, and Wiggins all finished beyond 90th place and Cavendish came across in 29th.

Tom Boonen of Belgium, Australia's Matthew Goss, André Greipel of Germany were also tipped as potential winners. Other sprinters tipped for Medals included Tour de France points classification winner Peter Sagan of Slovakia and Edvald Boasson Hagen of Norway – but both riders had perceived weaker teams than those of Great Britain, Belgium and Germany. If the race was to have ended in a sprint finish, Sagan and Boonen were tipped for victory, along with other classic specialists such as Fabian Cancellara of Switzerland, the silver medalist in 2008, and Philippe Gilbert of Belgium.

The defending champion, Samuel Sánchez of Spain, did not enter the race due to an injury suffered at the 2012 Tour de France.

Course

The race was long and began with a mass start. Crowds were bolstered by free entry for 150 km of the 250 km route, recent British success in the 2012 Tour de France and the possibility of the host nation winning its first gold medal of the 2012 Olympics through Mark Cavendish. Originally 3,500 paid tickets were made available for the grandstand area on Box Hill where the cyclists would undertake nine laps, but due to demand this was increased to 15,000 tickets.

Schedule

All times are British Summer Time (UTC+1)

Date Time Round Saturday, 28 July 2012 10:00 Final

Results

The entry list was published on 23 July.

In the table below, "s.t." indicates that the rider crossed the finish line in the same group as the cyclist before him, and was therefore credited with the same finishing time.

Rank Cyclist Nation Time Alexander Vinokourov 5:45:57 Rigoberto Urán Alexander Kristoff 5:46:054 Taylor Phinney 5 Sergey Lagutin 6 Stuart O'Grady 7 Jürgen Roelandts 8 Grégory Rast 9 Luca Paolini 10 Jack Bauer 11 Lars Boom 12 Jakob Fuglsang 13 Rui Costa 14 Luis León Sánchez 15 Roman Kreuziger 16 Sergio Henao 17 Andriy Hryvko 18 Alejandro Valverde 19 Philippe Gilbert 20 Sylvain Chavanel 21 Janez Brajkovič 22 Fumiyuki Beppu 23 Robert Gesink 24 Alexandr Kolobnev 25 Lars Petter Nordhaug 26 Jonathan Castroviejo 5:46:1327 André Greipel 5:46:3728 Tom Boonen 29 Mark Cavendish 30 Arnaud Démare 31 Francisco Ventoso 32 Murilo Fischer 33 Tyler Farrar 34 Peter Sagan 35 Andrey Amador 36 Bernhard Eisel 37 Wong Kam-po 38 Elia Viviani 39 Héctor Rangel 40 Daryl Impey 41 Radoslav Rogina 42 Matti Breschel 43 Assan Bazayev 44 José Joaquín Rojas 45 Miguel Ubeto 46 Borut Božič 47 Ramūnas Navardauskas 48 Yukiya Arashiro 49 Manuel Antonio Cardoso 50 Rene Mandri 51 Jackson Rodríguez 52 Vladimir Isaichev 53 Yauheni Hutarovich 54 Ivan Stević 55 David McCann 56 Aleksejs Saramotins 57 Martin Elmiger Nicki Sørensen 59 Gediminas Bagdonas 60 Michał Kwiatkowski 61 Danail Petrov 62 Adil Jelloul 63 Ryder Hesjedal 64 Laurent Didier 65 Jussi Veikkanen 66 Dmytro Krivtsov 67 Arnold Alcolea 68 Kristijan Đurasek 69 Nelson Oliveira 70 Tomás Gil 71 Lars Bak 72 Gonzalo Garrido 73 Daniel Teklehaymanot 74 Sebastian Langeveld 75 Jan Bárta 76 Gustav Larsson 77 Vegard Laengen 78 Branislau Samoilau 79 Grega Bole 80 Cadel Evans 81 Daniel Schorn 82 Niki Terpstra 83 Simon Gerrans 84 Maciej Bodnar 85 Matthew Goss 86 Tony Gallopin 87 Michael Schär 88 Timmy Duggan 89 Nicolas Roche 90 Dan Martin 91 Michael Rogers 92 Greg Van Avermaet 93 Chris Horner 5:46:4694 Ian Stannard 5:46:4795 Bert Grabsch 96 Michael Albasini 97 Lieuwe Westra 98 Denis Menchov 5:46:5199 Sacha Modolo 100 Stijn Vandenbergh 101 Vincenzo Nibali 5:46:53102 Marcel Sieberg 5:47:08103 Bradley Wiggins 5:47:14104 Tejay van Garderen 5:47:31105 John Degenkolb 5:48:49106 Fabian Cancellara 5:51:40107 Marco Pinotti 5:54:04108 David Millar 5:55:16109 Chris Froome 5:58:24110 Ioannis Tamouridis — Maximiliano Richeze Byron Guamá Mehdi Sohrabi Gabor Kasa Ahmet Akdilek — Gregolry Panizo Edvald Boasson Hagen Azzedine Lagab Spas Gyurov Muhamad Othman Miraç Kal Kemal Küçükbay Muradjan Khalmuratov Magno Nazaret Tony Martin Krisztián Lovassy Amir Rusli Oleg Berdos Michał Gołaś Andrei Nechita Vasil Kiryienka Alireza Haghi Greg Henderson Giorgi Nadiradze Park Sung-Baek Soufiane Haddi Manuel Rodas Dan Craven Mouhssine Lahsaini Omar Hasanin Jorge Soto Fabio Duarte Mickaël Bourgain Amir Zargari

Over time limit (OTL) Under UCI regulations for one-day road races (article 2.3.039), "Any rider finishing in a time exceeding that of the winner by more than 5% shall not be placed". Applying this to the winning time of Alexander Vinokourov resulted in a time limit of 6 hours, 3 minutes and 14 seconds.

References