Cycling’s Three Grand Tours and Their Jerseys Explained

The three Grand Tours are cycling’s longest and most prestigious stage races. Their coloured jerseys can look confusing at first, but the system is simple once explained.

What is a Grand Tour?

A Grand Tour is a stage race of up to 21 stages over about three weeks. The three events are the Tour de France (first held in 1903), the Giro d’Italia (1909) and the Vuelta a España (1935). Each includes flat stages, hilly stages, mountain stages and time trials.

How the winner is decided

The general classification is based on cumulative time. The rider with the lowest total time after the final stage wins, which means gaining or losing minutes on a single mountain day can decide the race.

Reading the jerseys

• Overall leader: yellow in the Tour, pink in the Giro and red in the Vuelta.
• Points classification: usually green, for consistent finishers and sprinters.
• Mountains classification: the Tour’s famous polka-dot jersey rewards climbers.
• Best young rider: a white jersey for the best-placed young rider.

Why yellow and pink?

The Tour’s yellow jersey is traditionally linked to the yellow paper of the newspaper that founded the race, while the Giro’s pink reflects the pink pages of its original sponsor newspaper.

Team roles

Cycling is a team sport. Domestiques shield leaders from the wind and carry supplies, sprinters’ teams build lead-outs, and climbers defend the overall contender in the mountains.

Planning to watch

Routes, jersey sponsors and rules change each year. Official race websites publish the latest stage profiles.