The men's individual road race was a
road bicycle racing
Road bicycle racing is the cycle sport discipline of road cycling, held primarily on Road surface, paved roads. Road racing is the most popular professional sport, professional form of bicycle racing, in terms of numbers of competitors, events and ...
event held as part of the
Cycling at the 1968 Summer Olympics
The cycling competition at the 1968 Summer Olympics consisted of two road cycling events and five track cycling events, all for men only.
Medal summary Road cycling
Track cycling
Participating nations
329 cyclists from 52 nations competed.
...
programme. 144 cyclists from 44 nations took part. The maximum number of cyclists per nation was four. It was held on 23 October 1968. The course, just short of 25 kilometres, was covered 8 times for a total distance of 196.2 kilometres.
The event was won by
Pierfranco Vianelli of Italy, the nation's second consecutive victory in the men's individual road race (putting Italy over France in most gold medals, three to two). It was the fourth consecutive Games that an Italian cyclist finished first or second.
Leif Mortensen
Leif Mortensen (born 5 May 1946) is a former Danish professional road bicycle racer. He won a silver medal in the individual road race at the 1968 Summer Olympics while finishing fourth in the team time trial. In 1970–1975 he rode profession ...
's silver was Denmark's second consecutive silver medal in the event.
Gösta Pettersson
Gösta Artur Roland Pettersson (born 23 November 1940) is a retired Swedish cyclist. As an amateur, he competed in the individual and team road events at the 1960, 1964 and 1968 Olympics and won one silver and two bronze medals, in 1964 and 196 ...
earned Sweden's first medal in the event with his bronze.
Background
This was the eighth appearance of the event, previously 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 (and which would be reintroduced alongside the road race in 1996). There "was no heavy favorite as the last three World Championships had seen nine different riders on the podium."
Barbados, Costa Rica, Cuba, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Ecuador, El Salvador, Guatemala, Lebanon, and Madagascar each made their debut in the men's individual road race; West Germany competed separately for the first time. Great Britain made its eighth appearance in the event, the only nation to have competed in each appearance to date.
Competition format and course
The mass-start race was on a course that covered eight laps of a 24.525 kilometres circuit, for a total of 196.2 kilometres. It was a "quite hilly" course.
[Official Report, vol. 3, p. 215.]
Schedule
All times are Central Standard Time
The North American Central Time Zone (CT) is a time zone in parts of Canada, the United States, Mexico, Central America, some Caribbean Islands, and part of the Eastern Pacific Ocean.
Central Standard Time (CST) is six hours behind Coordinate ...
( UTC-6)
Results
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Cycling at the 1968 Summer Olympics - Men's individual road race
Cycling at the Summer Olympics – Men's road race
Road cycling at the 1968 Summer Olympics