As the 2010 Tour of Italy (the Giro) is on at the moment I thought I’d create a series of posts, starting with the Giro, about the colours of the winning jerseys for the major bike races.
Every major multi-stage cycling race has different categories that can be won. Aside from the general, overall classification there are jerseys for:
- King of the mountains
- Points leader
- Young rider leader
- Last in race
Not all stage races have jerseys for the same classifications and colours of jerseys differ from race to race.
The colours of the jerseys were derived from the colours of the sports newspapers that originally sponsored the races.
Whilst everyone knows that the Tour de France leader wears the coveted yellow jersey, the leader of the Tour of Italy gets to wear pink:
- General leader = Pink Jersey (Italian: maglia rosa)
- Points leader = Red Jersey (Italian: maglia rosso)
- King of the mountains = Green Jersey (Italian: maglia verde)
- Young leader = White Jersey (Italian: maglia bianca)
- Last rider = Black Jersey (Italian: maglia nera)
Next in the series coming soon.
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