It’s often commented that Egan Bernal’s victory in the 2019 Tour de France opens up a new chapter in the race and for Colombia. But it also closes, at long last, another era in the history of his country’s cycling. By wearing the yellow jersey in Paris, Bernal has achieved something dubbed by Colombians as the sueño amarillo: the yellow dream.
More than four decades have passed since ‘Cochise’ Rodriguez, a former world track champion who raced for the Bianchi squad alongside Felice Gimondi, became the first Colombian to take part in the Tour in 1975. Since then, Colombia’s impact on the Tour de France has steadily increased, as well as in the Grand Tours across the board. But as Bernal repeatedly pointed out in his final press conference, despite all the podiums and triumphs in the Giro d’Italia and Vuelta a España, overall victory at the Tour de France had eluded Colombian cycling.
At the Tour, there have been numerous landmarks for the South American country since Rodriguez completed the race in 1975 in 33rd place. There was the first stage win in 1984, when Luis Herrera won on Alpe d’Huez. There was the first podium in Paris, when Fabio Parra placed third behind Pedro Delgado and Steven Rooks in 1988. There was the first yellow jersey in 2003, when US Postal’s Victor Hugo Peña, whose achievements as a swimmer led him to be nicknamed El Tiburon [The Shark], wore it for three days.
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There have also been some serious low points, such as in 2010, when no Colombians raced the Tour for the first time in 27 years. It prompted leading national newspaper El Tiempo to ask wistfully: "Is there someone prepared to pay 5 million euros to sponsor a Colombian team so that this sad part of our cycling history not to be repeated in the future?”
Overall, Colombian riders have now won 20 Tour stages, and finished on the Tour podium six times – once with Parra, Bernal and Rigoberto Uran, and three times with Nairo Quintana.
Rodriguez has the honour of being Colombia’s pioneer in the Tour. However, the point where the cycling world sat up and took full notice of the Colombian presence in the race occurred in 1983 and 1984.
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