*** Welcome to piglix ***

Cycling at the 2004 Summer Olympics – Men's individual road race

Men's cycling road race
at the Games of the XXVIII Olympiad
Venue Athens
Date August 14
Winning time 5:41:44
Medalists
1st, gold medalist(s) Paolo Bettini  Italy
2nd, silver medalist(s) Sérgio Paulinho  Portugal
3rd, bronze medalist(s) Axel Merckx  Belgium
← 2000
2008 →
1st, gold medalist(s) Paolo Bettini  Italy
2nd, silver medalist(s) Sérgio Paulinho  Portugal
3rd, bronze medalist(s) Axel Merckx  Belgium

Men's Road Race at the 2004 Summer Olympics (Cycling). In a race that showed numerous break away attempts, it wasn't until Paolo Bettini and Sérgio Paulinho broke away from the group with a couple of laps remaining and opened up a comfortable gap on the final lap that an idea of the medal positions could be gained. With the peloton giving up the chase of the leaders, Axel Merckx broke away to open up a sufficient gap for him to take bronze. Bettini out sprinted Paulinho for the gold, finishing in a time of 5 hours 41 minutes and 44 seconds. Among the other pre-race favourites, World Champion Igor Astarloa of Spain crashed on the opening lap, and 2000 Olympic road race champion Jan Ullrich finished among the peloton in 19th place. A number of other top names in the field, including Germany's Andreas Klöden and Russia's Viatcheslav Ekimov, pulled out before the end of the race, presumably with the Time Trial race, to be held four days later, in mind.

Date: August 14

Start: 12:45


...
Wikipedia

...