Cycling at the 2012 Summer Olympics – Men's road race
| Men's cycling road race at the Games of the XXX Olympiad
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Alexander Vinokourov leading the breakaway group in the men's road race, approximately 10 km from the finish line on The Mall.
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| Venue | Central and southwest London and north Surrey 250 km (155.3 mi) |
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| Date | 28 July 2012 | ||||||||||||
| Competitors | 144 from 63 nations | ||||||||||||
| Winning time | 5:45:57 | ||||||||||||
| Medalists | |||||||||||||
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Alexander Vinokourov |
 Kazakhstan
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Rigoberto Urán |
 Colombia
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Alexander Kristoff |
 Norway
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The men's road race, one of the cycling events at the 2012 Olympic Games in London, took place on 28 July at 10 a.m. in central and southwest London and north Surrey, starting and finishing on The Mall.
Samuel Sánchez of Spain would have been the defending champion, but due to an injury incurred at the 2012 Tour de France he could not compete. It was anticipated over one million people would line the route – a record for an Olympic event if reached.
The race was won by Kazakhstan's Alexander Vinokourov. He sprinted clear of Colombia's Rigoberto Urán, who claimed the silver medal. Alexander Kristoff of Norway won the sprint from the following group to take bronze.
The top ten ranked countries in the final standings of the 2011 UCI World Tour qualified to have five riders to represent their respective country in the race. The nations with five-man squads are: Spain, Belgium, Italy, Australia, Great Britain, Germany, Netherlands, United States and Switzerland; although Luxembourg placed ninth in the rankings, their roster was reduced to two men. Of the other nations on the World Tour, France and Denmark have four riders, Norway and Ireland three, Kazakhstan two and Slovakia, Costa Rica and Latvia one rider each. The top six countries on the UCI Europe Tour – Slovenia, Russia, Portugal, Poland, Turkey and Belarus – in addition to Colombia, Venezuela, Brazil, the UCI America Tour top three, UCI Asia Tour leaders Iran and UCI Africa Tour leaders Morocco, have three riders. The remaining nations in the race are represented by either two or one rider. There are a total of 144 participants.
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Wikipedia