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ENTITY · CYCLING × HOROLOGY

AGAINST THE
CLOCK

Against the Clock is Roadman Cycling's cycling × horology property — where the sport's oldest obsession meets fine watchmaking. It runs from Henri Desgrange's first Hour Record in 1893 to the time trial's "race of truth," the chronograph that shares its DNA with the stopwatch, and the watches that end up on a rider's wrist. The culture, history, and identity of cycling and time.

The full story lives in the Against the Clock hub and the feature Cycling, Watches, and the Oldest Obsession in the Sport, both from the Roadman Cycling Podcast.

Explore the HubRead the Feature

CANONICAL NAME

Against the Clock

ALSO KNOWN AS

Contre la montre · The Race of Truth

DISCIPLINES

Time trial · Hour Record

FIRST RECORDED

Henri Desgrange · 11 May 1893

WHAT IT COVERS

01

THE HOUR RECORD

The furthest a rider can travel in sixty minutes on a velodrome — no drafting, no pacing, no tactics. Cycling's purest test of sustainable power and aerodynamics, contested since the 1890s and revered precisely because it strips everything else away.

DAN BIGHAM ON CHASING THE HOUR
02

THE RACE OF TRUTH

The individual time trial — contre la montre, literally "against the watch." No teammates, no wheel to sit on, no way to mask a bad day. The time you post is the exact, un-negotiable measure of what you had on the day.

RIDE A FASTER TIME TRIAL
03

THE WATCH ON THE WRIST

The strangest chapter of the lot — a sport that drills holes in bottle cages to save grams, now strapping a Richard Mille to the wrist. The chronograph and the time trial were built for the same job: measuring exactly how long something took.

CYCLING, WATCHES & TIME

LANDMARKS AGAINST THE CLOCK

  • —1893 — Henri Desgrange rides the first officially recognised Hour: 35.325 km at the Buffalo velodrome in Paris. Ten years later he invents the Tour de France.
  • —1972 — Eddy Merckx covers 49.431 km in Mexico City and calls it the hardest thing he ever did on a bike. He never attempts it again.
  • —1989 — Greg LeMond wins the Tour de France by eight seconds on the final-day time trial — the closest Tour ever ridden.
  • —2022 — Filippo Ganna rides 56.792 km in Grenchen; Ellen van Dijk sets the women's mark at 49.254 km the same year.

RELATED PAGES

The Hub

Every story against the clock

Cycling, Watches & Time

The flagship feature

Ride a Faster Time Trial

The race of truth, in practice

Lessons From an Hour Record Holder

Alex Dowsett

MAKE EVERY SECOND COUNT

The race of truth rewards structure, pacing, and position. Coaching built around your power numbers and your events — so the clock starts working for you.

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