Cycling Road at the 2016 Summer Olympics

The first weekend of Rio 2016 was dominated by the road race portion of the Olympic programme and in particular discussion about the safety of the course. It featured steep climbs, and dangerous descents off the same elevations, on narrow winding roads.

Both men’s and women’s road races were blighted by serious crashes caused by rain making the descents on the Vista Chinesa part of the course extremely dangerous. A crash by leader Annemiek van Vleuten in the women’s race sickened all who saw it and led many viewers to question if they’d seen someone killed on live TV. Even her own mother feared the worst when she watched the race at home in the Netherlands. Van Vleuten was treated for a concussion and three small fractures of the spine but recovered well enough to become world time trial champion in 2017. The Olympic race was eventually won by her teammate Anna van der Breggen.

There was a record breaking performance from America’s Kristin Armstrong on the road where, on the eve of her 43rd birthday, she became the oldest ever female Olympic cycling champion by winning her third consecutive gold medal in the individual time trial.

The men’s events were won by Swiss time trial specialist Fabian Cancellara, who had also won the time trial gold in 2008, and Belgian Greg Van Avermaet in the road race.