From a ribbon to a legend: The history and magic of the rainbow jersey in cycling
By the time the peloton lines up each autumn, there is more at stake than a title. At the end of the day, one rider pulls on a jersey that is unlike any other. White, stark, bisected by five thin bands of colour. The rainbow jersey is the sport’s purest distinction.
The world championships began modestly in 1921. Only amateurs were invited, and Sweden’s Gunnar Sköld, the winner, received a purple ribbon across his chest. No jersey, no enduring image, just a gesture to mark a champion. One year later the ribbon gave way to a jersey traced with colored bands, and something more permanent began to take shape.
The professional peloton did not meet the rainbow until 1927, when Alfredo Binda triumphed at the Nürburgring. He was already destined to be a great rider, but in those stripes he became something more: the first of a line. The jersey’s meaning was not explained or announced. It simply appeared, and within a generation it was understood.
Five colors, five continents
Blue, red, black, yellow, green. The sequence was lifted from the Olympic flag, created in 1913 by Pierre de Coubertin to represent the union of five continents in sport. By adopting those colours, cycling borrowed a universal language: the world champion is not simply the strongest rider of a season, but the rider who has triumphed against all nations.
The design has barely changed since. White as a canvas, the five stripes circling chest and sleeves, the same for road, track, mountain bike or cyclocross. Other jerseys in cycling mutate and multiply, but the rainbow endures. Always instantly legible, whether glimpsed in a grainy photograph from the 1930s or in high definition today.
Privilege and pressure of the rainbow jersey
To win the rainbow jersey is to touch cycling’s ultimate prize, and with it comes a privilege that lasts all year. The reigning world champion must wear it in every race of their discipline, the stripes marking them out in every peloton they enter. The jersey offers no disguise. Rivals see it, fans search for it, cameras linger on it. The champion rides with a target stitched into their back.
Few explained it better than Óscar Freire, who wore the colours three times: “When you put on the World Champion jersey, you are the only one in the group wearing it... you say to yourself that right now, in this race, you are different because you are wearing this jersey.” Bernard Hinault, crowned in Sallanches in 1980, echoed the sentiment: “I have to go the extra mile because I have this jersey. We have to honour it and not just think we are the strongest.” Pride and pressure, stitched side by side.
Even when the year is over, the rainbow does not fully fade. Former champions keep its memory alive in the small rings of colour at collar and cuff, a discreet reminder to the world – and to themselves – that once they were the best.
Triumphs, curses, and borrowed glory
The rainbow has carried stories of both glory and misfortune. For as long as it has existed, riders and journalists have whispered about a curse, pointing to seasons when the stripes seemed to weigh too heavily, when victories dried up or accidents multiplied. In 2015, even the British Medical Journal published a study on the so-called “curse of the rainbow jersey.” The evidence was thin, the superstition enduring.
Some champions laugh at the idea. “It isn’t cursed,” Philippe Gilbert told L’Équipe in 2013. “The problem is that it doesn’t go unnoticed in a group where everyone is looking at it.” Julian Alaphilippe, who long dreamed of the bands, admitted that winning in them was its own form of release: “Raising my arms on the podium in the World Champion jersey is something I want to do as soon as possible – to get rid of the pressure of wanting to win this jersey so much.”
If there is a curse, it is simply the weight of expectation. And if there is luck, it lies in the calibre of champions who have thrived in the stripes. Merckx, Hinault, LeMond – all rode them to Tour de France victories. The rainbow does not decide; it only magnifies.
For others, the jersey is less about results than about remembrance. “Wearing it reminds you that that day you were the best,” said Anna van der Breggen. Lizzie Deignan put it more starkly: “It’s an honour to wear it. It is like it doesn’t really belong to you. It’s something you get a loan of for a year and I liked that.”
And that may be the truest measure of the rainbow: it is not kept, only carried. A reminder that champions come and go, while the stripes remain, waiting to be inherited and honoured for another season.
The World Championships in Rwanda run from 21-28 September:
👉 Explore the full race schedule
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