Ole Ritter

Amateur years

As an amateur he rode for ABC Denmark. His breakthrough came in 1962 where he won 2 silver medals at the world championship in Italy, Individual & 100 km team time trial. Ritter took part in the 1964 Summer Olympics. He rode the individual road race and finished in 74th place, and was part of the Danish team in the team time trial that finished seventh.

He became Danish champion twice (1962 and 1966), and Scandinavian champion once (1966)and in 1965 went to Italy to break the world record on the 100 km.

Professional years

In 1967 he became professional in Italy with the Germanvox-Wega team and his career took off. He won the individual time trial in the Giro d'Italia in front of Rudi Altig, Eddy Merckx and Jacques Anquetil. This time trial was just short of one hour, and Anquetil remarked that Ritter would have broken the hour record.

In 1968 he went to Mexico City before the Olympic Games, to accompany the Italian amateur cyclists and help them get used to the altitude. Since time on the track was scarce, the Italian team did not want to give Ritter much track time. On the day before the Olympics started, Ritter was allowed to ride in the morning, and he beat the hour record. He was the first rider to take the record at altitude since Willie Hamilton in 1898. He covered 48.653 km and it took four years and Eddy Merckx to beat it (49.431 km in 1972).

In 1974 at the age of 33 he went to Mexico again and beat his personal record twice in a week, with 48.739 and 48.879 km.

Grand Tours

Ritter finished 47th in the 1975 Tour de France. He rode the Giro d'Italia nine times, and is the Danish rider with the best GC finish (seventh, in 1973) and the most stage wins (three).

Other achievements

Near the end of his career, Ritter again became a Danish cycling hero when six-day racing returned to the country. He won three races: in 1974 and 1975 in Herning with Dutchman Leo Duyndam and in 1977 in Forum with Belgian six-day star Patrick Sercu. Ritter's last sixth-day race was in Copenhagen in 1978.

Films

Stars and Watercarriers (Danish: Stjernerne og vandbærerne), a 1974 film by Danish director Jørgen Leth, follows Ritter's fortunes in the 1973 Giro d'Italia. The film provides insight into a three-week stage race, dramatizing the roles and aims of different riders in the race. The heartbreak of the mountain stages, the intensity of the time trial (known as "the race of truth"), quiet moments on the road and the mundane daily signing-in are all part of the film. Ritter is featured in the time-trial segment, with his technical, physical and psychological preparations and later performance detailed to the accompaniment of a single, prolonged violin note.

A 1974 Danish documentary, The Impossible Hour (Danish: Den umulige time), explores Ritter's attempt to regain the one-hour distance record in Mexico City.