[2] The teams entering the race were:[2] In the previous year, Luis Ocaña was on his way to beat Eddy Merckx, when he fell as leader and had to give up.

[1] Ocana felt that he could have won the 1971 Tour, and Merckx did not like the comments that he did not deserve the 1971 victory, and both wanted to show their strengths.

[3] Merckx had won important races before the Tour started, including the 1972 Giro d'Italia, and was also the reigning world champion.

[3] The most important other participants were considered Raymond Poulidor, Felice Gimondi, Joop Zoetemelk and Bernard Thévenet.

[3] José Manuel Fuente, who had won the 1972 Vuelta a España and finished second in the 1972 Giro d'Italia, did not compete, as his team decided they had already been in too many hard races.

[6] The highest point of elevation in the race was 2,556 m (8,386 ft) at the summit tunnel of the Col du Galibier mountain pass on stage 14a.

[3] In the first stage, Cyrille Guimard won the sprint, and because of the bonification seconds took over the leader's jersey in the general classification.

[3] Merckx won the time trial in the second part of the fifth stage, but Guimard came third, retaining the lead.

Another group, including Zoetemelk and Guimard, had reached Merckx, and crossed the finish line together.

He did not play an important role in the general classification, but his team expected him to help his teammate Thevenet in the rest of the race.

After Merckx' team had pushed the pace such that most cyclists in the peloton had dropped, Ocana attacked four times.

[14] On the thirteenth stage, Merckx' team first set a pace that eliminated all but 16 cyclists at the start of the climb of the Vars.

Raymond Delisle escaped from that group, but Merckx and Agostinho chased and passed him after the summit.

[15] The fifteenth stage was also narrowly won by Guimard; Merckx had already raised one hand to cheer.

He needed medical attention during the entire stage, and lost two minutes on the final climb.

[19] The most important was the general classification, calculated by adding each cyclist's finishing times on each stage.

[25] At the conclusion of the Tour, Cyrille Guimard won the overall super-combativity award, also decided by journalists.

Overall awards were given for these also, with Bernard Thévenet seen as the funniest, Martin Van Den Bossche the best teammate and Felice Gimondi the most elegant.