BBC SPORT | Special Events | 2000 | Tour de France

During his reign he has stood on that podium alongside four different yellow jersey winners, with Lance Armstrong the only overall winner to retain his prize during this era.

And while Armstrong was heading for a third successive Tour victory with a leisurely ride into Paris, Zabel was involved in a titanic struggle with Australian Stuart O'Grady for the green jersey.

Not since 1984, when the Belgian Frank Hoste beat Irishman Sean Kelly by just four points, had there been such a close finish to the points race.

Zabel closed the gap to just two points by winning the penultimate stage and then edged past the Australian in a furious sprint to the line in Paris.

A sixth green jersey increases the 31-year-old's record tally achieved last year when he went past four-time green jersey winner Sean Kelly.

Erik Zabel and Lance Armstrong
Zabel is congratulated by Armstrong
Zabel is also the holder of the World Cup jersey - cycling's equivalent of the Formula One championship.

It is awarded to the best man in the 10 leading one-day events around Europe and Kelly - cycling's Mr Consistency during the 1980s - was the first winner of the prize in 1989.

Such versatility would have been unthinkable for the young Zabel who failed to finish his first Tour in 1994.

He took two stages a year later, a couple more along with the green jersey in 1996 and three plus the famous garment one further year on.

But when he started his run in green Zabel was a pure sprinter rather than a one-day classic rider.

The two disciplines are different. A Tour sprinter knows that the whole bunch is likely to stay together during most of the flat stages.

Erik Zabel wins the penultimate stage
Meanwhile Zabel has proved that he can also cope with the wind, the hills and the cobbled roads of the one-day scene.

Such an all-round improvement, however, came at a cost.

Kelly won five stages between 1978 and 1982 but he took no more in a Tour career which stretched into the 1990s.

Comparisons with the Irishman were all too obvious for Zabel, who came close to winning three jerseys without a stage win after 1997, just as Kelly did after 1982.

So it is little wonder the Zabel was so overjoyed to win the penultimate stage of last year's Tour to end his three-year drought.

Repeating the trick this year and claiming yet another green jersey merely confirmed his position as a Tour legend.