Ryder Hesjedal shows the strain during the Stage 19 time trial of the Tour de France on Saturday. He's poised to finish the Tour in seventh place, second only to the great Steve Bauer in all-time results by a Canadian. (Laurent Rebours/Associated Press)

Ryder Hesjedal now has his own T-shirt.

It comes in black or white and features a stylized maple leaf with "Ryder" below it and the phrase "Weight of a Nation" underneath.

The T-shirt is currently sold out on the Garmin Transitions team website, but they're getting more in right away. And they're going to need them.

My, how things have changed for the 29-year-old from Victoria, B.C., who on Sunday wrapped up a surprising and satisfying seventh place finish in the famous Tour de France cycling race — a marathon test of will and endurance that began with a prologue on July 2 in Brussels, and ended July 25 in Paris after 3,642 kilometres.

Alberto Contador of Spain won the race by 39 seconds over Andy Schleck of Luxembourg.

This was the 97th edition of the classic, and its route through two mountain ranges was considered one of the toughest in many years. There were 197 starters 23 days ago — 170 are finishing.

Hesjedal understands what his seventh place means.

"It's a career's worth of work so far," he said Saturday, over the phone from dinner in France before some sleep and a morning train ride up to the Parisian region for the final stage into the city.

"To perform in the biggest race in the world as a cyclist, as a Canadian … obviously there hasn't been too many of us here."

The Canadian's effort is the best since the great Steve Bauer, who was in 11 consecutive Tours from 1985 to 1995, and took fourth in 1988.

When Hesjedal made his debut as a domestique (a rider who helps the featured athletes along tactically and isn't expected to finish high in the standings) two years ago, he was the first Canadian in the race for 12 years.

Three events later he was joined by Toronto's Michael Barry, who worked as a domestique for Team Sky and finished 99th this month.

"Steve Bauer really made his mark in the world of cycling, and this has been the biggest accomplishment since then," Hesjedal said. "And I'm nothing but proud, and pleased, that I was able to come here and perform well and do it with the support of a whole nation."

Support came slowly

It certainly didn't start out that way.

Even in his third Tour, you would have been hard pressed to find a large number of Canadians who knew about Hesjedal, despite 10 years of top-quality work that led readers of Canadian Cyclist, an online magazine, to select him as the country's top rider of the decade.

He had stage wins in the other two Grand Tour events — the Giro d'Italia and Vuelta a Espana — in previous years, but outside of Victoria that hadn't registered so much as a slight blip on the media radar.

But after just two stages this month in France, Garmin's lead rider Christian Vande Velde was out with an injury and Hesjedal emerged with a fourth in Stage 3 from Wanze into Arenberg Porte du Hainaut.

He held fourth overall through six stages, moved up to third at the end of Stage 7 and then dropped back out of the top 10 as the battle moved through the brutal mountain stages.

Instead of backing down, however, Hesjedal fought all the way back to seventh overall.

And suddenly the comments and messages of support on his website took off, and the media began calling and the coverage on Versus network in the United States (OLN in Canada) began focusing more on him.

Hesjedal is now set up for the near future, as he signed a three-year extension with Garmin Transitions just before the Tour de France got underway. This comes as he hits the peak years for a pro cyclist.

"Cycling is an endurance sport that takes years and years to develop and get the experience you need," he said, adding he's still trying to work out for himself what this Tour de France breakthrough means.

"It's really surreal. I've been racing a long time, with breakthrough results. I don't feel any different and I feel I've raced well [before this]."

But he understands something has changed.

"It will be determined what it means in the future, but right now, me personally, it's the greatest thing I've done on a bike."

Tour is addictive

What he's really happy about is that many more Canadians have become interested in bike racing over the last month, and that can mean increased support money and help for young athletes coming up.

He also understands the excitement of newcomers seeing the Tour de France for the first time, with its seemingly impossible climbs, crazy crowds and half-naked guys running out into the road to wave flags in the racers' faces.

Not to mention the occasional stray dog or passing sheep.

"I think that's what captivates people and gets them so addicted to the sport," Hesjedal said. "There is so much going on from day one to the last day, every day has a different story, has something new, and the feats being done by the athletes.

"There's nothing like it in sports."

And he said it's been nice to see the support from maple leaf carrying fans along the route, especially during the final time trial on Saturday.

"There's no shortage of Canadian flags out there [on the route]. I found myself at moments not knowing if I was keeping a good pace, and every time it seemed like I was at a worse point I would come through a barrage of flags and [people yelling] 'Go Ryder' and that's what it's all about.

"For people to fly overseas, or fly around the world, to be here to watch, and if they were specifically here to see me, that's just overwhelming."

Oh, and about the pronunciation of the last name. It's Hesh-jah-dall, with an emphasis on the second syllable.

Best to get it right, since we're going to be using it a lot in the future.