-By John Consoli

Through the first 10 days of the Tour de France coverage on Versus, 20.8 million viewers have tuned in to some portion of the race, according to Nielsen Media Research data, making it the most-watched Tour telecast in the cable network’s history.

For the live morning race telecasts during the first 10 days, the network has averaged a household rating of 0.3, flat from last year.

Versus shows the competition live in the morning, televises an encore of the morning race in the afternoon, a fringe encore telecast at 5 p.m., a prime time encore at 8 p.m. And a late night encore at midnight.

Total viewership for the late night telecast is up 45 percent, Versus said, although it did not release specific numbers. The network is seeing solid growth among men 18-34, with ratings up 91 percent for the live morning telecasts, up 108 percent for the afternoon telecasts, up 56 for the 5 p.m. Telecasts, up 22 percent for the prime time telecasts, and up 99 percent for the late night telecasts. Those numbers are off smaller bases which the network did not release.

More than 3.4 million Tour de France videos have been downloaded on Versus.com, surpassing the 2007 total over a  23 day span. The network is averaging 341,000 videos per day, compared to 170,000 per day last year.