During the two decades from the End of the Prague Spring to the Fall of the Berlin Wall, the Peace Race became a show case of the East European sport and organization. Although the stages became somewhat shorter by this time, and the participation by strong West European riders became a thing of the past (Jean-Pierre Danguillaume of France was the only winner, in 1969, from outside Eastern Europe during this 21 year period) the intensity of the race competition was as fierce as ever. The new decade of the 1970's saw the emergence of a new cycling power in the Peace Race: Poland. Between 1970 and 1975 the Polish team, coached by the indomitable Henryk Lasak, utterly dominated the "may Stages", with five individual and two team victories. 1970 was perhaps the greatest year for Polish cyclist in the Peace Race;  they took home all the Jerseys on offer: Yellow, Purple and Blue; they won the total of 9 stages (out of the 15 on offer) and had the staggering total of five riders in the top 10 overall. The most impressive rider on the Polish team of those years and, arguably one of the great Peace Race champions was Ryszard Szurkowski. Ryszard won the Great Race unprecedented four times, 1970, 1971, 1973 (when he also became the Amateur World Champion) and 1975. If you read on, you will see how it took full 23 years (until 1998) to find a rider who could equal Ryszard Szurkowski's great record.

Ryszard Szurkowski was, however, only one of a number of truly great riders who graced the Peace Race during the 1970's and 1980's. After him came men like the 1980 Olympic Champion Sergei Suchorucenkov (USSR), the complete stage race rider Olaf Ludwig (GDR), the strong chrono man and 100 km TTT Gold Medalist from Seoul Uwe Raab (GDR), the Eastern European pioneer in the Tour de France peloton Czeslaw Lang, the great Dutch tour rider of the 1980's Peter Winnen, and last but by no means least, the Peace Race's only hat trick winner (1987-1989) Uwe Ampler [GDR].

At the team level, the decline of Polish Peace Race predominance in mid-1970's brought in the second era of Soviet dominance in the Peace Race: 1975 to 1986. During this 12 year period the "Sbornaja Komanda" won the Team Competition staggering 10 times and its riders took home the Yellow Jersey on 6 occasions. During this same time period the East German team was able to produce a number of great Yellow jersey winners: Hans J. Hartnick, in 1976, Olaf Ludwig, in 1982 and 1986 and  Falk Boden, in 1983. However, the East Germans took home the Blue Jerseys of the Best Team only twice, in 1982 and 1983.

As for Czechoslovak cycling, the Spring to Fall period presented the fans with something to cheer about: Vlastimil Moravec's narrow 2 second overall victory in 1972, 3rd place overall by Milos Hrazdira in 1974, and the 6 stage wins by Antonin Bartonicek. In the Team Competition the CSSR riders came in 2nd overall in 1970 and 1972. Try as they might, the Blue Jersey last won by the CSSR team in 1955, kept eluding them. For the most part (on 14? occasions during these 21 “Spring to Fall” editions of the Peace Race), the Czechoslovaks came in third.

The Spring to Fall years of the Peace Race also saw many great "Firsts": like Allan, in 1973, winning the first stage for Australia, or Weibel, in 1975, becoming the first Peace Race stage winner from West Germany and the USA rider Rogers achieving a great 4th place overall in 1983.