The Tour de France (French
pronunciation: [tuʁ
də fʁɑ̃s]) is an annual
multiple stage
bicycle race primarily held in
France,[1]
while also occasionally making passes through nearby countries. The race
was first organized in
1903 to increase paper sales for the magazine
L'Auto;[2]
it is currently run by the
Amaury Sport Organisation.[3]
The race has been held annually since its first edition in 1903 except
for when it was stopped for the two
World
Wars.[4]
As the Tour gained prominence and popularity the race was lengthened and
its reach began to extend around the globe. Participation expanded from
a primarily French field, as riders from all over the world began to
participate in the race each year. The Tour is a
UCI World Tour event, which means that the teams that compete in the
race are mostly
UCI ProTeams, with the exception of the teams that the organizers
invite.[5][6]
Along with the
Giro d'Italia and
Vuelta a España, the Tour makes up cycling's prestigious,
three-week-long
Grand Tours.[7]
Traditionally, the race is held primarily in the month of July. While
the route changes each year, the format of the race stays the same with
the appearance of at least two time trials,[1]
the passage through the mountain chains of the
Pyrenees and the
Alps, and
the finish on the
Champs-Élysées.[8][9]
The modern editions of the Tour de France consist of 21 day-long
segments (stages) over a 23-day period and cover around 3,200 kilometres
(2,000 mi).[10]
The race alternates between clockwise and anticlockwise circuits of
France.
The number of teams usually varies between 20 and 22, with nine riders
in each.
All of the stages are timed to the finish; after finishing the
riders' times are compounded with their previous stage times.[1]
The rider with the lowest aggregate time is the leader of the race and
gets to don the coveted
yellow jersey.[1][12]
While the general classification garners the most attention there are
other contests held within the Tour: the
points classification for the sprinters, the
mountains classification for the climbers with general
classification hopes,
young rider classification for the riders under the age of 26, and
the
team classification for the fastest teams.[1]
History
Origins
The Tour de France was made in 1903. The roots of the Tour de France
trace to the
Dreyfus Affair, a
cause célèbre that divided France at the end of the 19th century
over the innocence of
Alfred Dreyfus, a soldier convicted—though later exonerated—of
selling military secrets to the Germans. Opinions became heated and
there were demonstrations by both sides. One was what the historian
Eugen Weber called "an absurd political shindig" at the
Auteuil horse-race course in Paris in 1899.
Among those involved was Comte
Jules-Albert de Dion, the owner of the
De Dion-Bouton car works, who believed Dreyfus was guilty.
De Dion served 15 days in jail and was fined 100 francs for his role at
Auteuil,
which included striking
Émile Loubet, the president of France, on the head with a
walking stick.
The incident at Auteuil, said Weber, was "...tailor-made for the
sporting press." The first and the largest daily sports newspaper in
France was
Le Vélo,
which sold 80,000 copies a day.
Its editor,
Pierre Giffard, thought Dreyfus innocent. He reported the arrest in
a way that displeased de Dion, who was so angry that he joined other
anti-Dreyfusards such as
Adolphe Clément and
Édouard Michelin and opened a rival daily sports paper,
L'Auto.[n
2]
The new newspaper appointed
Henri Desgrange as the editor. He was a prominent cyclist and owner
with Victor Goddet of the
velodrome at the
Parc des Princes.
De Dion knew him through his cycling reputation, through the books and
cycling articles that he had written, and through press articles he had
written for the Clément tyre company.
L'Auto was not the success its backers wanted. Stagnating
sales lower than the rival it was intended to surpass led to a crisis
meeting on 20 November 1902 on the middle floor of L'Auto's
office at 10 Rue du Faubourg Montmartre, Paris. The last to speak was
the most junior there, the chief cycling journalist, a 26-year-old named
Géo Lefèvre.[19]
Desgrange had poached him from Giffard's paper.
Lefèvre suggested a six-day race of the sort popular on the track but
all around France.
Long-distance cycle races were a popular means to sell more newspapers,
but nothing of the length that Lefèvre suggested had been attempted.[n
3] If it succeeded, it would help L'Auto match its
rival and perhaps put it out of business.
It could, as Desgrange said, "nail Giffard's beak shut."[22][23]
Desgrange and Lefèvre discussed it after lunch. Desgrange was doubtful
but the paper's financial director, Victor Goddet, was enthusiastic. He
handed Desgrange the keys to the company safe and said: "Take whatever
you need."
L'Auto announced the race on 19 January 1903.
First Tour de
France
The first Tour de France was staged in 1903. The plan was a
five-stage race from 31 May to 5 July, starting in Paris and stopping in
Lyon, Marseille, Bordeaux and Nantes before returning to Paris. Toulouse
was added later to break the long haul across
southern France from the Mediterranean to the Atlantic. Stages would
go through the night and finish next afternoon, with rest days before
riders set off again. But this proved too daunting and the costs too
great for most
and only 15 entered. Desgrange had never been wholly convinced and he
came close to dropping the idea.
Instead, he cut the length to 19 days, changed the dates to 1 to 19
July, and offered a daily allowance to those who averaged at least
20 km/h on all the stages.
That was what a rider would have expected to earn each day had he worked
in a factory.
He also cut the entry fee from 20 to 10 francs and set the first prize
at 12,000 francs and the prize for each day's winner at 3,000 francs.
The winner would thereby win six times what most workers earned in a
year.
That attracted between 60 and 80 entrants – the higher number may have
included serious inquiries and some who dropped out – among them not
just professionals but amateurs, some unemployed, some simply
adventurous.[19]
Desgrange seems not to have forgotten the
Dreyfus Affair that launched his race and raised the passions of his
backers. He announced his new race on 1 July 1903 by citing the writer
Émile Zola, whose open letter in which every paragraph started"
J'accuse ..." led to Dreyfus's acquittal, establishing the
florid style he used henceforth.
The first Tour de France started almost outside the Café Reveil-Matin
at the junction of the Melun and Corbeil roads in the village of
Montgeron. It was waved away by the starter, Georges Abran, at 3:16 p.m.
on 1 July 1903. L'Auto hadn't featured the race on its front page
that morning.[n
4]
Among the competitors were the eventual winner,
Maurice Garin, his well-built rival
Hippolyte Aucouturier, the German favourite
Josef Fischer, and a collection of adventurers including one
competing as "Samson".[n
5]
The race finished on the edge of Paris at Ville d'Avray, outside the
Restaurant du Père Auto, before a ceremonial ride into Paris and several
laps of the Parc des Princes. Garin dominated the race, winning the
first and last two stages, at 25.68 km/h. The last rider, Millocheau,
finished 64h 47m 22s behind him.
"Last" Tour
Such was the passion that the first Tour created in spectators and
riders that Desgrange said the second would be the last. Cheating was
rife and riders were beaten up by rival fans as they neared the top of
the col de la République, sometimes called the col du Grand Bois,
outside St-Étienne.
The leading riders, including the winner Maurice Garin, were
disqualified, though it took the Union Vélocipèdique de France until 30
November to make the decision.
McGann says the UVF waited so long "...well aware of the passions
aroused by the race."
Desgrange's opinion of the fighting and cheating showed in the headline
of his reaction in L'Auto: THE END.
Desgrange's despair did not last. By the following spring he was
planning another Tour, longer at 11 stages rather than six -and this
time all in daylight to make any cheating more obvious.
Stages in 1905 began between 3 am and 7:30 am.
The race captured the imagination. L'Auto's circulation rose from
25,000 to 65,000;[19]
by 1908 it was a quarter of a million, and during the 1923 Tour 500,000.
The record claimed by Desgrange was 854,000 during the 1933 Tour.[41]
Le Vélo went out of business in 1904.
Early rules
Desgrange and his Tour invented bicycle stage racing.
Desgrange experimented with judging by elapsed time
and then from 1906 to 1912 by points for placings each day.[n
6] He allowed riders to have personal pacers on the last stage
in 1903 and on the first and last stages in 1905.
Desgrange stood against the use of multiple gears and for many years
insisted riders use wooden rims, fearing the heat of braking while
coming down mountains would melt the glue that held the tires on metal
rims (they were finally allowed in 1937).
From 1936 there were as many as three stages in a single day.
His dream was a race of individuals. He invited teams but until 1925
forbade their members to pace each other.
He then went the other way and from 1927 to 1929
ran the Tour as a giant
team time-trial, with teams starting separately with members pacing
each other. He demanded that riders mend their bicycles without help and
that they use the same bicycle from start to end. Exchanging a damaged
bicycle for another was allowed only in 1923.
In 1903, Desgrange allowed riders who dropped out one day to continue
the next for daily prizes but not the overall prize. In 1928, he allowed
teams who had lost members to replace them halfway through the race.
Above all, Desgrange conducted a campaign against the sponsors,
bicycle factories, which he was sure were undermining the spirit of a
Tour de France of individuals. In 1930 he insisted that competitors ride
plain yellow bicycles that he would provide, without a maker's name.
Touriste-routiers and regionals
The first Tours were open to whoever wanted to compete. Most riders
were in teams that looked after them. The private entrants were called
touriste-routiers – tourists of the road – from 1923
and were allowed to take part provided they make no demands on the
organisers. Some of the Tour's most colourful characters have been
touriste-routiers. One finished each day's race and then performed
acrobatic tricks in the street to raise the price of a hotel.
There was no place for individuals in the post-1930s teams and so
Desgrange created regional teams, generally from France, to take in
riders who would not otherwise have qualified. The original
touriste-routiers mostly disappeared but some were absorbed into
regional teams.
National teams
The first Tours were for individuals and members of sponsored teams.
There were two classes of race, one for the aces, the other for the
rest, with different rules.
By the end of the 1920s, however, Desgrange believed he could not beat
what he believed were the underhand tactics of bike factories.
When the
Alcyon team contrived to get
Maurice De Waele to win even though he was sick,
he said "My race has been won by a corpse" and in 1930 admitted only
teams representing their country or region.[52]
National teams contested the Tour until 1961.
The teams were of different sizes. Some nations had more than one team
and some were mixed in with others to make up the number. National teams
caught the public imagination but had a snag: that riders might normally
have been in rival trade teams the rest of the season. The loyalty of
riders was sometimes questionable, within and between teams.
Return of trade
teams
Riders in national teams wore the colours of their country and a
small cloth panel on their chest that named the team for which they
normally rode. Sponsors were always unhappy about releasing their riders
into anonymity for the biggest race of the year and the situation became
critical at the start of the 1960s. Sales of bicycles had fallen and
bicycle factories were closing.
There was a risk, the trade said, that the industry would die if
factories were not allowed the publicity of the Tour de France.
The Tour returned to trade teams in 1962,
although with further problems. Doping had become a problem and tests
were introduced for riders. Riders went on strike near
Bordeaux in 1966
and the organisers suspected sponsors provoked them. The Tour returned
to national teams for 1967 and 1968
as "an experiment".
The author Geoffrey Nicholson identified a further reason: opposition to
closure of roads by a race criticised as crassly commercial.[60]
The Tour returned to trade teams in 1969
with a suggestion that national teams could come back every few years.
This never happened.
Distances
The Tour originally ran around the perimeter of France. Cycling was
an endurance sport and the organisers realised the sales they would
achieve by creating supermen of their competitors. Night riding was
dropped after the second Tour in 1904, when there had been persistent
cheating when judges could not see riders.
That reduced the daily and overall distance but the emphasis remained on
endurance. Desgrange said his ideal race would be so hard that only one
rider would make it to Paris.[63]
A succession of
doping scandals in the 1960s, culminating in the death of
Tom Simpson in 1967, led the
Union Cycliste Internationale to limit daily and overall distances
and to impose rest days. It was then impossible to follow the frontiers,
and the Tour increasingly zig-zagged across the country, sometimes with
unconnected days' races linked by train, while still maintaining some
sort of loop. The modern Tour typically has 21 daily stages and not more
than 3,500 km (2,200 mi). The shortest and longest Tours were 2,428 and
5,745 km (1,509 and 3,570 mi) in 1904 and 1926, respectively.[1][64]
Advertising
caravan
The Tour changed in 1930 to a competition largely between teams
representing their countries rather than the companies that sponsored
them. The costs of accommodating riders fell to the organisers instead
of the sponsors and Henri Desgrange raised the money by allowing
advertisers to precede the race.
The procession of often colourfully decorated trucks and cars became
known as the publicity caravan. It formalised an existing situation,
companies having started to follow the race. The first to sign to
precede the Tour was the chocolate company,
Menier, one of those who had followed the race. Its head of
publicity, Paul Thévenin, had first put the idea to Desgrange.
It paid 50,000 old francs. Preceding the race was more attractive to
advertisers because spectators gathered by the road long before the race
or could be attracted from their houses. Advertisers following the race
found that many who had watched the race had already gone home.
Menier handed out tons of chocolate in that first year of preceding
the race, as well as 500,000 policemen's hats printed with the company's
name. The success led to the caravan's existence being formalised the
following year.
The caravan was at its height between 1930 and the mid-1960s, before
television and especially television advertising was established in
France. Advertisers competed to attract public attention. Motorcycle
acrobats performed for the
Cinzano
apéritif company and a toothpaste maker, and an accordionist, Yvette
Horner, became one of the most popular sights as she performed on the
roof of a Citroën Traction Avant .[66]
The modern Tour restricts the excesses to which advertisers are allowed
to go but at first anything was allowed. The writer Pierre Bost[n
7] lamented: "This caravan of 60 gaudy trucks singing across
the countryside the virtues of an apéritif, a make of underpants or a
dustbin is a shameful spectacle. It bellows, it plays ugly music, it's
sad, it's ugly, it smells of vulgarity and money."[67]
Advertisers pay the Société du Tour de France approximately €150,000
to place three vehicles in the caravan.[68]
Some have more. On top of that come the more considerable costs of the
commercial samples that are thrown to the crowd and the cost of
accommodating the drivers and the staff—frequently students—who throw
them. The vehicles also have to be decorated on the morning of each
stage and, because they must return to ordinary highway standards,
disassembled after each stage. Numbers vary but there are normally
around 250 vehicles each year. Their order on the road is established by
contract, the leading vehicles belonging to the largest sponsors.
The procession sets off two hours before the start and then regroups
to precede the riders by an hour and a half. It spreads 20–25 km and
takes 40 minutes to pass at between 20 and 60 km/h. Vehicles travel in
groups of five. Their position is logged by
GPS and from an aircraft and organised on the road by the caravan
director—Jean-Pierre Lachaud[n
8]—an assistant, three motorcyclists, two radio technicians
and a breakdown and medical crew.[68]
Six motorcyclists from the Garde Républicaine, the élite of the
gendarmerie, ride with them.[69]
The advertisers distribute publicity material to the crowd. The
number of items has been estimated at 11 million, each person in the
procession giving out 3,000 to 5,000 items a day.[68]
A bank, GAN, gave out 170,000 caps, 80,000 badges, 60,000 plastic bags
and 535,000 copies of its race newspaper in 1994. Together, they weighed
32 tons.[69]
Spectators have died in collisions with the caravan (see below).
Organisers
The first organiser was Henri Desgrange, although daily running of
the 1903 race was by Lefèvre. He followed riders by train and bicycle.
In 1936 Desgrange had a prostate operation. At the time, two operations
were needed; the Tour de France was due to fall between them. Desgrange
persuaded his surgeon to let him follow the race.
The second day proved too much and, in a fever at
Charleville, he retired to his château at Beauvallon. Desgrange died
at home on the Mediterranean coast on 16 August 1940.
The race was taken over by his deputy,
Jacques Goddet.[71]
War interrupted the Tour. The German Propaganda Staffel wanted it to
be run and offered facilities otherwise denied, in the hope of
maintaining a sense of normality.
They offered to open the borders between German-occupied France in the
north and nominally independent
Vichy France in the south but Goddet refused.
In 1944, L'Auto was closed – its doors nailed shut – and its
belongings, including the Tour, sequestrated by the state for publishing
articles too close to the Germans.[72]
Rights to the Tour were therefore owned by the government. Jacques
Goddet was allowed to publish another daily sports paper, L'Équipe,
but there was a rival candidate to run the Tour: a consortium of
Sports and Miroir Sprint. Each organised a candidate race.
L'Équipe and Le Parisien Libéré had La Course du Tour de
France[73]
and Sports and Miroir Sprint had La Ronde de France. Both
were five stages, the longest the government would allow because of
shortages.
L'Équipe's race was better organised and appealed more to the
public because it featured national teams that had been successful
before the war, when French cycling was at a high. L'Équipe was
given the right to organise the
1947 Tour de France.
L'Équipe's finances were never sound and Goddet accepted an
advance by Émilion Amaury, who had supported his bid to run the post-war
Tour.
Amaury was a newspaper magnate whose condition was that his sports
editor,
Félix Lévitan should join Goddet for the Tour.
The two worked together, Goddet running the sporting side and Lévitan
the financial.
Lévitan began to recruit sponsors, sometimes accepting prizes in kind
if he could not get cash.
He introduced the finish of the Tour at the Avenue des
Champs-Élysées in 1975. He left the Tour on 17 March 1987 after
losses by the Tour of America, in which he was involved. The claim was
that it had been cross-financed by the Tour de France.
Lévitan insisted he was innocent but the lock to his office was changed
and his job was over.
Goddet retired the following year. They were replaced in 1988 by
Jean-Pierre Courcol, the director of L'Équipe, then in 1989 by
Jean-Pierre Carenso and then by
Jean-Marie Leblanc, who in 1989 had been race director. The former
television presenter
Christian Prudhomme — he commentated on the Tour among other
events — replaced Leblanc in 2005, having been assistant director for
two years.
Current race director Prudhomme works for the Société du Tour de
France, a subsidiary of
Amaury Sport Organisation (ASO), which since 1993 has been part of
the media group
Amaury Group that owns L'Équipe.
It employs around 70 people full-time, in an office facing but not
connected to L'Équipe in the
Issy-les-Moulineaux area of outer western Paris. That number expands
to about 220 during the race itself, not including 500 contractors
employed to move barriers, erect stages, signpost the route and other
work.
Politics
The first three Tours stayed within France. The 1906 race went into
Alsace-Lorraine, territory annexed by the
German Empire in 1871 after the
Franco-Prussian War. Passage was secured through a meeting at
Metz
between Desgrange's collaborator, Alphonse Steinès, and the German
governor.
No teams from Italy, Germany or Spain rode in 1939 because of
tensions preceding the
Second World War. Henri Desgrange planned a Tour for 1940, after war
had started but before France had been invaded. The route, approved by
military authorities, included a route along the
Maginot Line.[78]
Teams would have been drawn from military units in France, including the
British, who would have been organised by a journalist, Bill Mills.[78]
Then the Germans invaded and the race was not held again until 1947 (see
Tour de France during the Second World War). The first German team
after the war was in 1960, although individual Germans had ridden in
mixed teams. The Tour has since started in Germany three times: in
Cologne in 1965, in Frankfurt in 1980 and in West Berlin on the city's
750th anniversary in 1987. Plans to enter
East Germany that year were abandoned.
Corsica
The Tour de France has visited every region of
Metropolitan France except
Corsica.[79]
Jean-Marie Leblanc, when he was organiser, said the island had never
asked for a stage start there. It would be difficult to find
accommodation for 4,000 people, he said.[80]
The spokesman of the Corsican nationalist party
Party of the Corsican Nation,
François Alfonsi, said: "The organisers must be afraid of terrorist
attacks.[n
9] If they are really thinking of a possible terrorist action,
they are wrong. Our movement, which is nationalist and in favour of
self-government, would be delighted if the Tour came to Corsica."[80]
The opening stages of the
2013 Tour de France are set to be held on Corsica as part of the
celebrations for the 100th edition of the race.
Prizes
Prize money in Euros in the Tour de France, not corrected
for inflation.
Prize money has always been awarded. From 20,000 old
francs the first year,[81]
prize money has increased each year, although from 1976 to 1987 the
first prize was an apartment offered by a race sponsor. The first prize
in 1988 was a car, a studio-apartment, a work of art and 500,000 francs
in cash. Prizes only in cash returned in 1990.
Prizes and bonuses are awarded for daily placings and final placings
at the end of the race. In 2009, the winner received €450,000, while
each of the 21 stage winners won €8,000 (€10,000 for the team time-trial
stage). The winners of the points classification and mountains
classification each win €25,000, the young rider competition and the
combativity prize €20,000, and €50,000 for the winner of the
team classification (calculated by adding the cumulative times of
the best three riders in each team).[83]
The Souvenir
Henri Desgrange, in memory of the founder of the Tour, is awarded to
the first rider over the col du Galibier where his monument stands,[83]
or to the first rider over the highest col in the Tour. A similar award
is made at the summit of the col du Tourmalet, at the memorial to
Jacques Goddet, Desgrange's successor.
Classifications
Riders aim to win overall but there are three further competitions:
points, mountains and for the best young rider. The leader of each wears
a distinctive jersey. A rider who leads more than one competition wears
the jersey of the most prestigious. The abandoned jersey is worn by the
second in the competition. The Tour's colours have been adopted by other
races and have meaning within cycling generally. For example, the
Tour of Britain has yellow, green, and polka-dot jerseys with the
same meaning as the Tour. The
Giro d'Italia differs by awarding the leader a pink jersey, since it
is organised by
La Gazzetta dello Sport, which has pink pages.
General
classification
The most sought after classification in the Tour de France is the
general classification. All of the stages are timed to the finish, after
finishing the riders' times are compounded with their previous stage
times; so the rider with the lowest aggregate time is the leader of the
race. The leader is determined after each stage's conclusion. The leader
of the race also has the privilege to wear the race leader's yellow
jersey. The jersey is presented to the leader rider on a podium in the
stage's finishing town. If a rider is leading more than one
classification that awards a jersey, he will wear the maillot jaune
since the general classification is the most important one in the race.
The lead can change after each stage.[12]
The winner of the
2012 Tour de France was
Bradley Wiggins.
The leader in the
first Tour de France was awarded a yellow armband.[19]
The color yellow was chosen as the magazine that created the Tour,
L'Auto, printed its newspapers on yellow paper. The yellow
jersey was added to the race in the 1919 edition and it has since become
a symbol of the Tour de France. The first rider to wear the yellow
jersey was
Eugène Christophe. Each team brings multiple yellow jerseys in
advance of the Giro in case one of their riders becomes the overall
leader of the race. Riders usually try to make the extra effort to keep
the jersey for as long as possible in order to get more publicity for
the team and the sponsor(s) of the team.
Eddy Merckx has worn the yellow jersey for 96 stages, which is more
than any other rider in the history of the Tour de France. Four riders
have won the general classification five times in their career:
Jacques Anquetil,
Eddy Merckx,
Bernard Hinault, and
Miguel Indurain.
Points
classification
The green jersey (maillot vert) is given to the leader of the
points classification. At the end of each stage, points are earned by
the riders who finish first, second, etc. More points are given for flat
stages and fewer for mountain stages. The points competition began in
1953, to mark the 50th anniversary. It was called the Grand Prix du
Cinquentenaire and was won by
Fritz Schaer of Switzerland. The first sponsor was La Belle
Jardinière. The current sponsor is Pari Mutuel Urbain, a state betting
company.[84]
Currently, the points classification is calculated by adding up the
points collected in the stage and subtracting penalty points.
Points are rewarded for a high finishing position in a stage or at an
intermediate sprint:[85]
Type |
1st |
2nd |
3rd |
4th |
5th |
6th |
7th |
8th |
9th |
10th |
11th |
12th |
13th |
14th |
15th |
|
Flat stage finish |
45 |
35 |
30 |
26 |
22 |
20 |
18 |
16 |
14 |
12 |
10 |
8 |
6 |
4 |
2 |
|
Medium mountain stage finish |
30 |
25 |
22 |
19 |
17 |
15 |
13 |
11 |
9 |
7 |
6 |
5 |
4 |
3 |
2 |
|
High mountain stage finish |
20 |
17 |
15 |
13 |
11 |
10 |
9 |
8 |
7 |
6 |
5 |
4 |
3 |
2 |
1 |
|
Individual time trial |
20 |
17 |
15 |
13 |
11 |
10 |
9 |
8 |
7 |
6 |
5 |
4 |
3 |
2 |
1 |
|
intermediate sprint |
20 |
17 |
15 |
13 |
11 |
10 |
9 |
8 |
7 |
6 |
5 |
4 |
3 |
2 |
1 |
In case of a tie, the leader is determined by the number of stage
wins, then the number of intermediate sprint victories, and finally, the
rider's standing in the general classification.
One rider has won the points competition six times:
One rider has won the points competition four times:
Mountains
classification
The
King of the Mountains wears a white jersey with red dots (maillot
à pois rouges), inspired by a jersey that one of the organisers,
Félix Lévitan, had seen at the
Vélodrome d'Hiver in Paris in his youth.[citation
needed] The competition gives points to the first
to top designated hills and mountains.
The best climber was first recognised in 1933, prizes were given from
1934, and the jersey was introduced in 1975.[84]
The first to wear the mountain jersey was
Lucien Van Impe, who earned the honour en route to his third
mountains title.
The first Tour de France crossed no mountain passes, but several
lesser cols. The first was the col des Echarmeaux (712 m (2,336 ft)), on
the opening stage from Paris to Lyon, on what is now the old road from
Autun to Lyon. The stage from Lyon to Marseille included the
col de la République (1,161 m (3,809 ft)), also known as the col du
Grand Bois, at the edge of St-Etienne. The first major climb—the
Ballon d'Alsace (1,178 m (3,865 ft)) in the
Vosges[86] —
was featured in the 1905 race. True mountains, however, were not
included until the
Pyrenees in
1910. In that year the race rode, or more walked, first the
col d'Aubisque and then the nearby
Tourmalet. Desgrange once more stayed away. Both climbs were mule
tracks, a demanding challenge on heavy, ungeared bikes ridden by men
with spare tires around their shoulders and their food, clothing and
tools in bags hung from their handlebars. The assistant organiser,
Victor Breyer, stood at the summit of the Aubisque with the colleague
who had proposed including the Pyrenees, Alphonse Steinès.
Desgrange was confident enough after the Pyrenees to include the
Alps in
1911.[88]
The highest climb in the race was the Cime de la Bonette-Restefond in
the
1962 Tour de France, reaching 2802 m.[89]
The highest mountain finish in the Tour was at the
Col du Galibier in the
2011 edition.[90]
The difficulty of a climb is established by its steepness, length and
its position on the course. The easiest are graded 4, most of the
hardest as 1 and the exceptional (such as the Tourmalet) as beyond
classification, or
hors catégorie. Notable hors catégorie peaks include the
Col du Tourmalet,
Mont Ventoux,
Col du Galibier, the climb to the ski resort of
Hautacam, and
Alpe d'Huez. In 2012, the attributed points were changed:[91]
The point distribution for the mountains is as follows:
Type |
1st |
2nd |
3rd |
4th |
5th |
6th |
7th |
8th |
9th |
10th |
|
Hors catégorie |
25 |
20 |
16 |
14 |
12 |
10 |
8 |
6 |
4 |
2 |
|
First Category |
10 |
8 |
6 |
4 |
2 |
1 |
|
|
|
|
|
Second Category |
5 |
3 |
2 |
1 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Third Category |
2 |
1 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Fourth Category |
1 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
- Points awarded are doubled for finishes that are of category two
or above.
One rider has been King of the Mountains seven times:
Two riders have been King of the Mountains six times:
-
Federico Bahamontes in
1954,
1958,
1959,
1962,
1963,
1964.
-
Lucien Van Impe in
1971,
1972,
1975,
1977,
1981,
1983.
Young
rider classification
The leader of the classification is determined the same way as the
general classification, with the riders' times being added up after each
stage and the eligible rider with lowest aggregate time is dubbed the
leader. The Young rider classification is restricted to the riders that
are under the age of 26. Originally the classification was restricted
neo-professionals - riders that are in their first three years of
professional racing - until
1983. In 1983, the organizers made it so that only first time riders
were eligible for the classification. In
1987, the organizers changed the rules of the classification to what
they are today.
This classification was added to the Giro d'Italia in the
1975 edition, with
Francesco Moser being the first to win the classification after
placing seventh overall. The Tour de France did award the white jersey
that it does today between 1989 and 2000. The Tour de France awards a
white jersey to the leader of the classification. Four riders have won
both the young rider classification and the general classification in
the same year:
Laurent Fignon (1983),
Jan Ullrich (1997),
Alberto Contador (2007),
and
Andy Schleck (2010). Two riders have won the young rider
classification three times in their respective careers: Jan Ullrich and
Andy Schleck. In
2012 it was won by
Tejay van Garderen.
Minor
classifications
The
prix de la combativité goes to the rider who most animates the
day, usually by trying to break clear of the field. The most combative
rider wears a number printed white-on-red instead of black-on-white next
day. An award goes to the most aggressive rider throughout the Tour.
Already in 1908 a sort of combativity award was offered, when Sports
Populaires and L'Education Physique created Le Prix du
Courage, 100 francs and a silver gilt medal for "the rider having
finished the course, even if unplaced, who is particularly distinguished
for the energy he has used."[92]
The modern competition started in 1958.[92]
In 1959, a Super Combativity award for the most combative cyclist of the
Tour was awarded. It was initially not rewarded every year, but since
1981 it has been given annually.
The
team classification is assessed by adding the time of each team's
best three riders each day. The competition does not have its own jersey
but since 2006 the leading team has worn numbers printed
black-on-yellow. Until 1990, the leading team would wear yellow caps. As
of 2012, the riders of the leading team wear yellow helmets.[95]
The best national teams are France and Belgium, with 10 wins each.[84]
From 1973 up to 1988, there was also a team classification based on
points (stage classification); members of the leading team would wear
green caps.
Historical
classifications
There has been an
intermediate sprints classification, which from 1984 awarded a red
jersey
for points awarded to the first three to pass intermediate points during
the stage. These sprints also scored points towards the points
classification and bonuses towards the general classification. The
intermediate sprints classification with its red jersey was abolished in
1989,[97]
but the intermediate sprints have remained, offering points for the
points classification and, until 2007, time bonuses for the general
classification.
From 1968 there was a
combination classification,
scored on a points system based on standings in the general, points and
mountains classifications. The design was originally white, then a
patchwork with areas resembling each individual jersey design. This was
also abolished in 1989.
Lanterne rouge
The rider who has taken most time is called the
lanterne rouge (red lantern, as in the red light at the back
of a vehicle so it can be seen in the dark) and in past years
sometimes carried a small red light beneath his
saddle.
Such was sympathy that he could command higher fees in the races that
previously followed the Tour. In 1939 and 1948 the organisers excluded
the last rider every day, to encourage more competitive racing.[n
10]
Stages
Mass-start stages
Riders in most stages start together. The first kilometres, the
départ fictif, are a rolling start without racing. The real start,
the départ réel is announced by the Tour director waving a white
flag. Riders are permitted to touch, but not push or nudge, each other.
The first to cross the stage finish line wins the stage.
All riders in a group finish in the same time as the lead rider. This
avoids dangerous mass sprints. It is not unusual for the entire field to
finish in a group, taking time to cross the line but being credited with
the same time. Since 2005, when riders fall or crash within the final 3
kilometres of a stage with a flat finish, they are awarded the same time
as the group they were in.[100]
This change encourages riders to sprint to the finish for points awards
without fear of losing time to the group. The final kilometre has been
indicated since 1906 by a red triangle – the flamme rouge – above
the road.
Time bonuses for the first three at intermediate sprints and stage
finishes were discontinued with the 2008 race.
Stages in the mountains often cause major shifts in the general
classification. On ordinary stages, most riders can stay in the peloton
to the finish; during mountain stages, it is not uncommon for riders to
lose 30 minutes or to be eliminated after finishing outside the time
limit.
The first photo-finish was in 1955.
Individual
time trials
Riders in a time trial compete individually against the clock, each
starting at a different time. The first time trial was between La
Roche-sur-Yon and Nantes (80 km) in 1934.
The first stage in modern Tours is often a short trial, a prologue,
to decide who wears yellow on the opening day. The first prologue was in
1967.
The 1988 event, at La Baule, was called "la préface".
There are usually two or three time trials. One may be a
team time trial. The final time trial has sometimes been the final
stage, more recently often the penultimate stage.
The launch ramp, a sloping start pad for riders, was first used in
1965, at Cologne.
Team time trial
A team
time trial (TTT) is a race against the clock in which each team
rides alone. The time is that of the fifth rider of each team: riders
more than a bike-length behind their team's fifth rider are awarded
their own times. The TTT has been criticised for favouring strong teams
and handicapping strong riders in weak teams. After a four-year absence,
the TTT returned in
2009 but was not included in 2010. It was reintroduced into the 2011
Tour.
The prologue stage in
1971 was a team time trial.
The
1939 TTT crossed the Iseran mountain pass between Bonneval and
Bourg-St-Maurice.
Notable stages
The race has finished since 1975 with
laps of the Champs-Élysées. This stage rarely challenges the leader
because it is flat and the leader usually has too much time in hand to
be denied. But in 1987,
Pedro Delgado broke away on the Champs to challenge the 40-second
lead held by
Stephen Roche. He and Roche finished in the peloton and Roche won
the Tour. In modern times, there tends to be a gentlemen's agreement,
such that, while the points classification is still contended if
possible, the overall classification is not fought over; because of
this, it is not uncommon for the de facto winner of the overall
classification to ride into Paris holding a glass of champagne.
In 1989 the last stage was a time trial.
Greg LeMond overtook
Laurent Fignon to win by eight seconds, the closest margin in the
Tour's history.
The climb of
Alpe d'Huez is a favourite, providing either a mass-start or
individual time trial stage in most Tours. During the
2004 Tour de France, for example, Alpe d'Huez was the scene of an
epic 15.5 km mountain time trial on the 16th stage, won by
Lance Armstrong. While the TV spectacle was overwhelming, the riders
complained of abusive spectators who threatened their progress up the
climb, and the stage may not be repeated.[106][107]
Mont Ventoux is often claimed to be the hardest in the Tour because
of the harsh conditions. Another notable mountain stage frequently
featured during the Tour climbs the
Col du Tourmalet.
Col du Galibier is the most visited mountain in the Tour. The
2011 Tour de France stage to Galibier marked the 100th anniversary
of the mountain in the Tour and also boasted the highest finish altitude
ever: 2,645 m.[108]
Some mountain stages have become memorable because of the weather. An
example is a stage in
1996 Tour de France from
Val-d'Isère to
Sestriere. A snowstorm at the start area led to a shortening of the
stage from 190 to just 46 km.
To host a stage start or finish brings prestige and business to a
town. The prologue and first stage are particularly prestigious. Usually
one town will host the prologue (too short to go between towns) and the
start of stage 1. In 2007 director
Christian Prudhomme said that "in general, for a period of five
years we have the Tour start outside France three times and within
France twice."[109]
The
start and finish of the Tour
Most stages are in mainland France, although since the 1960s it has
become common to visit nearby countries:
Andorra, Belgium, England, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, Monaco,
Netherlands, Spain and Switzerland have all hosted stages or part of a
stage. Austria, Qatar and Scotland have expressed an interest in hosting
future starts[citation
needed]. Stages can be flat, undulating or
mountainous. Since 1975 the finish has been on the
Champs-Élysées in Paris; from 1903 to 1967 the race finished at the
Parc des Princes stadium in western Paris and from 1968 to 1974 at
the
Piste Municipale south of the capital.
Yorkshire has been announced as the host for the first two stages of the
Tour de France 2014.[111][112]
Broadcasting
The Tour was first followed only by journalists from L'Auto,
the organisers. The race was founded to increase sales of a floundering
newspaper and its editor, Desgrange, saw no reason to allow rival
publications to profit. The first time papers other than L'Auto
were allowed was 1921, when 15 press cars were allowed for regional and
foreign reporters.
The Tour was shown first on cinema newsreels a day or more after the
event. The first live radio broadcast was in 1929, when Jean Antoine and
Alex Virot of the newspaper L'Intransigeant broadcast for Radio
Cité. They used telephone lines. In 1932 they broadcast the sound of
riders crossing the col d'Aubisque in the Pyrenees on 12 July, using a
recording machine and transmitting the sound later.
The first television pictures were shown a day after a stage. The
national TV channel used two 16mm cameras, a Jeep and a motorbike. Film
was flown or taken by train to Paris. It was edited there and shown the
following day. The first live broadcast, and the second of any sport in
France, was the finish at the Parc des Princes in Paris on 25 July 1948.
Rik van Steenbergen of Belgium led in the bunch after a stage of
340 km from
Nancy. The first live coverage from the side of the road was from
the Aubisque on 8 July 1958. Proposals to cover the whole race were
abandoned in 1962 after objections from regional newspapers whose
editors feared the competition.
The dispute was settled but not in time and the first complete coverage
was the following year.
The leading television commentator in France was a former rider,
Robert Chapatte. At first he was the only commentator. He was joined
in following seasons by an analyst for the mountain stages and by a
commentator following the competitors by motorcycle.
Broadcasting in France was largely a state monopoly until 1982, when
the
socialist president
François Mitterrand allowed private broadcasters and privatised the
leading television channel. Competition between channels raised the
broadcasting fees paid to the organisers from 1.5 per cent of the race
budget in 1960 to more than a third by the end of the century.
Broadcasting time also increased as channels competed to secure the
rights. The two largest channels to stay in public ownership,
Antenne 2 and
FR3, combined to offer more coverage than its private rival,
TF1. The two
stations, renamed France 2 and France 3, still hold the domestic rights
and provide pictures for broadcasters around the world.
The stations use a staff of 300 with four helicopters, two aircraft,
two motorcycles, 35 other vehicles including trucks, and 20 podium
cameras.[n
11]
Domestic television covers the most important stages of the Tour,
such as those in the mountains, from mid-morning until early evening.
Coverage typically starts with a survey of the day's route, interviews
along the road, discussions of the difficulties and tactics ahead, and a
30-minute archive feature. The biggest stages are shown live from start
to end, followed by interviews with riders and others and features such
an edited version of the stage seen from beside a team manager following
and advising riders from his car. Radio covers the race in updates
throughout the day, particularly on the national news channel,
France Info, and some stations provide continuous commentary on long
wave. Other countries broadcast the Tour, including the United States,
which has shown the Tour since 1999 on the
NBC Sports Network.
The combination of unprecedented rigorous doping controls and almost
no positive tests helped restore fans' confidence in the 2009 Tour de
France. This led directly to an increase in global popularity of the
event. The most watched stage of 2009 was stage 20, from Montélimar to
Mont Ventoux in Provence, with a global total audience of 44 million,
making it the 12th most watched sporting event in the world in 2009.[117]
Culture
Part of the crowd during most days of the Tour is
Didi Senft who, in a red
devil costume, has been the Tour devil since 1993.
The Tour is important for fans in Europe. Millions[118]
line the route, some having camped a week to get the best view.
The Tour de France appealed from the start not just for the distance
and its demands but because it played to a wish for national unity,
a call to what
Maurice Barrès called the France "of earth and deaths" or what
Georges Vigarello called "the image of a France united by its earth."[120]
School book by Augustine Fouillée under the 'nom de plume'
G. Bruno.
The image had been started by the 1877 travel/school book
Le Tour de la France par deux enfants.[n
12] It told of two boys, André and Julien, who "in a thick
September fog left the town of Phalsbourg in
Lorraine to see France at a time when few people had gone far beyond
their nearest town."
The book sold six million copies by the time of the first Tour de
France,
the biggest selling book of 19th century France (other than the Bible).[121]
It stimulated a national interest in France, making it "visible and
alive", as its preface said. There had already been a car race called
the Tour de France but it was the publicity behind the cycling race, and
Desgrange's drive to educate and improve the population,
that inspired the French to know more of their country.
The academic historians Jean-Luc Boeuf and Yves Léonard say most
people in France had little idea of the shape of their country until
L'Auto began publishing maps of the race.
Arts
The Tour has inspired several popular songs in France, notably
P'tit gars du Tour (1932), Les Tours de France (1936) and
Faire le Tour de France (1950).
Kraftwerk had a hit with
Tour de France in 1983 – described as a minimalistic "melding of man
and machine"[125] –
and produced an album,
Tour de France Soundtracks in 2003, the centenary of the Tour.
The Tour and its first Italian winner,
Ottavio Bottecchia, are mentioned at the end of
Ernest Hemingway's
The Sun Also Rises.[126]
In films, the Tour was background for Cinq Tulipes Rouges
(1949) by Jean Stelli, in which five riders are murdered. A burlesque in
1967, Les Cracks by Alex Joffé, with Bourvil et Monique Tarbès,
also featured him. Patrick Le Gall made Chacun son Tour (1996).
The comedy, Le Vélo de Ghislain Lambert (2001), featured the Tour
of 1974.
In 2005, three films chronicled a team. The German Höllentour,
translated as
Hell on Wheels, recorded 2003 from the perspective of
Team Telekom. The film was directed by Pepe Danquart, who won an
Academy Award for live-action short film in 1993 for Black Rider
(Schwarzfahrer).[127]
The Danish film Overcoming by Tómas Gislason recorded the 2004
Tour from the perspective of
Team CSC.
Wired to Win chronicles
Française des Jeux riders
Baden Cooke and Jimmy Caspar in 2003. By following their quest for
the points classification, won by Cooke, the film looks at the working
of the brain. The film, made for IMAX theaters, appeared in December
2005. It was directed by Bayley Silleck, who was nominated for an
Academy Award for documentary short subject in 1996 for
Cosmic Voyage.[128]
A fan, Scott Coady, followed the 2000 Tour with a handheld video
camera to make The Tour Baby!,[129]
which raised $160,000 to benefit the
Lance Armstrong Foundation,[130]
and made a 2005 sequel, Tour Baby Deux!.[131]
Vive Le Tour by
Louis Malle is an 18-minute short of 1962. The 1965 Tour was filmed
by
Claude Lelouch in Pour un Maillot Jaune. This 30-minute
documentary has no narration and relies on sights and sounds of the
Tour.
In fiction, the 2001 animated feature Les Triplettes de Belleville
(The
Triplets of Belleville) ties into the Tour de France.
Post-Tour
criteriums
After the Tour de France there are
criteriums in the
Netherlands,
Belgium
and
Germany. These races are public spectacles where thousands of people
can see their heroes, from the Tour de France, race. The budget
of a criterium is over 100.000 Euro, with most of the money going to the
riders. Jersey winners or big name riders earn between 20 and 60
thousand euros per race in start money.[132]
Doping
Allegations of
doping have plagued the Tour almost since 1903. Early riders
consumed
alcohol and used
ether, to dull the pain. Over the years they began to increase
performance and the
Union Cycliste Internationale and governments enacted policies to
combat the practice.
In 1924,
Henri Pélissier and his brother
Charles told the journalist
Albert Londres they used
strychnine,
cocaine,
chloroform,
aspirin,
"horse ointment" and other drugs.[133]
The story was published in
Le Petit Parisien under the title Les Forçats de la Route
('The Convicts of the Road')[19][135]
On 13 July 1967, British cyclist
Tom Simpson died climbing
Mont Ventoux after taking
amphetamine. In 1998, the "Tour of Shame",
Willy Voet,
soigneur for the
Festina
team, was arrested with
erythropoietin (EPO),
growth hormones,
testosterone and amphetamine. Police raided team hotels and found
products in possession of the cycling team
TVM. Riders went on strike. After mediation by director
Jean-Marie Leblanc, police limited their tactics and riders
continued. Some riders had abandoned and only 96 finished the race. It
became clear in a trial that management and health officials of the
Festina team had organised the doping.
Further measures were introduced by race organisers and the
UCI, including more frequent testing and tests for
blood doping (transfusions
and
EPO use). This would lead the UCI to becoming a particularly
interested party in an
International Olympic Committee initiative, the
World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA), created in 1999. In 2002, the wife
of
Raimondas Rumšas, third in the
2002 Tour de France, was arrested after
EPO and
anabolic steroids were found in her car. Rumšas, who had not failed
a test, was not penalised. In 2004,
Philippe Gaumont said doping was endemic to his
Cofidis
team. Fellow Cofidis rider
David Millar confessed to
EPO after his home was raided. In the same year,
Jesus Manzano, a rider with the Kelme team, alleged he had been
forced by his team to use banned substances.[137]
Doping controversy has surrounded
Lance Armstrong. In August 2005, one month after Armstrong's seventh
consecutive victory, L'Équipe published documents it said showed
Armstrong had used EPO in the 1999 race.[138][139]
At the same Tour, Armstrong's urine showed traces of a
glucocorticosteroid hormone, although below the positive threshold. He
said he had used skin cream containing
triamcinolone to treat
saddle sores.[140]
Armstrong said he had received permission from the UCI to use this
cream.
There have been
further allegations which ultimately culminated in the USADA
disqualifying him from all his victories since August 1, 1998, including
his seven consecutive Tour de France victories, and a lifetime ban from
competing in professional sports.[142]
He chose not to appeal the decision and in January 2013, he publicly
admitted to doping throughout his career, including for all his Tour de
France victories,[143]
despite having made repeated denials throughout his career.[144][145]
The
2006 Tour had been plagued by the
Operación Puerto doping case before it began, favourites such as
Jan Ullrich and
Ivan Basso banned by their teams a day before the start. Seventeen
riders were implicated. American rider
Floyd Landis, who finished the Tour as holder of the overall lead,
had tested positive for
testosterone after he won stage 17, but this was not confirmed until
some two weeks after the race finished. On 30 June 2008 Landis lost his
appeal to the
Court of Arbitration for Sport, and
Óscar Pereiro was named as winner.[146]
On 24 May 2007,
Erik Zabel admitted using EPO during the first week of the 1996
Tour,[147]
when he won the points classification. Following his plea that other
cyclists admit to drugs, former winner
Bjarne Riis admitted in
Copenhagen on 25 May 2007 that he used EPO regularly from 1993 to
1998, including when he won the 1996 Tour.[148]
His admission meant the top three in 1996 were all linked to doping, two
admitting cheating. On 24 July 2007
Alexander Vinokourov tested positive for a blood transfusion (blood
doping) after winning a time trial, prompting his Astana team to
pull out and police to raid the team's hotel.[149]
The next day
Cristian Moreni tested positive for
testosterone. His Cofidis team pulled out.[150]
The same day, leader
Michael Rasmussen was removed for "violating internal team rules" by
missing random tests on 9 May and 28 June. Rasmussen claimed to have
been in Mexico. The Italian journalist
Davide Cassani told Danish television he had seen Rasmussen in
Italy. The alleged lying prompted his firing by Rabobank.[151]
On 11 July 2008
Manuel Beltrán tested positive for EPO after the first stage.[152]
On 17 July 2008,
Riccardo Riccò tested positive for
continuous erythropoiesis receptor activator, a variant of EPO,[153]
after the fourth stage. In October 2008, it was revealed that Riccò's
teammate and
Stage 10 winner
Leonardo Piepoli, as well as
Stefan Schumacher[154] –
who won both time trials – and
Bernhard Kohl[155] –
third on general classification and King of the Mountains – had tested
positive.
After winning the
2010 Tour de France, it was announced that
Alberto Contador had tested positive for low levels of
clenbuterol on 21 July rest day.[156]
On 26 January 2011, the
Spanish Cycling Federation proposed a 1-year ban,[157]
but reversed its ruling on 15 February and cleared Contador to race.[158]
Despite a pending appeal by the
UCI, Contador finished 5th overall in the
2011 Tour de France, but in February 2012, Contador was suspended,
and was stripped of his 2010 victory.[159]
During the 2012 Tour, the 3rd placed rider from 2011,
Frank Schleck tested positive for the banned diuretic Xipamide and
was immediately disqualified from the Tour.[160]
In October 2012
USADA released a report on doping by the
U.S. Postal Service cycling team, implicating, amongst others,
Armstrong. The report contained affidavits from riders including
Frankie Andreu,
Tyler Hamilton,
George Hincapie,
Floyd Landis,
Levi Leipheimer, and others describing wide spread use of
Erythropoietin (EPO), blood transfusion, testosterone, and other
banned practices in several Tours.[161]
In October 2012 the UCI acted upon this report, formally stripping
Armstrong of all titles since 1 August 1998, including all seven Tour
victories,[162]
and announced that his Tour wins would not be reallocated to other
riders.[163]
Strikes, exclusions and disqualifications
In 1904 twelve riders, including winner
Maurice Garin and all the stage winners, were disqualified for
various reasons including illegal use of cars and trains.
In 1907
Emile Georget was placed last in the day's results after changing
his bicycle outside a permitted area. Edmond Gentil, sponsor of the
rival
Alcyon team, withdrew all his riders in protest at what he
considered too light a penalty. They included
Louis Trousselier, the winner in 1905.
In 1912 and in 1913
Octave Lapize withdrew all his La Française team in protest at what
he saw as the collusion of Belgian riders.
In 1913 as well,
Odile Defraye pulled out of the race with painful legs and took the
whole Alcyon team with him.
In 1920 half the field pulled out at Les Sables d'Olonne in
protest at Desgrange's style of management.
In 1925 the threat of a strike ended Desgrange's plan that
riders should all eat exactly the same amount of food each day.
In 1937
Sylvère Maes of Belgium withdrew all his national team after he
considered his French rival,
Roger Lapébie, had been punished too lightly for being towed uphill
by car.
In 1950 the two Italian teams went home after the leader of
the first team,
Gino Bartali, thought a spectator had threatened him with a knife.
In 1950 much of the field got off their bikes and ran into the
Mediterranean at
Ste-Maxime. The summer had been unusually hot and some riders were
said to have ridden into the sea without dismounting. All involved were
penalised by the judges.
In 1966 riders went on strike near Bordeaux after drug tests
the previous evening.
In 1968 journalists went on strike for a day after Félix
Lévitan had accused them of watching "with tired eyes", his response to
the writers' complaint that the race was dull.
In 1978 they rode slowly all day and then walked across the
line at Valence d'Agen in protest at having to get up early to ride more
than one stage in a day.
In 1982 striking steel workers halted the team time trial.
In 1987 photographers went on strike, saying cars carrying the
Tour's guests were getting in their way.
In 1988 the race went on strike in a protest concerning a
drugs test on
Pedro Delgado.
In 1990 the organisers learned of a blockade by farmers in the
Limoges area and diverted the race before it got there.
In 1991 riders refused to race for 40 minutes because a rider,
Urs Zimmerman, was penalised for driving from one stage finish to
the start of the next instead of flying.
In 1991 the PDM team went home after its riders fell ill one
by one within 48 hours.
In 1992 activists of the Basque separatist movement bombed
followers' cars overnight.
In 1997 Belgian sprinter
Tom
Steels was expelled from the race for throwing his drinking bottle
at another rider in a bunch sprint at
Marennes.[164]
In
1998:
- The Festina team was disqualified after revelations of organised
doping within the team.
- After this discovery, the race stopped in protest at what the
riders saw as heavy-handed investigation of this and other doping
allegations.
In 1999 demonstrating firemen stopped the race and pelted it
with stink bombs.
In 2006
Floyd Landis was stripped of his title after
testing positive for synthetic testosterone.
In
2007:
- Team Astana abandoned the race after
Alexander Vinokourov was caught doping, and the
Cofidis team withdrew the next day following
Cristian Moreni failing a drug test
-
Michael Rasmussen was removed by his team, Rabobank, while
wearing the yellow jersey for lying about his whereabouts during a
team training session in Mexico. This was an issue as by claiming to
be in Mexico he was unavailable for random drugs tests in Europe
where he was actually residing.
In 2008 Riccardo Ricco was kicked out of the race after
testing positive for CERA.
In 2008 Moisés Dueñas Nevado was kicked out of the race after
testing positive for Erythropoietin.
In 2008 Manuel Beltrán was kicked out of the race after
testing positive for EPO.
In 2010
Alberto Contador failed a doping test. After a series of events, the
CAS finally in February 2012 declared
Andy Schleck the new winner. Also in 2010 lead out man
Mark Renshaw (HTC-Columbia) was disqualified after headbutting
another rider,
Julian Dean, as well as his blocking of Garmin-Transitions rider
Tyler Farrar.
In 2011
Alexandr Kolobnev left the race after testing positive for
hydrochlorothiazide.[165]
In 2012:
Deaths
Cyclists who have died during the Tour de France:
Another seven fatal accidents have occurred:
- 1934: A motorcyclist giving a demonstration in the velodrome of
La Roche Sur Yon, to entertain the crowd before the cyclists
arrived, died after he crashed at high speed.[168]
- 1957: 14 July: Motorcycle rider Rene Wagter and passenger Alex
Virot, a journalist for
Radio Luxembourg, went off a mountain road near
Ax-les-Thermes.
- 1958: An official, Constant Wouters, died after an accident with
sprinter
André Darrigade at the
Parc des Princes.[169]
- 1964: Twenty people died when a supply van hit a bridge in the
Dordogne region, resulting in the highest tour-related death
toll.[170]
- 2000: A 12-year-old from
Ginasservis, known as Phillippe, was hit by a car in the Tour de
France publicity caravan.[171]
- 2002: A seven-year-old boy, Melvin Pompele, died near
Retjons after running in front of the caravan.[171]
- 2009: 18 July, Stage 14: A spectator in her 60s was struck and
killed by a police motorcycle while crossing a road along the route
near
Wittelsheim.[68]
Records and
statistics
One rider has been
King of the Mountains, won the combination classification,
combativity award, the points competition, and the Tour in the same
year—Eddy
Merckx in 1969, which was also the first year he participated.[172]
Twice the Tour was won by a racer who never wore the yellow jersey
until the race was over. In 1947,
Jean Robic overturned a three-minute deficit on a 257 km final stage
into Paris. In 1968,
Jan Janssen of the Netherlands secured his win in the individual
time trial on the last day.
The Tour has been won three times by racers who led the general
classification on the first stage and holding the lead all the way to
Paris.
Maurice Garin did it during the Tour's very first edition, 1903; he
repeated the feat the next year, but the results were nullified by the
officials as a response to widespread cheating. Ottavio Bottechia
completed a GC start-to-finish sweep in 1924. And in 1928, Nicolas
Frantz held the GC for the entire race, and at the end, the podium
consisted solely of members of his racing team. While no one has
equalled this feat since '28, four times a racer has taken over the GC
lead on the second stage and carried that lead all the way to Paris.
The most appearances have been by
George Hincapie with 17. In light of Hincapie's suspension for use
of performance enhancing drugs, before which he held the mark for most
consecutive finishes with sixteen, having completed all but his very
first,
Joop Zoetemelk holds the record for the most finishes, having
completed all 16 of the Tours that he started.
In the early years of the Tour, cyclists rode individually, and were
sometimes forbidden to ride together. This led to large gaps between the
winner and the number two. Since the cyclists now tend to stay together
in a
peloton, the margins of the winner have become smaller, as the
difference usually originates from time trials, breakaways or on
mountain top finishes, or from being left behind the peloton. In the
table below, the eight smallest margins between the winner and the
second placed cyclists at the end of the Tour are given. The largest
margin, by comparison, remains that of the first Tour in 1903: 2h 49m
45s between Maurice Garin and
Lucien Pothier.[173]
The eight smallest margins between first and second placed riders are as
follows:[174]
Three riders have won 8 stages in a single year:
Charles Pélissier (1930[175]),
Eddy Merckx (1970,
1974[176]),
Freddy Maertens (1976[177]).
Mark Cavendish has the most mass finish stage wins with 23, ahead of
André Darrigade and André Leducq with 22, François Faber with 19 and
Eddy Merckx with 18.[178]
The youngest Tour de France stage winner is
Fabio Battesini, who was 19 when he won one stage in the
1931 Tour de France.[179]
The fastest massed-start stage was in 1999 from Laval to Blois
(194.5 km), won by
Mario Cipollini at 50.4 km/h.[180]
The fastest full-length time-trial is
David Zabriskie's opening stage of 2005, Fromentine –
Noirmoutier-en-l'Ile (19 km) at 54.7 km/h.[181]
Chris Boardman rode faster during the 1994 prologue stage,[182]
Lille-Euralille (7.2 km), with 55.2 km/h.[183]
The fastest stage win was by the 2005 Discovery Channel team in a team
time-trial. It completed the 67.5 km between Tours and Blois at
57.3 km/h.[184][185]
The longest successful post-war breakaway by a single rider was by
Albert Bourlon in the
1947 Tour de France. In the stage Carcassone-Luchon, he stayed away
for 253 km.[186]
It was one of seven breakaways longer than 200 km, the last being
Thierry Marie's 234 km escape in 1991.[186]
Bourlon finished 16 m 30s ahead. This is one of the biggest time gaps
but not the greatest. That record belongs to
José-Luis Viejo, who beat the peloton by 22 m 50s in the 1976 stage
Montgenèvre-Manosque.[186]
He was the fourth and most recent rider to win a stage by more than 20
minutes.
See also
Notes
-
^ Formerly
Lance Armstrong with 7 wins until he was stripped of his
awards and banned for life from all UCI events following an
official investigation into
doping allegations against him
[1].
-
^ De Dion, Clément
and Michelin were particularly concerned with Le Vélo—which
reported more than cycling—because its financial backer was one
of their commercial rivals, the Darracq company. De Dion
believed Le Vélo gave Darracq too much attention and him
too little. De Dion was a gentlemanly but outspoken man who
already wrote columns for
Le Figaro, Le Matin and others. He was also rich
and could afford to indulge his whims, which included founding
Le Nain Jaune (the yellow gnome), a publication that
"...answers no particular need."
-
^ Desgrange had
first attempted to copy and outdo races run by his rival. In
1901 he revived the Paris-Brest event after a decade's absence.
His winner knocked nearly two hours off the time but the race
didn't catch the public imagination. The longest races went from
city to city, such as from Bordeaux to Paris, in one stint.
Giffard was the first to suggest a race that lasted several
days, new to cycling but established practice in car racing.
Unlike other cycle races, it would also be run largely without
pacers.
-
^ L'Auto preferred
to concentrate on the Coupe Gordon-Bennett car race, even though
it wasn't to start for another 48 hours. The choice reflects not
only that the Tour de France was an unknown quantity – only
after the first race had finished did it establish a
reputation – but it hints at Desgrange's uncertainty. His
position as editor depended on raising sales. That would happen
if the Tour succeeded. But the paper and his employers would
lose a lot of money if it didn't. Desgrange preferred to keep a
distance. He didn't drop the flag at the start and he didn't
follow the riders. Reporting was left to Lefèvre, whose idea it
had been, who followed the race by bike and by train. Desgrange
showed a personal interest in his race only when it looked a
success.
-
^ The use of false
and often colourful names was not unusual. It reflected not only
the daring of the enterprise but the slight scandal still
associated with riding bicycle races, enough that some preferred
to use a false name. The first city-to-city race, from Paris to
Rouen, included many made-up names or simply initials. The first
woman to finish had entered as "Miss America", despite not being
American.
-
^ The formula in
1905 was a combination of both time and points. Riders had
points deducted for each five minutes lost. Desgrange saw
problems in judging both by time and by points. By time, a rider
coping with a mechanical problem—which the rules insisted he
repair alone—could lose so much time that it cost him the race.
Equally, riders could finish so separated that time gained or
lost on one or two days could decide the whole race. Judging the
race by points removed over-influential time differences but
discouraged competitors from riding hard. It made no difference
whether they finished fast or slow or separated by seconds or
hours, so they were inclined to ride together at a relaxed pace
until close to the line, only then disputing the final placings
that would give them points.
-
^ Pierre Bost was a
journalist and playwright known for the prolific film and stage
scripts he wrote in the 1940s. He died in 1975.
-
^ Jean-Pierre
Lachaud joined the Tour de France caravan in 1983 to distribute
publicity for Crédit Lyonnais, the bank that sponsors the yellow
jersey. The experience led to his starting his own company,
Newsport, which now administers the caravan for the Société du
Tour de France
-
^ Corsica has known
periods of violent action attributed to those seeking separation
from France.
-
^ Jacques Goddet
said in his autobiography that teams were using the rule to
eliminate rivals. A rider in last position knew he would be
disqualified at the end of the stage. If he dropped out before
or during the stage, another competitor became the last and he
would leave the race as well. That weakened a rival team, which
now had fewer helpers.
-
^ A podium camera is
not one focused on the winner's podium but a full-scale camera
on a mount, or podium.
-
^ A school book
written by Augustine Fouillée under the name G. Bruno and
published in 1877, it sold six million by 1900, seven million by
1914 and 8,400,000 by 1976. It was used in schools until the
1950s and is still available.
Citations
-
^
a
b
c
d
e
f
Joel
Gunter (16 July 2012).
"The Tour de France: a guide to the basics". The Telegraph.
Retrieved 30 July 2012.
-
^
"1903 Tour de France". Bikeraceinfo.com. 19 January 1903.
Retrieved 30 July 2012.
-
^
"Tour de France snubs velodrome Holocaust memorial". The
Jewish Chronicle. 12 July 2012.
Retrieved 30 July 2012.
-
^
Barry Boys.
"The Return of a Grand Affair – "New Tour Legend: the Maillot
Jaune"". Cycling Revealed.
Retrieved 3 June 2009.
-
^
"Union Cycliste Internationale". Uci.ch.
Retrieved 6 August 2012.
-
^
When is the Criterium route
announced.
"UCI WorldTour calendar 2012". Cycling Weekly.
Retrieved 6 August 2012.
-
^
"Million dollar, baby!". Cycling News (Future
Publishing Limited). 12 January 2007.
Retrieved 21 May 2011.
-
^
"Tour de France 2011 – Stage by stage". Letour.fr.
Retrieved 30 July 2012.
-
^
"Moment 17: 1975 – TDF's First Champs Elysees Finish".
Bicycling Magazine.
Retrieved 30 July 2012.
-
^
"UCI Regulations" (2.6.011 ed.). p. 43.
Retrieved 21 July 2009.
- ^
a
b
"Regulations of the race" (PDF). ASO/letour.fr.
Retrieved 30 December 2008.
-
^
a
b
c
d
e
Woodland 2007.
-
^
"www.cyclingnews.com presents the 93rd Tour de France".
Cycling News. Retrieved
18 July 2009.
-
^
"Know how the Tour de France started". Amazon.com. 19
January 1903. Retrieved 18
July 2009.
-
^
Spaarnestad Photo image number SFA001006411
-
^
"Torelli's History of the Tour de France: the 1930s or, All They
Wanted To Do Was to Sell a Few More Newspapers".
BikeRaceInfo.com. Retrieved
27 May 2007.
-
^ "Tour de France,
100 ans, 1903–2003", L'Équipe, France, 2003, p182
-
^
Woodland 2007, p. 234.
-
^
Tom James (15 August 2003).
"Veloarchive 1924: Le Tour de Souffrance". Veloarchive.
Retrieved 24 October 2009.
-
^
"Tour Honour Roll". Ride Media
2007 Official Tour de France Guide, Australian Edition: 172,
200–201. 2007.
-
^ Le Petit Bleu de
Lot-et-Garonne, France, 20 July 2005
-
^ "Cette caravane de
soixante camions barriolés qui chantent à travers la campagne
les vertus d'un apéritif, d'un caleçon ou d'une boîte à ordures
fait un honteux spectacle. Cela crie, cela fait de la sale
musique, c'est laid, c'est triste, c'est bête, cela sue la
vulgarité et l'argent." – Laget, Serge (1990), La Saga du Tour
de France, Découvertes Gaillard, France,
ISBN 978-2-07-053101-1. Legend says people in remote areas
ran into their houses at the sight of a giant model black lion
on the roof of a car promoting Lion Noir shoe polish in 1930.
-
^
a
b
c
d
Le Tour Guide, France, 2000
-
^
a
b
GAN Spécial Tour de France, 1994
-
^ Tour de France,
100 ans, 1903–2003, L'Équipe, France, 2003, p227
-
^ Libération,
France, 4 July 2003.
-
^
"Cycling Revealed – Tour de France Timeline".
Cyclingrevealed.com.
Retrieved 18 July 2009.
-
^
a
b
The Bicycle, UK, 8 July 1943, p6
-
^
"La Corse fait-elle peur au Tour de France ? – le Plus".
Leplus.nouvelobs.com.
Retrieved 23 February 2012.
-
^
a
b
L'Équipe Magazine, France, 23
October 2004
-
^
Woodland 2007, p. 300–304.
-
^
a
b
"Règlement de l'épreuve et Liste des prix". Letour.fr.
Retrieved 18 July 2009.
-
^
a
b
c
Woodland 2007, p. 203.
-
^
"Regulations of the race". ASO/letour.fr.
Retrieved 29 June 2011.
-
^
Woodland 2000, p. 38.
-
^
Woodland 2000, p. 43.
-
^
Woodland 2007, p. 273.
-
^
Tour de France 2011—The Galibier 1911–2011. Letour.fr (10
July 1911). Retrieved 23 February 2011.
-
^
"Tour de France 2011 – Rules". Letour.fr.
Retrieved 23 February 2012.
-
^
a
b
Woodland 2007, p. 96.
-
^
Simon_MacMichael on 1 July 2012 –
22:45 (1 July 2012).
"Team Sky's yellow helmets cause a kerfuffle during Tour de
France Stage 1 | road.cc | Road cycling news, Bike reviews,
Commuting, Leisure riding, Sportives and more". road.cc.
Retrieved 9 July 2012.
-
^
"The Tour de France" (website). BBC H2G2.
Retrieved 9 July 2007.
-
^
"2006 Regulations of the Race and Prize Money" (PDF).
Tour de France regulations. Amaury Sport Organisation.
Retrieved 9 July 2007.
-
^
"Tour de France Letters Special – 23 July 2004".
CyclingNews. 23 July 2004.
Retrieved 27 May 2007.
-
^
Maloney, Tim (21 July 2004).
"Stage 16 – 21 July: Bourg d'Oisans – Alpe d'Huez ITT, 15.5 km;
Sign of the times: Armstrong dominates on l'Alpe d'Huez".
CyclingNews. Retrieved 27 May
2007.
-
^
"Tour de France 2011 – The Galibier 1911–2011". Letour.fr.
10 July 1911. Retrieved 23
February 2012.
-
^
"Provence Blog by ProvenceBeyond: Tour de France starting in
Monaco". Provenceblog.typepad.com.
Retrieved 4 November 2008.
-
^
"Grand Départ in Yorkshire for 2014".
-
^
Pidd, Helen (17 January 2014).
"2014 to be held in Yorkshire". The Guardian.
Retrieved 28 May 2013.
-
^
"ViewerTrack, The most watched TV sporting events of 2009".
-
^
"Tour de France Facts, Figures and Trivia".
Gofrance.about.com. Retrieved
4 November 2008.
-
^ L'image d'une
France unifiée par le sol, Vigarello, Georges, Le Tour de
France, p3807, cited Boeuf, p67
-
^
France Since 1871: Lecture 9 Transcript, by
John M. Merriman,
Open Yale Courses, 3 October 2007.
-
^ Chris Jones,
Kraftwerk, Tour De France Soundtracks,
BBC,
4 August 2003
-
^
"A splendid thing". 16 November 2009.
-
^
"Blood, sweat and gears". Sydney Morning Herald. 27
May 2005. Retrieved 27 May
2007.
-
^
Morris, Wesley (30 December 2005).
""Wired" is winning tour of race, brain". BOSTON GLOBE.
Retrieved 11 July 2008.
-
^
"thetourbaby.com". thetourbaby.com.
Retrieved 2013-06-29.
-
^
Melvin, Ian (8 October 2004).
"The Tour Baby!". RoadCycling.com.
Retrieved 27 May 2007.
-
^
"tourbabydeuxmovie.com". tourbabydeuxmovie.com.
Retrieved 2013-06-29.
-
^
"Fixed for the fans - the post-TdF criteriums".
cyclingnews.com. Retrieved 21
May 2013.
-
^ Tour de France,
100 ans, 1903–2003, L'Équipe, France 2003, p149
-
^
"Association of British Cycling Coaches (ABCC), Drugs and the
Tour De France by Ramin Minovi". ABCC. 1 June 1965.
Retrieved 18 July 2009.
-
^
"Ex-Kelme rider promises doping revelations". VeloNews. 20
March 2004. Retrieved 27 May
2007.
-
^ L'Équipe, France,
23 August 2005, p1
-
^
"L'Équipe alleges Armstrong samples show EPO use in 99
Tour". VeloNews. 23 August 2005.
Retrieved 27 May 2007.
-
^
"Armstrong's journey : Tour leader rides from Texas plains to
Champs-Elysees". CNN Sports Illustrated. 22 July 2000.
Retrieved 27 May 2007.
-
^
"Lance Armstrong Receives Lifetime Ban And Disqualification Of
Competitive Results For Doping Violations Stemming From His
Involvement In The United States Postal Service Pro-Cycling Team
Doping Conspiracy". U.S. Anti-Doping Agency.
Retrieved 2013-06-29.
-
^
January 15, 2013, 4:05 PM
(2013-01-15).
"Lance Armstrong tells Oprah he doped to win". CBS News.
Retrieved 2013-06-29.
-
^
"In Reversal, Armstrong Is Said to Weigh Admitting Drug Use".
New York Times. Retrieved
2013-01-05.
-
^
"Atty. denies report Lance Armstrong will admit doping". CBS
News. Retrieved 2013-01-05.
-
^
"Landis loses appeal, must forfeit Tour de France title".
Houston Chronicle. 30 June 2008.
Retrieved 30 June 2008.
-
^
Westemeyer, Susan (24 May 2007).
"Zabel and Aldag confess EPO usage". CyclingNews.
Retrieved 27 May 2007.
-
^
"Riis, Tour de France Champ, Says He Took Banned Drugs".
Bloomberg. 25 May 2007.
Retrieved 26 May 2007.
-
^
Astana Pulls Out of Tour de France Washington Post. 24 July
2007.
-
^
BBC.co.uk – Tour hit by second doping result
-
^
"Rasmussen, Tour de France Leader, Is Expelled by Team".
Bloomberg. 26 July 2007.
Retrieved 18 July 2009.
-
^
"Doping agency: Beltran positive for EPO". google.
Associated Press. Retrieved 7
November 2008.[dead
link]
-
^
"BBC SPORT | Other sport ... | Tour 'winning war against
doping'". News.bbc.co.uk. Page last updated at 18:30 GMT,
Thursday, 17 July 2008 19:30 UK.
Retrieved 4 November 2008.
-
^
"Piepoli and Schumacher Tour de France samples positive for
CERA". Autobus.cyclingnews.com. 7 October 2008.
Retrieved 18 July 2009.
-
^
"Kohl positive confirmed". Autobus.cyclingnews.com.
Retrieved 18 July 2009.
-
^
"Contador tests positive for low levels of clenbuterol".
VeloNews.competitor.com. Page last updated 30 September 2010
4:23 pm UTC. Retrieved 7 July
2011.
-
^
"Spanish federation proposes one-year suspension for Contador".
VeloNews.competitor.com. Page last updated 27 January 2011
12:59 pm UTC. Retrieved 7
July 2011.
-
^
"Spanish fed clears Alberto Contador, Contador plans to start
Algarve". VeloNews.competitor.com. Page last updated 15
February 2011 1:30 pm UTC.
Retrieved 7 July 2011.
-
^
"CAS sanctions Contador with two-year ban in clenbutorol case".
Cyclingnews (Future Publishing Limited). 6 February 2012.
Retrieved 6 February 2012.
-
^
"Disgraced Schleck will miss Tour de France after failing drug
test during last year's race".
Retrieved 1 February 2013.
-
^
U.S. Postal Service Pro Cycling Team Investigation, USADA,
2012 October, retr 2012 10 14
-
^
"Lance Armstrong stripped of all seven Tour de France wins by
UCI". BBC. 22 October 2012.
Retrieved 22 October 2012.
-
^
"Lance Armstrong's Tour de France victories will not be
reallocated". BBC. 26 October 2012.
Retrieved 26 October 2012.
-
^
Lionel Birnie (2 July 2010).
"Tom Steels on Mark Cavendish: 'He's the man to beat'".
Cycling Weekly. Retrieved
24 July 2010.
-
^
"cnn.com". CNN. 11 July 2011.
Retrieved 23 February 2012.
-
^
"Frank Schleck to leave Tour de France after failing doping
test". CNN. Retrieved 17
July 2012.
-
^
Pretot, Julien (22 October 2012).
"Armstrong's Tour titles stripped". Geneva: Reuters.
Retrieved 22 October 2012.
-
^
"Ultimas Informaciones – La XXVIII Vuelta a Francia" (in
Spanish). El Mundo Deportivo. 28 July 1934. p. 2.
-
^
Woodland 2007, p. 105.
-
^
"Europe | Tour de France spectator killed". BBC News. 18
July 2009. Retrieved 18 July
2009.
-
^
a
b
Woodland 2007, p. 80.
-
^
Memoire du cyclisme. Retrieved 13 July 2012
-
^
"Tour de France 2009 – Stats". Letour.fr.
Retrieved 18 July 2009.
-
^
"Verschil tussen de nummers 1 en 2 van het eindklassement"
(in Dutch). tourde-france.nl.
Retrieved 17 March 2008.
-
^
"Charles Pélissier". Results history. letour.fr.
Retrieved 23 July 2012.
-
^
"Eddy Merckx". Results history. letour.fr.
Retrieved 23 July 2012.
-
^
"Freddy Maertens". Results history. letour.fr.
Retrieved 23 July 2012.
-
^
p125 "Letour Guide Historique 2012". Letour.fr. 10 July 2012.
Retrieved 23 July 2012.
-
^
"Peter Sagan captures Stage 1". ESPN. Associated Press. 1
July 2012. Retrieved 8 July
2012.
-
^
"Cipollini Sprints to Record Win – Los Angeles Times".
Los Angeles Times. 8 July 1999.
Retrieved 18 July 2009.
-
^
"1david zabriskie 54676 km/h record 2 – Archives de la Tribune
de Geneve". Archives.tdg.ch.
Retrieved 18 July 2009.
-
^ Prologue
time-trials are shorter than those later in the race.
-
^
"Tour de France Launch Interviews (Chris Boardman)".
Britishcycling.org.uk. Archived from
the original on 21 March 2006.
Retrieved 18 July 2009.
-
^
"Armstrong in yellow after Discovery powers through TTT".
VeloNews. 5 July 2005.
Retrieved 18 July 2009.
-
^
"Discovery Channel Pro Cycling Team Breaking Records With Trek
Bikes Designed On AMD64 Technology". Amd.com.
Retrieved 18 July 2009.
-
^
a
b
c
Tour 09, Procycling (UK) summer
2009
References
-
Goddet, Jacques (1991).
L'équipée belle.
Éditions Robert Laffont.
ISBN 978-2-221-07290-5.
Retrieved 6 May 2013.
-
Nicholson, Geoffrey (1991).
Le Tour: The Rise and Rise of the Tour de France.
London:
Hodder & Stoughton.
ISBN 978-0-340-54268-2.
Retrieved 6 May 2013.
-
Augendre, Jacques (1996).
Le Tour de France: panorama d'un siècle. Service
Communication-presse de la Société du Tour de France.
Retrieved 6 May 2013.
- Seray,
Jacques (2000).
1904 Tour de France. Ann Arbor Press.
ISBN 978-0-9649835-2-6.
Retrieved 6 May 2013.
-
Woodland, Les (2000).
The Unknown Tour De France: The Many Faces of the World's
Biggest Bicycle Race. U.S.: Cycling Resources.
ISBN 978-1-892495-26-6.
Retrieved 6 May 2013.
-
Armstrong, Lance; Jenkins, Sally (2001) [1st. pub. 2000].
It's Not About the Bike: My Journey Back to Life. New
York City:
Random House.
ISBN 978-0-224-06087-5.
Retrieved 6 May 2013.
- Harp,
Stephen L. (2001).
Marketing Michelin: Advertising and Cultural Identity in
Twentieth-Century France. Baltimore, Maryland, U.S.:
Johns Hopkins University Press.
ISBN 978-0-8018-6651-7.
Retrieved 6 May 2013.
-
Ollivier, Jean-Paul (2001).
L'ABCdaire du Tour de France. Paris:
Groupe Flammarion.
ISBN 978-2-08-012727-3.
Retrieved 6 May 2013.
-
Boeuf, Jean-Luc; Léonard, Yves (2003).
La République du Tour de France.
Éditions du Seuil.
ISBN 978-2-02-058073-1.
Retrieved 6 May 2013.
-
Allchin, Richard; Bell, Adrian (2003).
Golden stages of the Tour de France : tales from the
legendary stages of the world's greatest bike race.
London: Mousehold Press.
ISBN 978-1-874739-28-9.
Retrieved 6 May 2013.
- de
Mondenard, Jean-Paul (2003).
Dopage: l'imposture des performances : mensonges et vérités
sur l'école de la triche. Chiron.
Retrieved 6 May 2013.
- Masso,
Benjamin (2003).
Het zweet der goden: legende van de wielersport (4th
ed.). Atlas.
ISBN 978-90-450-1126-4.
Retrieved 6 May 2013.
-
McGann, Bill; McGann, Carol (2006).
The Story of the Tour de France, Volume 1.
Indianapolis, U.S.: Dog Ear Publishing.
ISBN 978-1-59858-180-5.
Retrieved 6 May 2013.
-
Woodland, Les (2007) [1st. pub. 2003].
The Yellow Jersey Companion to the Tour de France.
London:
Random House.
ISBN 978-0-224-08016-3.
Retrieved 26 April 2013.
-
McGann, Bill; McGann, Carol (2008).
The Story of the Tour De France: 1965-2007.
Indianapolis, U.S.: Dog Ear Publishing.
ISBN 978-1-59858-608-4.
Retrieved 25 April 2013.
-
Thompson, Christopher S. (2008).
The Tour de France: A Cultural History (2nd ed.).
Berkeley, California, U.S.:
University of California Press.
ISBN 978-0-520-93486-3.
Retrieved 26 April 2013.
-
Cazeneuve, Thierry;
Chany, Pierre (2011).
La fabuleuse histoire du Tour de France. Paris:
La Martinière.
ISBN 978-2-7324-4792-6.
Retrieved 13 February 2013.
-
Moore, Tim (2011) [1st. pub. 2001].
French Revolutions: Cycling the Tour de France.
London:
Random House.
ISBN 978-1-4464-1497-2.
Retrieved 6 May 2013.
-
Dauncey, Hugh; Hare, Geoff (2013) [1st. pub. 2003].
The Tour De France, 1903-2003: A Century of Sporting
Structures, Meanings and Values. London:
Routledge.
ISBN 978-1-135-76239-1.
Retrieved 6 May 2013.
Further reading
External links