The first Tour de France sixty cyclists and nineteen days of daring on the road to Paris
The greatest cycling race in the entire world -- The phantom race takes shape -- A great event beyond our imaginations -- Let us fight with the same weapons -- These riders will never reach the finish -- A beautiful but terrible battle -- An honest and closely checked contest -- I've beaten Gar...
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| Format: | UnknownFormat |
| Sprache: | eng |
| Veröffentlicht: |
New York
Nation Books
2017
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Tag hinzufügen | Zusammenfassung: | The greatest cycling race in the entire world -- The phantom race takes shape -- A great event beyond our imaginations -- Let us fight with the same weapons -- These riders will never reach the finish -- A beautiful but terrible battle -- An honest and closely checked contest -- I've beaten Garin! -- Are the organisers beginners or just incapable? -- Everyone who finished this stage is a marvellous rider -- Your bicycle is your salvation -- Road cycling has been democratised -- Colossal, gigantic and monstrous -- Sickened by the behaviour of my rivals -- An outpouring of local chauvinism -- Vive Garin! vive le Tour! -- The most abominable hard race ever imagined -- A tour that had everything -- Appendix : What became of the 1903 Tour's star names The first Tour de France was a far cry from the polished international sporting event we see on television today. Organized by the financially free falling L'Auto magazine, the desperate editors thought that organizing a grand cycling tour was the only thing that could save their publication. But in 1903, cyclists weren't enthusiastic about what was pitched to them as a heroic race through roads more suited to hooves than wheels, with bikes weighing up to forty-four pounds, on a single fixed gear, for three full weeks. Assembling enough riders for the race meant bribing unemployed laborers from the suburbs of Paris, including a butcher, a blacksmith, a chimney sweep, and a wrestler. Through these characters' backstories, Cossins paints a nuanced portrait of France in the early 1900's. The race itself is packed with mishaps and adventure--in part due to the fact that water was scarce at the time, so the men drank wine and beer throughout, often keeling over from their bicycles in a drunken stupor. There was no indication that a ramshackle cycling pack would draw crowds to throng France's rutted roads and cheer the first Tour heroes. But they did, and cycling would never be the same again.--Provided by publisher |
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| Beschreibung: | ix, 358 Seiten 8 ungezählte Seiten Bildtafeln. - Illustrationen, Portraits, 1 Portrait [des Verfassers] 22 cm |
| ISBN: | 9781568589848 978-1-56858-984-8 1568589840 1-56858-984-0 |