This year saw the centenary of the Tour heading into the mountains. Lequipe has had a set of great photo's of the Mountain that changed the Tour landscape. As if it wasn't hard enough riding around the French country side they now had to contend with high mountains. Unlike today these were no paved and riders would fear bears and wolves attacking them. Octave Lapize was the first rider over the col in 1910 yelling at the organizers 'Vous êtes des assassins! Oui, des assassins!', even with my lack of French I can sense by the word assassins he was not happy with them. What lead to this outburst, surely climbing a mountain can not be that bad. Well the stage was 326km long and feature 7 cols to be climbed, all of thin with single gear bikes and possibly even fixed gear. Assassins indeed!!!
Photo from L'Equipe
Any information on this post or any stories you would like to share can be sent to me. Don't be shy, lets share the history of our great sport
 |
| Octave Lapize, Luchon - Bayonne |
Any information on this post or any stories you would like to share can be sent to me. Don't be shy, lets share the history of our great sport
