Butcher, Blacksmith, Acrobat, Sweep
The Tale of the First Tour de France
Published on 7. June 2018
Book
Paperback/Softback
384 pages
978-0-224-10066-3 (ISBN)
Description
From the winner of the Telegraph Sports Book Awards Cycling Book of the Year 2018
The first Tour de France in 1903 was a colourful affair full of adventure, mishaps and audacious attempts at cheating. Its riders included characters like Maurice Garin, an Italian-born Frenchman, said to have been swapped for a round of cheese by his parents in order to smuggle him into France to clean chimneys as a teenager, Hippolyte Aucouturier with his trademark handlebar moustache, and amateurs like Jean Dargassies, a blacksmith who had never raced before.
Would this ramshackle pack of cyclists draw crowds to throng France's rutted roads and cheer the first Tour heroes? Surprisingly it did, and, all thanks to a marketing ruse dreamed up to revive struggling newspaper L'Auto, cycling would never be the same again. Peter Cossins takes us through the inaugural Tour de France, painting a nuanced portrait of France in the early 1900s, to see where the greatest sporting event of all began.
The first Tour de France in 1903 was a colourful affair full of adventure, mishaps and audacious attempts at cheating. Its riders included characters like Maurice Garin, an Italian-born Frenchman, said to have been swapped for a round of cheese by his parents in order to smuggle him into France to clean chimneys as a teenager, Hippolyte Aucouturier with his trademark handlebar moustache, and amateurs like Jean Dargassies, a blacksmith who had never raced before.
Would this ramshackle pack of cyclists draw crowds to throng France's rutted roads and cheer the first Tour heroes? Surprisingly it did, and, all thanks to a marketing ruse dreamed up to revive struggling newspaper L'Auto, cycling would never be the same again. Peter Cossins takes us through the inaugural Tour de France, painting a nuanced portrait of France in the early 1900s, to see where the greatest sporting event of all began.
Reviews / Votes
Essential...The First Tour de France takes you back to the race itself. Cossins produces a deeply researched and detailed description of the race that toggles between background information on the race's organization and the individual stages, with long stretches of real-time-style stage reporting one chapter at a time.The effect of this, especially the latter, is soaring * Podium Cafe * Enthralling... Full of outlandish characters and ripping yarns, it makes for a cracking good read * Bikes Etc *More details
Language
English
Place of publication
London
United Kingdom
Publishing group
Vintage Publishing
Product notice
Paperback (UK-B)
Dimensions
Height: 197 mm
Width: 128 mm
Thickness: 30 mm
Weight
270 gr
ISBN-13
978-0-224-10066-3 (9780224100663)
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Other editions
Additional editions
E-Book
06/2017
Vintage Digital
€10.99
Available for download
Person
First drawn into the sport while a student in Spain in the mid-1980s, Peter Cossins has been writing about cycling since 1993, contributing principally to Cycling Weekly, Cycle Sport and Procycling.
The Monuments, his history of cycling's five greatest one-day Classic races, was published in 2014, followed in 2015 by Alpe d'Huez, an appraisal of cycling's greatest climb.
For Yellow Jersey Press he has written the definitive account of the first ever Tour de France, Butcher, Blacksmith, Acrobat, Sweep the also the enlightening book on cycling tactics, Full Gas.
He lives in the Ariege in the heart of the French Pyrenees.
The Monuments, his history of cycling's five greatest one-day Classic races, was published in 2014, followed in 2015 by Alpe d'Huez, an appraisal of cycling's greatest climb.
For Yellow Jersey Press he has written the definitive account of the first ever Tour de France, Butcher, Blacksmith, Acrobat, Sweep the also the enlightening book on cycling tactics, Full Gas.
He lives in the Ariege in the heart of the French Pyrenees.