Vive le Tour!

goldencleric

http://vimeo.com/21306164

Great short from 1962 about le Tour. Not sure if people are familiar with it but it is really worth a watch!

kincsem

Excellent. Loved it. It showed a few nice cafe raids for beer and wine by the peleton.

goldencleric

I loved that bit, nowadays riders are careful to take even a water bottle from the fans! Although I do recall seeing Thomas Voeckler taking a bottle of Evian on one of the climbs in the alps.

Such a beautiful era of the Tour.

Signal_ rabbit

Excellent! Class!

Rovi

That's gorgeous, thanks for posting it!

The tax man

Gotta love the era were health&saftey didn't exist, especially the guys on the motorbikes.

Johnners1878

Great piece of film - camerawork, editing, super soundtrack. Makes me wish my French was better. Would be funny to see Tommy going up Galibier with a couple of bottles of beer down the back of the maillot juene. Poor old No. 20, at least he went out fighting. Though it all looked nostalgic and innocent, there was a big doping scandal in 1962 after a heap of riders abandoned through illness claiming they were suffering from food-poisoning after eating fish. The Tour Doctor investigated and dismissed it. L'Equipe published a cartoon of the "sick" riders gathered around a fish skeleton with syringes for ribs (according to Matt Rendell's "Blazing Saddles (A Cruel and Unusual History of The Tour De France)"

jimm

Great film thanks for posting it.

Hard men eh....slap a bit of cotton dressing on a head wound and stick his blood soaked cap back on to hold it in place.

Jeeez, those crashes, and with glass bottles in their jersey pockets :eek:

You gotta feel for no. 20 on Team Ignis (red and black stripes). He was so out of it, he just falls into the roadside verge still strapped in to the pedals.

wayne0308

Fantastic video, I really enjoyed that. I've never seen the tour in colour that far back. Does anyone know who No.20 was? Tried looking for rider lists with no success.

Hermy

Giuseppe Zorzi?

wayne0308

Hermy wrote: »

Giuseppe Zorzi?

Yep that's spot on, just found a team listing using your info and it's got him as rider No. 20. Cheers, I was interested to know what happened to him in the end.

http://ledicodutour.perso.sfr.fr/equipes/equipes_par_annees/1957_1966/1962.htm

a.b. 6 e must mean he pulled out or was pulled out in the 6th stage.

jimm

wayne0308 wrote: »

I was interested to know what happened to him in the end.

Still with us it seems aged 73. Wonder if he's racing with the Italian Vets.:)

http://www.cyclingarchives.com/coureurfiche.php?coureurid=25620

Hungrycol

Excelent, that 18 minutes just few by! Those roads in 1962 and still better than the Irish roads of 2011!

Hermy

wayne0308 wrote: »

Fantastic video, I really enjoyed that. I've never seen the tour in colour that far back. Does anyone know who No.20 was? Tried looking for rider lists with no success.

If you go to Wikipedia and then click on some of the other language options you may find more info. The Dutch pages are usually a good one to start with.
And http://www.memoire-du-cyclisme.net/ is great too.

ledgesquared

I usually don't leave comments but I had to log in to thank you for posting that. Absolutely class video, and a great reminder of just how hardcore it was.

That is cycling!

Hermy

Hermy wrote: »

Giuseppe Zorzi?

Do I not get a thank you?:(

wayne0308

Thankeee!!! Seems like he didn't really last long enough or win enough in the professional world to have much information written about him sadly.

Hermy

wayne0308 wrote: »

Thankeee!!!

Godsentme

Brilliant! Brilliant! These were MEN!!

SACH Central

English sub-titles here