Daily Cycling Facts 05.07.2014

The Tour de France began on this day in 1909, 1938, 1956, 1997, 2003 and 2008.

1909

The Tour, 1909

14 stages, 4,498km.
In 1908, Desgrange decided that all riders should race on identical bikes supplied by the Tour in an attempt to make the race a contest of skill and athleticism, rather than one that might be won by superior equipment. This had not been judged a success and was dropped in 1909 - firstly due to the expense of providing the bikes and secondly because trade teams became official: in the past, while riders did ride with teams, teams were not recognised by the race. Now the teams were official, though riders were still considered to be individuals and were expected to race as such rather than in support of a team leader. This meant the companies that ran them would put more money into the Tour - and in return, they obviously wanted to show off their bikes to the public. However, each rider was still required to complete the race using one bike only, which could only be replaced if a course official declared it irreparably damaged; at the start line each bike was given a stamped lead seal and officials checked them carefully at the start lines, finish lines and checkpoints (where, for the first time, toilets were installed - Desgrange was embarrassed that riders urinated in front of spectators, despite the fact that spectators appear to have always found this a source of great amusement and will still gather around locations thought likely to become "nature break" stops to this day). The winner was selected according to points, as had been the case since 1905; after Stage 8, by which time 79 riders had abandoned (mostly due to the awful weather), the points amassed by those riders were redistributed among the riders still in the race according to the position in which they'd have finished each stage had the race only included them at the start. This was repeated after the eleventh stage.

Faber runs with his broken bike to win Stage 4

A record 150 riders started the race; only 38 of them rode for the teams, the remainder being unsponsored correurs isolés ("isolated riders") who paid their own way. The Tour had been developing into an international event ever since the first edition, but with so many riders there were more foreigners than ever before: the French were still in the majority but there were many Belgians (5), Swiss (5)  and Italians (19) and two riders from elsewhere. Cyrille van Hauwaert won Stage 1 and became the first Belgian stage winner and the first foreigner to lead the race in Tour history, then François Faber (having become the first Luxembourger to win a stage the previous year and only the second foreigner, Faber was tipped to win by Lucien Petit-Breton) won the next when be beat Octave Lapize by 33'. Faber, at 1.88m and 88kg, was enormous by the standards of the day, hence his nickname The Giant of Colombes; he used the strength he'd built up in his work as a docker to ride solo for 200km the next day through deep snow and won again, this time beating Gustave Garrigou by 33'. On Stage 4 his chain broke with a kilometres to go, so he ran the rest of the way with his bike beside him and won that one by 10'. During Stage 5 he was first blown right of the road by a powerful crosswind and then kicked off his bike by a horse, in both cases he was able to continue and ended up beating Garrigou into second place again, this time by 5'.

Faber now had a thirteen point advantage over Garrigou and became the Tour's first superstar: in the past, French fans supported French riders, Belgian fans supported Belgian riders and so on, but Faber transcended that - 20,000 people, French, Belgian, Luxembourger and others, turned out to see him finish Stage 6 and when he won that one too they were ecstatic and his five consecutive stage wins remains a record more than a century later. Tour organisers became worried, however, that if Faber continued to dominate the race so completely, the other riders would give up all hope of winning and race despondently for second and third; so they asked him if he'd take things easy for a while: he'd either tired himself out, realised that the race was already as good as his or agreed, because Stage 7 was won by Ernest Paul - who just happened to be his half-brother. Jean Alavoine won Stage 9 (Faber had a rest and came tenth, his worst performance in the race), then Constant Ménager took the only Tour stage win of his career. Louis Trousselier, Garrigou and Paul Duboc won the following three, but they were all still too far behind Faber overall for a single stage win to make any difference. Finally, Alavoine won Stage 14 in notable circumstances - his bike became sufficiently damaged to be unridable 10km to go and, realising that locating an official and going through the formalities of being permitted a new one was going to lose significant time, he shouldered it like a cyclo cross rider and ran to the finish line where he won the stage by 6'30".

François Faber

Faber had moved to Alcyon from Peugeot at the end of 1908 and was now instrumental in the team's domination of the race, but his team mates had also ridden remarkably well: three places in the top ten went to isolés, including Ernest Paul in sixth, while Le Globe's Ménager was seventh. All the other places were taken by Alcyon. Being tall and well-built with his big moustache, Faber looked older than he was - few realise therefore that, at 22 years and seven months old, he's the third youngest man to have won a Tour a well as the first foreigner. He was only 28 when he climbed out of a trench and went into no man's land to rescue an injured comrade on the 9th of May in 1915, and was shot in the back and killed as he carried the man back. That very morning he'd received a message from his wife, informing him that she had given birth to a healthy baby girl.

Top Ten Final General Classification
1 François Faber (LUX) Alcyon 37
2 Gustave Garrigou (FRA) Alcyon 57
3 Jean Alavoine (FRA) Alcyon 66
4 Paul Duboc (FRA) Alcyon 70
5 Cyrille van Hauwaert (BEL) Alcyon 92
6 Ernest Paul (FRA) – 95
7 Constant Ménager (FRA) Le Globe 102
8 Louis Trousselier (FRA) Alcyon 114
9 Eugène Christophe (FRA) – 139
10 Aldo Bettini (ITA) – 142


1938

The Tour, 1938

21 stages (Stages 6 and 17 split into parts A and B; Stages 4, 10 and 20 split into parts A, B and C), 4,694km.
Unsponsored individual riders were barred from entry for the first time - as professionalism among the sponsored riders and teams increased, they had largely ceased to be competitive some time earlier. The time bonus system was extensively overhauled in an attempt to prevent any rider who won two or three stages with a large lead from gaining an unfair advantage over one who rode consistently; now winning a stage earned 1' or a maximum of 1'15" if his lead over the second place rider was judged sufficient. Since climbers were thought to suffer less on plain stages than sprinters did in the mountains, the winner of a mountain stage was limited to one minute. Team time trials had fallen out of favour and were abandoned, not reappearing in the race until 1954, and the Col d'Iseran - a mountain that has played host to so many of the most glorious moments in the history of the Tour, was included for the first time. The Belgian and French teams (there were in fact three French teams - the national team, the Bleuets made up of riders who for various reasons couldn't be included in the national team and the Cadets, a team of young riders) were considered to be the strongest. The Italians were thought less so, but they had Gino Bartali who, having come very close to victory in 1937, was a favourite for overall victory.

The first seven stages were unremarkable, save for the unwelcome sight of Willi Oberbeck winning Stage 1 in a jersey emblazoned with the swastika of Nazi Germany. Then on Stage 8, when the race reached the Pyrenees, Bartali attacked and nobody could follow him (Georges Speicher tried to do so by hanging onto a car, but was seen by officials and disqualified) - he was the first man over the Aubisque, Tourmalet and Aspin, but then disaster struck when his rear wheel crumpled. The Belgians Félicien Vervaecke and Ward Vissers passed him and went on to take first and second place, Bartali managed to take third place 55" behind them. After the stage, Vervaecke led the General Classification with Bartali second at +2'18", but with time bonuses the next day the gap was reduced to 57".

Gino Bartali

On Stage 14, Bartali attacked again - and for a second time nobody could stop him being the first over Allos, Vars and Izoard. This time his bike didn't let him down and he finished the stage with a overall advantage of 17'45" over the Luxembourgian Matt Clemens and 21'30" over Vervaecke. he lost some time in the Stage 20b time trial, but from that point onwards his victory was never in any doubt; his final advantage was 18'27". André Leducq (winner in 1930 and 1932) and Antonin Magne (winner in 1931 and 1934) mounted a successful two-man escape in the final stage and crossed the line together, being declared joint stage winner. For Leducq, it was a record 25th stage win, since bettered by only Eddy Merckx (34) and Bernard Hinault(28) (and, since Mark Cavendish has 21 and shows no signs of slowing down at the time of writing, probably him too before long). Neither man would ever ride the Tour again.

Top Ten Final General Classification
1 Gino Bartali (ITA) Italy 148h 29' 12"
2 Félicien Vervaecke (BEL) Belgium +18' 27"
3 Victor Cosson (FRA) France +29' 26"
4 Ward Vissers (BEL) Belgium +35' 08"
5 Matt Clemens (LUX) Luxembourg +42' 08"
6 Mario Vicini (ITA) Italy +44' 59"
7 Jules Lowie (BEL) Belgium +48' 56"
8 Antonin Magne (FRA) France +49' 00"
9 Marcel Kint (BEL) Belgium +59' 49"
10 Dante Gianello (FRA) Bleuets +1h 06' 47


1956
22 stages (Stage 4 split into parts A and B), 4,498km.
The French government ordered the Tour to take secondary roads as much as possible so as to avoid major road closures, but the Tour and caravan was now so large that it frequently became stuck on the narrow routes and caused far more disruption than it would have done had the organisers have been permitted to take it on roads of their own choosing. A rule change allowed punctures to be remedied by changing the wheel, previously the rider had to stop and repair it. For the second time in Tour history, no previous winner started the race - this had last happened in 1927 (1903 isn't counted on account of being the first Tour). Based on form, Charly Gaul therefore became favourite.

Enough climbing talent to make a thousand mortal grimpeurs:
Gaul and Bahamontes

Gaul, who was almost as good against the clock as he was in the mountains, won the Stage 4a but remained 15'04" behind overall; however, he was expected to make up time in the mountains provided the weather was on his side - he hated hot conditions, but when it was cool nobody in the world could follow him. Unforunately, the Pyrenees tended to be too hot for him and he lost time; when the race arrived at the Alps it was looking as though he was going to run out of time - even Stage 17, the second day in the Alps when he was the first man over Sestrieres, didn't win back enough time to make much of a difference. Stage 18 was a different matter entirely: Federico Bahamontes (the only climber to ever rival Gaul) was fastest up Mont Cenis and his less-famous countryman René Marigil fastest on Croix de Fer, then Gaul launched one of the blistering attacks that in the future would win him a Tour. Having simply ridden away from the peloton, he won the stage with 3'22" on Stan Ockers and 7'29" on Gastone Nencini and Bahamontes - who was so angry at his inability to respond that he picked up his bike and threw it into a gulley (his team mates managed to get it back out and persuaded him to continue). It had been a superb stage win, but it was still too late for Gaul to take the General Classification. The King of the Mountains, meanwhile, was his.

Every once in a while, the Tour turns up a completely unexpected winner. Roger Walkowiak, who had only been given opportunity to ride at the very last moment after Gilbert Bauvin was transferred from Nord-Est-Centre to the national team, found himself in the maillot jaune after Stage 7 when he got away in an escape group (for the second time in the race) that won the stage by 18'46", but at such an early point he neither expected nor intended to keep it - team manager Sauveur Ducazeaux told him he'd be far better off losing it and seeing what happened later, because defending it would likely prove too much effort. He lost time over the coming stages, giving up the jersey in Stage 10 and few people thought he'd get it back again. However, in Stage 15 the entire Belgian became ill - an incident they blamed on food poisoning from bad fish served in a hotel the night before but which is commonly supposed (and very possibly was) caused by an unknown drug administered to them; a serious setback for the French team's strongest rivals. In Stage 17 he got away in another successful break, though this time the maillot jaune went to Wouter Wagtmans; but when Walkowiak managed to keep up with Bahamontes as Gaul was winning Stage 18 it passed back to him. Bahamontes was now probably the only rider capable of challenging him, but with only one mountain stage left his chance never came - an almost unknown rider, dismissed as an also-ran before the race even got under way, had won. He was the second rider to win a Tour without a stage win on the way to victory, the last man to do so being Firmin Lambot in 1922, and the only Tour winner to have won a single Tour stage at any point during his career.

Roger Walkowiak

Neither the press nor public were impressed; they'd wanted the young Jacques Anquetil (who had decided not to take part anyway) to win - Jacques Goddet said that the applause as he crossed the last finish line sounded more like a lamentation than a celebration. It wasn't long before the first accusations that he was an undeserving winner, a victor through luck rather than skill and effort (the term "à la Walko," to succeed in that way, became popular for a while), began to appear and he was badly hurt by them.  He rode again the next year but his spirit was broken and he rapidly dropped the bottom of the General Classification, despite a stage win at that year's Vuelta a Espana proving that he was fully capable of winning a stage in his own right; gradually, depressed, he faded away. In retirement he opened a bar in his hometown, but even local cycling fans told him he shouldn't have won and before long he gave that up too, preferring the anonymity of a job at a car factory, where he had worked before becoming a professional cyclist.

Goddet had a totally different opinion. Walowiak, he said, was his all-time favourite winner and the very archetype of what an all-rounder should be and had won the maillot jaune with his legs before keeping it with his head. Later, Bernard Hinault would also defend him - "There are people who say that Walkowiak should not have won the Tour. They should have been on that Tour! He took the jersey, he lost it and he regained it. He was not a thief. The Tour is not a gift," he insisted. Walkowiak is 85 at the time of writing. In time, the cycling world finally came to understand that Goddet and Hinault were correct and, after so many years of shameful treatment that left him preferring to pretend his great achievement had never happened he's now happy to talk about it.

Top Ten Final General Classification
1 Roger Walkowiak (FRA) North East-Center 124h 01'16"
2 Gilbert Bauvin (FRA) France +1'25"
3 Jan Adriaensens (BEL) Belgium +3'44"
4 Federico Bahamontes (ESP) Spain +10'14"
5 Nino Defilippis (ITA) Italy +10'25"
6 Wout Wagtmans (NED) Netherlands +10'59"
7 Nello Lauredi (FRA) South East France +14'01"
8 Stan Ockers (BEL) Belgium +16'52"
9 René Privat (FRA) France +22'59"
10 Antonio Barbosa (POR) Luxembourg/Mixed +26'03"


1997

Ullrich and Udo Bolts, 1997

21 stages + prologue, 3,943.8km.
Jan Ullrich's final advantage of 9'09" becomes the biggest gap between first and second place since Laurent Fignon beat Bernard Hinault by 10'32" in 1984. Ullrich also wins the Youth category, becoming the first rider to have won it and the General Classification in a single edition.

Top Ten Final General Classification
1 Jan Ullrich (GER) Telekom 100h 30' 35"
2 Richard Virenque (FRA) Festina +9' 09"
3 Marco Pantani (ITA) Mercatone Uno +14' 03"
4 Abraham Olano (ESP) Banesto +15' 55"
5 Fernando Escartín (ESP) Kelme +20' 32"
6 Francesco Casagrande (ITA) Saeco +22' 47"
7 Bjarne Riis (DEN) Telekom +26' 34"
8 José Maria Jimenez (ESP) Banesto +31' 17"
9 Laurent Dufaux (SUI) Festina +31' 55"
10 Roberto Conti (ITA) Mercatone Uno +32' 26"


2003

Armstrong in the maillot jaune after Stage 8, 2003

20 stages + prologue, 3,427.5km.
Unusually for a modern Tour, the 2003 edition started and ended in Paris - to mark the race's first century, celebrations also inspiring the organisers to keep the race entirely in France, as had been the case with early editions. The race was expected to be - and was - one of the most hotly-contested in many years and numerous favourites attempted to prevent Lance Armstrong from matching the five-victory record shared by Jacques Anquetil, Eddy Merckx, Bernard Hinault and Miguel Indurain; yet statistics show - and he confesses - that his preformance in this edition was the worst of his seven wins. The Tour was awarded the Prince of Asturias Award, a prize given to events and organisations that "contribute to encouraging and promoting scientific, cultural and humanistic values that form part of mankind's universal heritage."

In 2003, there was an incident that is likely to remain unique - as fans watched the tail end of the peloton go by on Galibier, they were asked to move a little further along the road. Then, without warning, a man on a mountain bike hurtled down towards the road from higher up the slope, launched into the air from a small rocky ledge and jumped clear across the riders, landing (and crashing) on the rock-strewn terrain on the other side. His name was Dave Watson, a professional freerider with the Kona Clump team; after being given a check-over by paramedics, police decided that his assistants (from a French mountain bike magazine) hadn't endangered any member of the public other than Dave himself, he was allowed to go on his way.

Lance Armstrong, who won this edition and six others, would be stripped of all his Tour victories in 2012 following an investigation into doping.

Top Ten Final General Classification
1 Lance Armstrong (USA) US Postal Service 83h 41' 12" (disqualified)
2 Jan Ullrich (GER) Bianchi +1' 01"
3 Alexandre Vinokourov (KAZ) Telekom +4' 14"
4 Tyler Hamilton (USA) Team CSC +6' 17"
5 Haimar Zubeldia (ESP) Euskaltel +6' 51"
6 Iban Mayo (ESP) Euskaltel +7' 06"
7 Ivan Basso (ITA) Fassa Bortolo +10' 12"
8 Christophe Moreau (FRA) Crédit Agricole +12' 28"
9 Carlos Sastre (ESP) Team CSC +18' 49"
10 Francisco Mancebo (ESP) iBanesto.com +19' 15"


2008

Sastre in yellow, 2008

21 stages, 3,559km.
The bonification system - which awarded time bonuses to the winners of intermediate sprints and stages - was abandoned. A feud between the ASO and the UCI finally boiled over when the ASO announced that it wasn't inviting Astana to the race due to the team's involvement in Operacion Puerto, despite a UCI rule stating that all ProTour teams were to be invited to the Grand Tours; the ASO got its way. The race remained almost entirely in France, dipping briefly into Italy at the end of Stage 15 and the start of Stage 16. Mark Cavendish won his first four Tour stages but didn't place in the top ten on points, Bernard Kohl won the King of the Mountains and was third overall but was later shown to have doped with CERA, an EPO variant, and was disqualified. To date, second place Carlos Sastre - who also won overall - has not been upgraded in the Mountains, nor has Denis Menchov in the General Classification.

Top Ten Final General Classification
1 Carlos Sastre (ESP) Team CSC 87h 52' 52"
2 Cadel Evans (AUS) Silence-Lotto +0' 58"
3  ---
4 Denis Menchov (RUS) Rabobank +2' 10"
5 Christian Vande Velde (USA) Garmin +3' 05"
6 Fränk Schleck (LUX) Team CSC +4' 28"
7 Samuel Sánchez (ESP) Euskaltel +6' 25"
8 Kim Kirchen (LUX) Team Columbia +6' 55"
9 Alejandro Valverde (ESP) Caisse d'Epargne +7' 12"
10 Tadej Valjavec (SLO) Ag2r +9' 05"

Eduardo Chozas
Born in Madrid on this day in 1960, Eduardo Chozas, a professional rider from 1980 to 1993, has been largely fogotten today despite winning two stages at the Giro d'Italia (Stage 5, 1983; Stage 2, 1990) and four stages at the Tour de France (Stage 15, 1985; Stage 11, 1986; Stage 22, 1987, Stage 13, 1990 - when he also took his best General Classification result, sixth, and won the overall Combativity Award).

His other claim to fame is that he entered more Grand Tours than any other man in the history of cycling - six editions of the Tour de France, seven editions of the Giro d'Italia and fourteen editions of the Vuelta a Espana. He finished 26 of them, also a record, abandoning only the 1984 Vuelta.

Cyclists born on this day: Philippe Gilbert (Belgium, 1982); Günter Kaslowski (Germany, 1934, died 2001); Ali Çetiner (Turkey, 1925); Raimondas Vilčinskas (Lithuania, 1977); Jan Kudra (Poland, 1937); Hernán López (Argentina, 1973); Amadu Yusufu (Malawi, 1958); Pramote Sangskulrote (Thailand, 1952); Glenn Magnusson (Sweden, 1969); Jo Jae-Hyeon (South Korea, 1938); Alex Zülle (Switzerland, 1968); Gustav Hentschel (USA, 1896, died 1980); Frank Elliott (Canada, 1911, died 1964); Alexander Kristoff (Norway, 1987); Ernest Bens (Belgium, 1949); Ralf Elshof (Netherlands, 1962); ...and Paul Smith, the fashion designed who wanted to be a professional cyclist (Great Britain, 1946).

Daily Cycling Facts 05.07.2013

The Tour de France began on this day in 1909, 1938, 1956, 1997, 2003 and 2008.

1909

The Tour, 1909

14 stages, 4,498km.
In 1908, Desgrange decided that all riders should race on identical bikes supplied by the Tour in an attempt to make the race a contest of skill and athleticism, rather than one that might be won by superior equipment. This had not been judged a success and was dropped in 1909 - firstly due to the expense of providing the bikes and secondly because trade teams became official: in the past, while riders did ride with teams, teams were not recognised by the race. Now the teams were official, though riders were still considered to be individuals and were expected to race as such rather than in support of a team leader. This meant the companies that ran them would put more money into the Tour - and in return, they obviously wanted to show off their bikes to the public. However, each rider was still required to complete the race using one bike only, which could only be replaced if a course official declared it irreparably damaged; at the start line each bike was given a stamped lead seal and officials checked them carefully at the start lines, finish lines and checkpoints (where, for the first time, toilets were installed - Desgrange was embarrassed that riders urinated in front of spectators, despite the fact that spectators appear to have always found this a source of great amusement and will still gather around locations thought likely to become "nature break" stops to this day). The winner was selected according to points, as had been the case since 1905; after Stage 8, by which time 79 riders had abandoned (mostly due to the awful weather), the points amassed by those riders were redistributed among the riders still in the race according to the position in which they'd have finished each stage had the race only included them at the start. This was repeated after the eleventh stage.

Faber runs with his broken bike to win Stage 4

A record 150 riders started the race; only 38 of them rode for the teams, the remainder being unsponsored correurs isolés ("isolated riders") who paid their own way. The Tour had been developing into an international event ever since the first edition, but with so many riders there were more foreigners than ever before: the French were still in the majority but there were many Belgians (5), Swiss (5)  and Italians (19) and two riders from elsewhere. Cyrille van Hauwaert won Stage 1 and became the first Belgian stage winner and the first foreigner to lead the race in Tour history, then François Faber (having become the first Luxembourger to win a stage the previous year and only the second foreigner, Faber was tipped to win by Lucien Petit-Breton) won the next when be beat Octave Lapize by 33'. Faber, at 1.88m and 88kg, was enormous by the standards of the day, hence his nickname The Giant of Colombes; he used the strength he'd built up in his work as a docker to ride solo for 200km the next day through deep snow and won again, this time beating Gustave Garrigou by 33'. On Stage 4 his chain broke with a kilometres to go, so he ran the rest of the way with his bike beside him and won that one by 10'. During Stage 5 he was first blown right of the road by a powerful crosswind and then kicked off his bike by a horse, in both cases he was able to continue and ended up beating Garrigou into second place again, this time by 5'.

Faber now had a thirteen point advantage over Garrigou and became the Tour's first superstar: in the past, French fans supported French riders, Belgian fans supported Belgian riders and so on, but Faber transcended that - 20,000 people, French, Belgian, Luxembourger and others, turned out to see him finish Stage 6 and when he won that one too they were ecstatic and his five consecutive stage wins remains a record more than a century later. Tour organisers became worried, however, that if Faber continued to dominate the race so completely, the other riders would give up all hope of winning and race despondently for second and third; so they asked him if he'd take things easy for a while: he'd either tired himself out, realised that the race was already as good as his or agreed, because Stage 7 was won by Ernest Paul - who just happened to be his half-brother. Jean Alavoine won Stage 9 (Faber had a rest and came tenth, his worst performance in the race), then Constant Ménager took the only Tour stage win of his career. Louis Trousselier, Garrigou and Paul Duboc won the following three, but they were all still too far behind Faber overall for a single stage win to make any difference. Finally, Alavoine won Stage 14 in notable circumstances - his bike became sufficiently damaged to be unridable 10km to go and, realising that locating an official and going through the formalities of being permitted a new one was going to lose significant time, he shouldered it like a cyclo cross rider and ran to the finish line where he won the stage by 6'30".

François Faber

Faber had moved to Alcyon from Peugeot at the end of 1908 and was now instrumental in the team's domination of the race, but his team mates had also ridden remarkably well: three places in the top ten went to isolés, including Ernest Paul in sixth, while Le Globe's Ménager was seventh. All the other places were taken by Alcyon. Being tall and well-built with his big moustache, Faber looked older than he was - few realise therefore that, at 22 years and seven months old, he's the third youngest man to have won a Tour a well as the first foreigner. He was only 28 when he climbed out of a trench and went into no man's land to rescue an injured comrade on the 9th of May in 1915, and was shot in the back and killed as he carried the man back. That very morning he'd received a message from his wife, informing him that she had given birth to a healthy baby girl.

Top Ten Final General Classification
1 François Faber (LUX) Alcyon 37
2 Gustave Garrigou (FRA) Alcyon 57
3 Jean Alavoine (FRA) Alcyon 66
4 Paul Duboc (FRA) Alcyon 70
5 Cyrille van Hauwaert (BEL) Alcyon 92
6 Ernest Paul (FRA) – 95
7 Constant Ménager (FRA) Le Globe 102
8 Louis Trousselier (FRA) Alcyon 114
9 Eugène Christophe (FRA) – 139
10 Aldo Bettini (ITA) – 142


1938

The Tour, 1938

21 stages (Stages 6 and 17 split into parts A and B; Stages 4, 10 and 20 split into parts A, B and C), 4,694km.
Unsponsored individual riders were barred from entry for the first time - as professionalism among the sponsored riders and teams increased, they had largely ceased to be competitive some time earlier. The time bonus system was extensively overhauled in an attempt to prevent any rider who won two or three stages with a large lead from gaining an unfair advantage over one who rode consistently; now winning a stage earned 1' or a maximum of 1'15" if his lead over the second place rider was judged sufficient. Since climbers were thought to suffer less on plain stages than sprinters did in the mountains, the winner of a mountain stage was limited to one minute. Team time trials had fallen out of favour and were abandoned, not reappearing in the race until 1954, and the Col d'Iseran - a mountain that has played host to so many of the most glorious moments in the history of the Tour, was included for the first time. The Belgian and French teams (there were in fact three French teams - the national team, the Bleuets made up of riders who for various reasons couldn't be included in the national team and the Cadets, a team of young riders) were considered to be the strongest. The Italians were thought less so, but they had Gino Bartali who, having come very close to victory in 1937, was a favourite for overall victory.

The first seven stages were unremarkable, save for the unwelcome sight of Willi Oberbeck winning Stage 1 in a jersey emblazoned with the swastika of Nazi Germany. Then on Stage 8, when the race reached the Pyrenees, Bartali attacked and nobody could follow him (Georges Speicher tried to do so by hanging onto a car, but was seen by officials and disqualified) - he was the first man over the Aubisque, Tourmalet and Aspin, but then disaster struck when his rear wheel crumpled. The Belgians Félicien Vervaecke and Ward Vissers passed him and went on to take first and second place, Bartali managed to take third place 55" behind them. After the stage, Vervaecke led the General Classification with Bartali second at +2'18", but with time bonuses the next day the gap was reduced to 57".

Gino Bartali

On Stage 14, Bartali attacked again - and for a second time nobody could stop him being the first over Allos, Vars and Izoard. This time his bike didn't let him down and he finished the stage with a overall advantage of 17'45" over the Luxembourgian Matt Clemens and 21'30" over Vervaecke. he lost some time in the Stage 20b time trial, but from that point onwards his victory was never in any doubt; his final advantage was 18'27". André Leducq (winner in 1930 and 1932) and Antonin Magne (winner in 1931 and 1934) mounted a successful two-man escape in the final stage and crossed the line together, being declared joint stage winner. For Leducq, it was a record 25th stage win, since bettered by only Eddy Merckx (34) and Bernard Hinault(28) (and, since Mark Cavendish has 21 and shows no signs of slowing down at the time of writing, probably him too before long). Neither man would ever ride the Tour again.

Top Ten Final General Classification
1 Gino Bartali (ITA) Italy 148h 29' 12"
2 Félicien Vervaecke (BEL) Belgium +18' 27"
3 Victor Cosson (FRA) France +29' 26"
4 Ward Vissers (BEL) Belgium +35' 08"
5 Matt Clemens (LUX) Luxembourg +42' 08"
6 Mario Vicini (ITA) Italy +44' 59"
7 Jules Lowie (BEL) Belgium +48' 56"
8 Antonin Magne (FRA) France +49' 00"
9 Marcel Kint (BEL) Belgium +59' 49"
10 Dante Gianello (FRA) Bleuets +1h 06' 47


1956
22 stages (Stage 4 split into parts A and B), 4,498km.
The French government ordered the Tour to take secondary roads as much as possible so as to avoid major road closures, but the Tour and caravan was now so large that it frequently became stuck on the narrow routes and caused far more disruption than it would have done had the organisers have been permitted to take it on roads of their own choosing. A rule change allowed punctures to be remedied by changing the wheel, previously the rider had to stop and repair it. For the second time in Tour history, no previous winner started the race - this had last happened in 1927 (1903 isn't counted on account of being the first Tour). Based on form, Charly Gaul therefore became favourite.

Enough climbing talent to make a thousand mortal grimpeurs:
Gaul and Bahamontes

Gaul, who was almost as good against the clock as he was in the mountains, won the Stage 4a but remained 15'04" behind overall; however, he was expected to make up time in the mountains provided the weather was on his side - he hated hot conditions, but when it was cool nobody in the world could follow him. Unforunately, the Pyrenees tended to be too hot for him and he lost time; when the race arrived at the Alps it was looking as though he was going to run out of time - even Stage 17, the second day in the Alps when he was the first man over Sestrieres, didn't win back enough time to make much of a difference. Stage 18 was a different matter entirely: Federico Bahamontes (the only climber to ever rival Gaul) was fastest up Mont Cenis and his less-famous countryman René Marigil fastest on Croix de Fer, then Gaul launched one of the blistering attacks that in the future would win him a Tour. Having simply ridden away from the peloton, he won the stage with 3'22" on Stan Ockers and 7'29" on Gastone Nencini and Bahamontes - who was so angry at his inability to respond that he picked up his bike and threw it into a gulley (his team mates managed to get it back out and persuaded him to continue). It had been a superb stage win, but it was still too late for Gaul to take the General Classification. The King of the Mountains, meanwhile, was his.

Every once in a while, the Tour turns up a completely unexpected winner. Roger Walkowiak, who had only been given opportunity to ride at the very last moment after Gilbert Bauvin was transferred from Nord-Est-Centre to the national team, found himself in the maillot jaune after Stage 7 when he got away in an escape group (for the second time in the race) that won the stage by 18'46", but at such an early point he neither expected nor intended to keep it - team manager Sauveur Ducazeaux told him he'd be far better off losing it and seeing what happened later, because defending it would likely prove too much effort. He lost time over the coming stages, giving up the jersey in Stage 10 and few people thought he'd get it back again. However, in Stage 15 the entire Belgian became ill - an incident they blamed on food poisoning from bad fish served in a hotel the night before but which is commonly supposed (and very possibly was) caused by an unknown drug administered to them; a serious setback for the French team's strongest rivals. In Stage 17 he got away in another successful break, though this time the maillot jaune went to Wouter Wagtmans; but when Walkowiak managed to keep up with Bahamontes as Gaul was winning Stage 18 it passed back to him. Bahamontes was now probably the only rider capable of challenging him, but with only one mountain stage left his chance never came - an almost unknown rider, dismissed as an also-ran before the race even got under way, had won. He was the second rider to win a Tour without a stage win on the way to victory, the last man to do so being Firmin Lambot in 1922, and the only Tour winner to have won a single Tour stage at any point during his career.

Roger Walkowiak

Neither the press nor public were impressed; they'd wanted the young Jacques Anquetil (who had decided not to take part anyway) to win - Jacques Goddet said that the applause as he crossed the last finish line sounded more like a lamentation than a celebration. It wasn't long before the first accusations that he was an undeserving winner, a victor through luck rather than skill and effort (the term "à la Walko," to succeed in that way, became popular for a while), began to appear and he was badly hurt by them.  He rode again the next year but his spirit was broken and he rapidly dropped the bottom of the General Classification, despite a stage win at that year's Vuelta a Espana proving that he was fully capable of winning a stage in his own right; gradually, depressed, he faded away. In retirement he opened a bar in his hometown, but even local cycling fans told him he shouldn't have won and before long he gave that up too, preferring the anonymity of a job at a car factory, where he had worked before becoming a professional cyclist.

Goddet had a totally different opinion. Walowiak, he said, was his all-time favourite winner and the very archetype of what an all-rounder should be and had won the maillot jaune with his legs before keeping it with his head. Later, Bernard Hinault would also defend him - "There are people who say that Walkowiak should not have won the Tour. They should have been on that Tour! He took the jersey, he lost it and he regained it. He was not a thief. The Tour is not a gift," he insisted. Walkowiak is 85 at the time of writing. In time, the cycling world finally came to understand that Goddet and Hinault were correct and, after so many years of shameful treatment that left him preferring to pretend his great achievement had never happened he's now happy to talk about it.

Top Ten Final General Classification
1 Roger Walkowiak (FRA) North East-Center 124h 01'16"
2 Gilbert Bauvin (FRA) France +1'25"
3 Jan Adriaensens (BEL) Belgium +3'44"
4 Federico Bahamontes (ESP) Spain +10'14"
5 Nino Defilippis (ITA) Italy +10'25"
6 Wout Wagtmans (NED) Netherlands +10'59"
7 Nello Lauredi (FRA) South East France +14'01"
8 Stan Ockers (BEL) Belgium +16'52"
9 René Privat (FRA) France +22'59"
10 Antonio Barbosa (POR) Luxembourg/Mixed +26'03"


1997

Ullrich and Udo Bolts, 1997

21 stages + prologue, 3,943.8km.
Jan Ullrich's final advantage of 9'09" becomes the biggest gap between first and second place since Laurent Fignon beat Bernard Hinault by 10'32" in 1984. Ullrich also wins the Youth category, becoming the first rider to have won it and the General Classification in a single edition.

Top Ten Final General Classification
1 Jan Ullrich (GER) Telekom 100h 30' 35"
2 Richard Virenque (FRA) Festina +9' 09"
3 Marco Pantani (ITA) Mercatone Uno +14' 03"
4 Abraham Olano (ESP) Banesto +15' 55"
5 Fernando Escartín (ESP) Kelme +20' 32"
6 Francesco Casagrande (ITA) Saeco +22' 47"
7 Bjarne Riis (DEN) Telekom +26' 34"
8 José Maria Jimenez (ESP) Banesto +31' 17"
9 Laurent Dufaux (SUI) Festina +31' 55"
10 Roberto Conti (ITA) Mercatone Uno +32' 26"


2003

Armstrong in the maillot jaune after Stage 8, 2003

20 stages + prologue, 3,427.5km.
Unusually for a modern Tour, the 2003 edition started and ended in Paris - to mark the race's first century, celebrations also inspiring the organisers to keep the race entirely in France, as had been the case with early editions. The race was expected to be - and was - one of the most hotly-contested in many years and numerous favourites attempted to prevent Lance Armstrong from matching the five-victory record shared by Jacques Anquetil, Eddy Merckx, Bernard Hinault and Miguel Indurain; yet statistics show - and he confesses - that his preformance in this edition was the worst of his seven wins. The Tour was awarded the Prince of Asturias Award, a prize given to events and organisations that "contribute to encouraging and promoting scientific, cultural and humanistic values that form part of mankind's universal heritage."

In 2003, there was an incident that is likely to remain unique - as fans watched the tail end of the peloton go by on Galibier, they were asked to move a little further along the road. Then, without warning, a man on a mountain bike hurtled down towards the road from higher up the slope, launched into the air from a small rocky ledge and jumped clear across the riders, landing (and crashing) on the rock-strewn terrain on the other side. His name was Dave Watson, a professional freerider with the Kona Clump team; after being given a check-over by paramedics, police decided that his assistants (from a French mountain bike magazine) hadn't endangered any member of the public other than Dave himself, he was allowed to go on his way.

Lance Armstrong, who won this edition and six others, would be stripped of all his Tour victories in 2012 following an investigation into doping.

Top Ten Final General Classification
1 Lance Armstrong (USA) US Postal Service 83h 41' 12" (disqualified)
2 Jan Ullrich (GER) Bianchi +1' 01"
3 Alexandre Vinokourov (KAZ) Telekom +4' 14"
4 Tyler Hamilton (USA) Team CSC +6' 17"
5 Haimar Zubeldia (ESP) Euskaltel +6' 51"
6 Iban Mayo (ESP) Euskaltel +7' 06"
7 Ivan Basso (ITA) Fassa Bortolo +10' 12"
8 Christophe Moreau (FRA) Crédit Agricole +12' 28"
9 Carlos Sastre (ESP) Team CSC +18' 49"
10 Francisco Mancebo (ESP) iBanesto.com +19' 15"


2008

Sastre in yellow, 2008

21 stages, 3,559km.
The bonification system - which awarded time bonuses to the winners of intermediate sprints and stages - was abandoned. A feud between the ASO and the UCI finally boiled over when the ASO announced that it wasn't inviting Astana to the race due to the team's involvement in Operacion Puerto, despite a UCI rule stating that all ProTour teams were to be invited to the Grand Tours; the ASO got its way. The race remained almost entirely in France, dipping briefly into Italy at the end of Stage 15 and the start of Stage 16. Mark Cavendish won his first four Tour stages but didn't place in the top ten on points, Bernard Kohl won the King of the Mountains and was third overall but was later shown to have doped with CERA, an EPO variant, and was disqualified. To date, second place Carlos Sastre - who also won overall - has not been upgraded in the Mountains, nor has Denis Menchov in the General Classification.

Top Ten Final General Classification
1 Carlos Sastre (ESP) Team CSC 87h 52' 52"
2 Cadel Evans (AUS) Silence-Lotto +0' 58"
3  ---
4 Denis Menchov (RUS) Rabobank +2' 10"
5 Christian Vande Velde (USA) Garmin +3' 05"
6 Fränk Schleck (LUX) Team CSC +4' 28"
7 Samuel Sánchez (ESP) Euskaltel +6' 25"
8 Kim Kirchen (LUX) Team Columbia +6' 55"
9 Alejandro Valverde (ESP) Caisse d'Epargne +7' 12"
10 Tadej Valjavec (SLO) Ag2r +9' 05"

Eduardo Chozas
Born in Madrid on this day in 1960, Eduardo Chozas, a professional rider from 1980 to 1993, has been largely fogotten today despite winning two stages at the Giro d'Italia (Stage 5, 1983; Stage 2, 1990) and four stages at the Tour de France (Stage 15, 1985; Stage 11, 1986; Stage 22, 1987, Stage 13, 1990 - when he also took his best General Classification result, sixth, and won the overall Combativity Award).

His other claim to fame is that he entered more Grand Tours than any other man in the history of cycling - six editions of the Tour de France, seven editions of the Giro d'Italia and fourteen editions of the Vuelta a Espana. He finished 26 of them, also a record, abandoning only the 1984 Vuelta.

Cyclists born on this day: Philippe Gilbert (Belgium, 1982); Günter Kaslowski (Germany, 1934, died 2001); Ali Çetiner (Turkey, 1925); Raimondas Vilčinskas (Lithuania, 1977); Jan Kudra (Poland, 1937); Hernán López (Argentina, 1973); Amadu Yusufu (Malawi, 1958); Pramote Sangskulrote (Thailand, 1952); Glenn Magnusson (Sweden, 1969); Jo Jae-Hyeon (South Korea, 1938); Alex Zülle (Switzerland, 1968); Gustav Hentschel (USA, 1896, died 1980); Frank Elliott (Canada, 1911, died 1964); Alexander Kristoff (Norway, 1987); Ernest Bens (Belgium, 1949); Ralf Elshof (Netherlands, 1962); ...and Paul Smith, the fashion designed who wanted to be a professional cyclist (Great Britain, 1946).

Daily Cycling Facts 19.05.2013

Carlo Galetti

The 19th of May has seen the first stage of nine editions of the Giro d'Italia - 1912, 1929, 1934, 1951, 1956, 1960, 1962, 1963 and 2001. 1912 was the third edition and holds the record for the smallest ever number of riders with only 56 starting the race. They were split into fourteen trade teams (the first time trade teams were allowed) of four men each, with the fastest team being declared the winner rather than an individual rider. Atala-Dunlop (which became known unofficially as The Four Musketeers) was the team of Luigi Ganna (1909 winner), Carlo Galetti (1910/1911 winner), Giovanni Micheletto and Eberardo Pavesi and led through all nine stages - had the race have been run in a more conventional manner with a General Classification, Galetti would have won after completing the 2,435km in 100h2'57". Originally, only eight stages were to be run - however, organisers decided apparently on a whim to lengthen Stage 4 by 50km, which met with the disapproval of the riders who showed their displeasure by stopping at a station and getting on a train rather than riding the added section. Fans - who had paid for tickets to see the riders cross the finish line within a velodrome in Rome - were furious and made some very real death threats against the organisers. The stage results were disqualified and Stage 9 was later added as a result.

In 1929, Alfredo Binda won Stage 2 - and then the next seven stages too, eight in a row and still a record to this day. That was more than enough to secure his General Classification placing and he took first place after completing the fourteen stages and 2,920km in 107h18'24". Five years later in 1934, when the race next began on this day, he was favourite to win - but this time, fortune was not on his side and he abandoned at the end of Stage 6, leaving Learco Guerra to win after he completed the 17 stages and 3,706km in 121h17'17".

Fausto Coppi was considered the favourite a few months before the 1951 edition began, but the death of his beloved younger brother Serse left him so crushed many wondered if he would ever recover. However, Coppi loved cycling almost as much as he had loved Serse, and while the man who appeared on the start line was not the Coppi that Italy adored he still raced - and came a respectable fourth. With Bartali now long past his best years, the way ahead clear for Fiorenzo Magni to do battle with Rik van Steenbergen and claim the second of his three Giro victories when he finished the 20 stages and 4,153km in 121h11'37".

Charly Gaul and the 1956 Blizzard

Charly Gaul, 1932-2005

1956 brought one of the most remarkable victories in the history of cycling when the Luxembourgian climber Charly Gaul revealed himself to be made of far sterner stuff than mere mortals, pressing on through a blizzard on Monte Bodone (Charly also had a remarkable talent for swallowing amphetamine pills, which may have contributed a little). After he'd escaped the peloton and ridden off into the snow alone, it wasn't long before nobody had the slightest idea where he'd got to. Team managers and race officials scoured the mountain in their cars searching for him, but there was no trace. Eventually, it was 1934 winner Learco Guerra (who by then had become  manager of Faema) who found him: completely by chance, he'd spotted what looked like Charly's bike propped up against a wall of a little village bar and gone inside. There, he discovered the rider sat by the fire, wrapped in blankets and being administered hot, sweet coffee by the owners in an attempt to return him from  a near-comatose state.

Learco stripped Gaul out of his soaking jersey and shorts and had him vigourously rubbed down with hot water and, slowly, the rider began to return to life. Outside, the weather had worsened - the snow was coming down harder now and the wind was increasing in strength. So Gaul, being Gaul, went outside, got back on his bike and set off to complete the stage. Head down, his face devoid of expression, he kept on turning the cranks with his usual smooth, powerful style, on and on and on.

He suffered for it - when he got to the finish line, spectators say his face was wrinkled and pale, his extremities blue and stiff. In fact, was in such poor condition that he had to be physically lifted into a bath of hot water and it took more than hour before he was able to speak. 44 men, including race leader Pasquale Fornara abandoned that day. Charly rode alone in the blizzard for 88km and won by 7'44", securing overall victory.


Gaul was favourite in 1960, but a throat infection prevented him from riding at his full capability. Nevertheless, he remained a greater obstacle in Jacques Anquetil's quest for glory than the 2,006m climb to Cervinia (a ski resort on the Matterhorn, the mountain the Italians call Monte Cervino) and even the 2,621m Gavia Pass, featuring in the race for the very first time that year and the site of controversy: Italy was mourning the death of its greatest hero Fausto Coppi and desperately wanted an Italian - any Italian - to win, which persuaded organisers to look the other way when Gastone Nencini received a helping hand from fans on his way up the mountain. However, the Frenchman was on better form than ever before in the Stage 14 time trial, hammering around the parcours to take the win despite starting with a six minute disadvantage behind the Luxembourgian. From that point on, he was unstoppable and led the General Classification for the remainder of the race, completing the 3,481km and 21 stages in 94h03'54" as the first Frenchman to have won a Giro.

Franco Balmamion

The 1962 edition was unusual due to a lack of time trials and appeared to have been designed solely to promote tourism rather than to showcase professional cycling, twisting this way and that around the country and covering 4,180km in an attempt to visit as many of Italy's most famous attractions as could possibly be worked into the parcours. Anquetil was away, concentrating on winning a third Tour de France and Gaul had begun his long, slow decline that led ultimately to his later reclusive life in a forest hut, which left the race open for the next generation. The Belgian Armand Desmet looked set for the win after he won Stage 7 and then rode well enough to lead the General Classification for seven stages, but Graziano Battistini took it from him in Stage 14 and surrendered it to Franco Balmamion three stages later and hung onto it until the end of Stage 21 when he was declared winner with a time of 123h07'03". Balmamion won again the following year, 1963, when the race started on the same date after completing the 21 stages and 4,063km in 116h50'16". Pope Giovanni XXIII blessed the race that year, but at times the conduct of riders and organisers was somewhat less than godly - doping became an issue for the first time (one year after Pierre Dumas had highlighted the problem with the first public statement on the subject at the Tour de France) when the official race doctor began an investigation following news that a rider had administered himself an intravenous injection of a substance that remains unknown. There was also a serious row between organisers, the League of Professional Cyclists' chairman Mario Fontana and the Italian Federation boss Bruno Mealli battling one another in an effort to take overall control of the race. In the end, both men walked out and the Italian government was forced to take over.

2001 was also hit by drama. During the night between Stages 16 and 17, officers from the Comando Carabinieri per la Tutela della Salute (the Italian police department that deals with issues involving public health, food and drugs) mounted a raid that has become known as the San Remo Blitz. Raiding hotel rooms, they seized a huge pile of doping products including steroids, growth hormones and other drugs, blood transfusion equipment and assorted blood testing equipment intended to help teams get riders through controls. Among the 36 people (riders and team officials) to face charges related to the raid was Dario Frigo - the very same Dario Frigo who, four years later at the Tour de France, was arrested after police searched his wife's car and discovered ten doses of EPO. After the Giro offence he was handed a six-month ban; after the Tour offence (three years later, in fact), he and his wife received six-month prison sentences and a €8,757 fine. The race covered 3,356km over 21 stages, won by Gilberto Simoni in 89h02'58" and will be forever remembered as the worst in Giro history.

Janssen in yellow, 1968
(image credit: Pivos / P. Vossen CC BY 2.5)

Jan Janssen
Born in Nootdorp, Netherlands on this day in 1940, Jan Janssen earned a living digging foundations with his family's construction firm after he joined a cycling club at the age of 16. Before too long he started to win some races and it began to look as though he might be able to make a living from it, which resulted in an invitation to turn semi-professional with Locomotif-Vredestein in 1961. The next year, he won three stages and came third overall at the Tour de l'Avenir and was offered a professional contract with Pelforth-Sauvage-Lejeune.

Though he'd originally come to wider attention as a sprinter, Janssen soon showed aptitude in other areas after joining Pelforth; rapidly becoming known as a good all-rounder and likely General Classification contender. With his excellent French, sharp wits and natural leadership skills, he soon became team captain. In 1963, he was third at Paris-Roubaix - and finishing Paris-Roubaix in any position proves a rider's credentials. He also rode his first Tour de France that year and won a stage, an extremely rare achievement for any rider new to the race (unfortunately, he crashed the next day and was forced to abandon). The next year he won Paris-Nice, the World Championship and Stages 7 and 10 at the Tour (and finished top three in eight others); which only gave him 24th on the overall General Classification but won him the Points competition - and he won it the next year too, then came second in the GC the year after that.

He won Paris-Roubaix in 1967 and entered the Tour again, this time one stage and winning the Points for a third time. Then, in the 1968 edition, he beat Herman van Springel by 38" - which would remain the smallest margin by which a Tour had ever been won until 1989, but was more than enough: 32 years after Dutch riders first took part in the Tour, they had a winner.

For a description of Janssen's 1968 Tour, see
Granny Gear Blog
(image credit: Granny Gear Blog)

Four years later, Janssen found himself unable to keep up with the field at the Tour of Luxembourg. "I knew then that I was Jan Janssen, winner of the Tour de France and the championship of the world and that it was time for me to stop," he later said, and after reaching the finish line he retired from professional cycling forever. Later, he set up a frame building workshop in the little town of Putte which is position so precisely on the border that part of it lies within Belgium. He became friendly with a neighbour, Hennie Kuiper - who won the World Championship in 1975, Paris-Roubaix in 1983 and very nearly two Tours of his own - and they can still sometimes be seen riding together. Janssen says he likes it when people recognise him.

Anthony Doyle
Born in Ashord, Great Britain on this day in 1958, Tony Doyle rose to fame when he won two bronze medals (Pursuit and Sprint) at the 1978 Commonwealth Games, turned professional in 1979 with KP Crisps-Viscount and then a year later when be became World Pursuit Champion, as he would a second time in 1986.

In 1988, Doyle was involved in a serious crash at the Six Days of Munich and suffered serious head injuries and numerous broken bones, remaining in a coma for ten days and being given the last rites. Defying medical expectations, he then began to recover, though he would spend six weeks in an intensive care ward and two months at a specialist rehabilitation centre. Nevertheless, he was not expected to ride again - but then in 1989 he won the Six Days of Cologne and, a year later, Munich.

A spine injury ended his career in 1994 but he remained closely connected to the cycling world - his hand-built frames are still highly sought-after and in 1996 he became president of British Cycling, later directing the 2004 Tour of Britain.

Other cyclists born on this day: Klaas Vantornout (Belgium, 1982); Christian Murro (Italy, 1978); José Ferreira (Venezuela, 1934); Francisco Lozano (Mexico, 1932, died 2008); Anselmo Citterio (Italy, 1927, died 2006); Juan Arroyo (Venezuela, 1955); Philippe Vernet (France, 1961); Geir Digerud (Norway, 1956); Maciej Bielecki (Poland, 1987).