1914 Tour de France - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

The 1914 Tour de France was the 12th Tour de France

Tour de France

The Tour de France is an annual bicycle race held in France and nearby countries. First staged in 1903, the race covers more than and lasts three weeks. As the best known and most prestigious of cycling's three "Grand Tours", the Tour de France attracts riders and teams from around the world. The...

, taking place June 28 to July 26, 1914. The total distance was 5405 kilometres (3,358.5 mi) and the average speed of the riders was 26.835 kilometre per hour (0.00463181594481589 mi). It was won by the Belgian

Belgium

Belgium , officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a federal state in Western Europe. It is a founding member of the European Union and hosts the EU's headquarters, and those of several other major international organisations such as NATO.Belgium is also a member of, or affiliated to, many...

cyclist Philippe Thys

Philippe Thys

Philippe Thys was a Belgian cyclist and three times winner of the Tour de France.-Professional career:...

.

The day the Tour began, Franz Ferdinand, Archduke of Austria was assassinated in Sarajevo

Sarajevo

Sarajevo |Bosnia]], surrounded by the Dinaric Alps and situated along the Miljacka River in the heart of Southeastern Europe and the Balkans....

, marking the start of World War I

World War I

World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...

. On August 3, Germany

Germany

Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...

invaded Belgium

Belgium

and declared war on France

France

The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...

, making this Tour the last for five years, until 1919

1919 Tour de France

The 1919 Tour de France was the 13th Tour de France, taking place from 29 June to 27 July 1919 over a total distance of . It was the first Tour de France after World War I, and was won by Firmin Lambot...

. The three men who won the Tour between 1907 and 1910 would die in the war.

Changes from the 1913 Tour de France

Not much changed from the 1913 Tour de France

1913 Tour de France

The 1913 Tour de France was the 11th Tour de France, taking place June 29 to July 27, 1913. The total distance was and the average speed of the riders was . The competition was won by the Belgian Philippe Thys, after in the crucial sixth stage Eugène Christophe broke his bicycle and lost several...

, the most important novelty was the introduction of frame numbers.
Philippe Thys, who had won the 1913 Tour de France, was returning in 1914 and considered favourite, together with his team mate Henri Pélissier

Henri Pélissier

Henri Pélissier was a French racing cyclist from Paris and champion of the 1923 Tour de France. In addition to his 29 career victories, he was known for his long-standing feud with Tour founder Henri Desgrange and for protesting against the conditions endured by riders in the early years of the Tour...

. Apart from him six other previous Tour de France winners started the race: Louis Trousselier, Lucien Petit-Breton

Lucien Petit-Breton

Lucien Georges Mazan was a French racing cyclist .He was born in Plessé, Loire-Atlantique , a part of Brittany, now part of Pays de la Loire. When he was six he moved with his parents to Buenos Aires where he took Argentine nationality...

, Octave Lapize

Octave Lapize

Octave Lapize was a French professional road racing cyclist and track cyclist.Most famous for winning the 1910 Tour de France and a bronze medal at the 1908 Summer Olympics in the men's 100 kilometres, he was a three-time winner of one-day classics, Paris–Roubaix and Paris–Brussels.In his first...

, François Faber

François Faber

François Faber was a Luxembourgian/French racing cyclist. He was born in France. He was the first foreigner to win the Tour de France in 1909, and his record of winning 5 consecutive stages still stands...

, Odile Defraye

Odile Defraye

Odile Defraye was a Belgian road racing cyclist who won three stages and the overall title of the 1912 Tour de France, which was the last tour decided by a points system instead of overall best time...

and Gustave Garrigou

Gustave Garrigou

Cyprien Gustave Garrigou was one of the best professional racing cyclists of his era. He rode the Tour de France eight times and won once...

. Four more cyclists started the race that would later win a Tour de France: Firmin Lambot

Firmin Lambot

Firmin Lambot was a Belgian bicycle racer who twice won the Tour de France.Born in the small town of Florennes, Lambot worked as a saddler. He worked 12 hours a day, starting at 6am. He bought his first bicycle at 17 and began riding 50 km a day to and from work. His first race was in a local...

, Léon Scieur

Léon Scieur

Léon Scieur was a Belgian cyclist who won the 1921 Tour de France, along with stages 3 and 10. His first great victory was the 1920 Liège–Bastogne–Liège; he won a stage and finished fourth in the 1919 and 1920 Tours de France.-Origins:Léon Scieur was the son of a farmer in Florennes, near...

, Henri Pélissier

Henri Pélissier

and Lucien Buysse

Lucien Buysse

Lucien Buysse was a Belgian cyclist and a champion of the Tour de France.Born in Wontergem, Buysse began racing professionally in 1914, when he entered the Tour de France but did not finish. He resumed his career after World War I, entering but abandoning the Tour again in 1919 but placing third...

. This number of 11 former or future Tour de France winners on the start line is a record. In addition, Italian champion Costante Girardengo

Costante Girardengo

Costante Girardengo was an Italian professional road bicycle racer, considered by many to be one of the finest riders in the history of the sport. He was the first rider to be declared a "Campionissimo" or "champion of champions" by the Italian media and fans...

, started the race, but Girardengo was not yet the champion from 1919 on, and was not the team leader.

In 1914, the first cyclists from Australia started the Tour de France, Don Kirkham and Ivan Munro. They also finished the race, in 17th place and 20th place.

The cyclists used whistles, to warn other persons that they were coming (mainly downhill).

Race details

Thys was dominant in the entire race. Even though he only won the first stage, he finished in the top five every other stage.
In that first stage, Jean Rossius

Jean Rossius

Jean Rossius was a Belgian road racing cyclist who won five stages in total in the Tour de France. In the 1914 Tour de France he finished in fourth place in the overall classification, his best finishing.- Palmarès :1914...

finished second with the same time. The second stage was won by Rossius, with Thys in the same time. Both had the same time, and the same finishing places, so they were both given the lead in the general classification.

In the third stage, the riders reached the first check point one hour late, after they had taken the wrong route and rode 30 km in the wrong direction. The race was then stopped and restarted from the first check point.

The lead remained shared between Rossius and Thys until after the fifth stage, when Thys got away from Rossius. After that stage, Pélissier was third in the classification with only 5'27" behind.

In the sixth stage, the Pyrénées mountains appeared. The stage was won by Lambot, with Thys only 7 minutes behind. The other competitors did worse, with Pélissier losing over 30 minutes and Rossius over one hour. Thys was firmly in the lead. In that stage, Ali Neffati was hit by a car from the organization, and could not continue. According to the rules, he did not have to finish the stage, and was given a time which allowed him to keep his 42nd place in the overall classification. In the sixth stage, Girardengo crashed again, and retired from the Tour, never to come back.

The weather was hot, and in the eighth stage, the cyclists did not want to race and cycled at a low speed. Tour organizer Henri Desgrange

Henri Desgrange

Henri Desgrange was a French bicycle racer and sports journalist. He set 12 world track cycling records, including the hour record of 35.325 kilometres on 11 May 1893. He was the first organiser of the Tour de France.-Origins:Henri Desgrange was one of two brothers, twins...

then stopped the race, and organized a sprint tournament, with semifinals and finals, which was won by Octave Lapize. In the ninth stage, former winner Faber was penalized with 90 minutes, because he had been pushed and took drinks from a motor cyclist.

Pélissier, still in second place, had done his best to win back time, but he only managed to win back a few minutes. After the thirteenth stage, he was still 31 minutes and 50 seconds behind.
In the 14th stage to Dunkerque, Thys' bicycle broke. It was not allowed to get help while fixing your bicycle, and in the 1913 Tour de France

1913 Tour de France

, Eugene Christophe

Eugene Christophe

Eugène Christophe was a French road bicycle racer and pioneer of cyclo-cross. He was a professional from 1904 until 1926. In 1919 he became the first rider to wear the yellow jersey of the Tour de France .Eugène Christophe rode 11 Tours de France and finished eight...

lost his chances of a victory by repairing his own bicycle. Thys decided to take the risk of a time penalty, and bought a new wheel at a shop. This cost him a 30 minute penalty, which left Thys with only 1:50 ahead of Pélissier. Pélissier did his best to overcome the gap, but Thys followed him. In the stage to Dunkerque, Pélissier claimed spectators prevented him from getting away from Thys. In the end, Thys stayed less than two minutes ahead of Henri Pélissier, and managed to keep that margin until the finish in Paris.

Stage winners

Stage results
Stage	Date	Route	TerrainIn 1914, there was no distinction in the rules between plain stages and mountain stages; the icons shown here indicate whether the stage included mountains.	Length	Race leader
1	28 June	Paris Paris Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region... – Le Havre Le Havre Le Havre is a city in the Seine-Maritime department of the Haute-Normandie region in France. It is situated in north-western France, on the right bank of the mouth of the river Seine on the English Channel. Le Havre is the most populous commune in the Haute-Normandie region, although the total...	Plain stage	388 km (241.1 mi)	From the first to the fifth stage, Thys and Rossius finished in the same times, leading the classification. In all sources, Thys is recorded as leader after the first stage, which he won, but from the second to the fifth stage, they are marked as joint leaders.
2	30 June	Le Havre – Cherbourg	Plain stage	364 km (226.2 mi)
3	2 July	Cherbourg – Brest Brest, France Brest is a city in the Finistère department in Brittany in northwestern France. Located in a sheltered position not far from the western tip of the Breton peninsula, and the western extremity of metropolitan France, Brest is an important harbour and the second French military port after Toulon...	Plain stage	405 km (251.7 mi)
4	4 July	Brest – La Rochelle La Rochelle La Rochelle is a city in western France and a seaport on the Bay of Biscay, a part of the Atlantic Ocean. It is the capital of the Charente-Maritime department.The city is connected to the Île de Ré by a bridge completed on 19 May 1988...	Plain stage	470 km (292 mi)
5	6 July	La Rochelle – Bayonne Bayonne Bayonne is a city and commune in south-western France at the confluence of the Nive and Adour rivers, in the Pyrénées-Atlantiques department, of which it is a sub-prefecture...	Plain stage	376 km (233.6 mi)
6	8 July	Bayonne – Luchon	Stage with mountain	326 km (202.6 mi)
7	10 July	Luchon – Perpignan Perpignan -Sport:Perpignan is a rugby stronghold: their rugby union side, USA Perpignan, is a regular competitor in the Heineken Cup and seven times champion of the Top 14 , while their rugby league side plays in the engage Super League under the name Catalans Dragons.-Culture:Since 2004, every year in the...	Stage with mountain	323 km (200.7 mi)
8	12 July	Perpignan – Marseille Marseille Marseille , known in antiquity as Massalia , is the second largest city in France, after Paris, with a population of 852,395 within its administrative limits on a land area of . The urban area of Marseille extends beyond the city limits with a population of over 1,420,000 on an area of...	Plain stage	370 km (229.9 mi)
9	14 July	Marseille – Nice Nice Nice is the fifth most populous city in France, after Paris, Marseille, Lyon and Toulouse, with a population of 348,721 within its administrative limits on a land area of . The urban area of Nice extends beyond the administrative city limits with a population of more than 955,000 on an area of...	Stage with mountain	338 km (210 mi)
10	16 July	Nice – Grenoble Grenoble Grenoble is a city in southeastern France, at the foot of the French Alps where the river Drac joins the Isère. Located in the Rhône-Alpes region, Grenoble is the capital of the department of Isère...	Stage with mountain	323 km (200.7 mi)
11	18 July	Grenoble – Geneva Geneva Geneva In the national languages of Switzerland the city is known as Genf , Ginevra and Genevra is the second-most-populous city in Switzerland and is the most populous city of Romandie, the French-speaking part of Switzerland...	Stage with mountain	325 km (201.9 mi)
12	20 July	Geneva – Belfort Belfort Belfort is a commune in the Territoire de Belfort department in Franche-Comté in northeastern France and is the prefecture of the department. It is located on the Savoureuse, on the strategically important natural route between the Rhine and the Rhône – the Belfort Gap or Burgundian Gate .-...	Stage with mountain	325 km (201.9 mi)
13	22 July	Belfort – Longwy Longwy Longwy is a commune in the Meurthe-et-Moselle department in north-eastern France.The inhabitants are known as Longoviciens.-Economy:Longwy has historically been an industrial center of the Lorraine iron mining district. The town is known for its artistic glazed pottery.-History:Longwy initially...	Stage with mountain	325 km (201.9 mi)
14	24 July	Longwy – Dunkerque	Plain stage	390 km (242.3 mi)
15	26 July	Dunkerque – Paris Paris Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...	Plain stage	340 km (211.3 mi)

General classification

Final general classification (1–10)
Rank	Team	Time
1	Peugeot–Wolber Peugeot (cycling team) Peugeot team was a French professional cycling team that promoted and rode Peugeot racing bikes.It is listed as the most successful cycling team of all time, on www.cyclingranking.com, with a large margin on the second placed team, Alcyon.-History:...	200h 28' 48"
2	Peugeot–Wolber Peugeot (cycling team) Peugeot team was a French professional cycling team that promoted and rode Peugeot racing bikes.It is listed as the most successful cycling team of all time, on www.cyclingranking.com, with a large margin on the second placed team, Alcyon.-History:...	+1' 50"
3	Peugeot–Wolber Peugeot (cycling team) Peugeot team was a French professional cycling team that promoted and rode Peugeot racing bikes.It is listed as the most successful cycling team of all time, on www.cyclingranking.com, with a large margin on the second placed team, Alcyon.-History:...	+36' 53"
4	Alcyon–Soly Alcyon (cycling team) Alcyon is a former French professional cycling team that was active from 1906 to 1955. It was owned by Alcyon, a French bicycle, automobile and motorcycle manufacturer.- History :...	+1h 57' 05"
5	Peugeot–Wolber Peugeot (cycling team) Peugeot team was a French professional cycling team that promoted and rode Peugeot racing bikes.It is listed as the most successful cycling team of all time, on www.cyclingranking.com, with a large margin on the second placed team, Alcyon.-History:...	+3h 00' 21"
6	Peugeot–Wolber Peugeot (cycling team) Peugeot team was a French professional cycling team that promoted and rode Peugeot racing bikes.It is listed as the most successful cycling team of all time, on www.cyclingranking.com, with a large margin on the second placed team, Alcyon.-History:...	+3h 20' 59"
7	J.B. Louvet–Continental	+3h 53' 55"
8	Peugeot–Wolber Peugeot (cycling team) Peugeot team was a French professional cycling team that promoted and rode Peugeot racing bikes.It is listed as the most successful cycling team of all time, on www.cyclingranking.com, with a large margin on the second placed team, Alcyon.-History:...	+5h 08' 54"
9	Peugeot–Wolber Peugeot (cycling team) Peugeot team was a French professional cycling team that promoted and rode Peugeot racing bikes.It is listed as the most successful cycling team of all time, on www.cyclingranking.com, with a large margin on the second placed team, Alcyon.-History:...	+6h 15' 53"
10	Peugeot–Wolber Peugeot (cycling team) Peugeot team was a French professional cycling team that promoted and rode Peugeot racing bikes.It is listed as the most successful cycling team of all time, on www.cyclingranking.com, with a large margin on the second placed team, Alcyon.-History:...	+7h 49' 02"

Final general classification (11–54)
Rank	Rider	Sponsor	Time
11		Peugeot–Wolber Peugeot (cycling team) Peugeot team was a French professional cycling team that promoted and rode Peugeot racing bikes.It is listed as the most successful cycling team of all time, on www.cyclingranking.com, with a large margin on the second placed team, Alcyon.-History:...	+8h 31' 58"
12		Delage–Continental	+9h 42' 51"
13		Peugeot–Wolber Peugeot (cycling team) Peugeot team was a French professional cycling team that promoted and rode Peugeot racing bikes.It is listed as the most successful cycling team of all time, on www.cyclingranking.com, with a large margin on the second placed team, Alcyon.-History:...	+10h 00' 40"
14		Thoman–Joly	+10h 02' 30"
15		—	+10h 14' 33"
16		Alleluia–Continental	+11h 21' 22"
17		Phebus–Dunlop	+11h 53' 39"
18		Delage–Continental	+12h 23' 21"
19		Thoman–Joly	+12h 24' 15"
20		Phebus–Dunlop	+12h 34' 57"
21		Delage–Continental	+12h 59' 23"
22		Armor–Soly	+13h 22' 14"
23		Gladiator–Dunlop	+14h 32' 36"
24		—	+14h 36' 14"
25		Clement–Dunlop	+15h 18' 21"
26		Delage–Continental	+15h 38' 44"
27		J.B. Louvet–Continental	+16h 32' 55"
28		J.B. Louvet–Continental	+17h 05' 07"
29		Peugeot–Wolber Peugeot (cycling team) Peugeot team was a French professional cycling team that promoted and rode Peugeot racing bikes.It is listed as the most successful cycling team of all time, on www.cyclingranking.com, with a large margin on the second placed team, Alcyon.-History:...	+17h 07' 55"
30		Gladiator–Dunlop	+18h 18' 57"
31		Automoto	+18h 35' 32"
32		—	+19h 21' 04"
33		—	+20h 31' 40"
34		Gladiator–Dunlop	+20h 58' 45"
35		Gladiator–Dunlop	+21h 04' 56"
36		—	+22h 03' 15"
37		Alleluia–Continental	+23h 08' 26"
38		Automoto	+23h 44' 30"
39		—	+26h 11' 22"
40		Automoto	+29h 05' 54"
41		Alleluia–Continental	+30h 04' 05"
42		Delage–Continental	+30h 54' 28"
43		—	+30h 55' 10"
44		—	+35h 13' 35"
45		Gladiator–Dunlop	+35h 56' 03"
46		—	+37h 42' 31"
47		—	+37h 42' 31"
48		—	+52h 15' 32"
49		—	+59h 20' 16"
50		—	+59h 59' 01"
51		—	+67h 46' 24"
52		—	+72h 55' 21"
53		—	+84h 03' 10"
54		—	+99h 04' 45"

Other classifications

Camille Botte, ranked 15 in the general classification, became the winner of the "isolés" category. The "isolés" classification was calculated in the same way as the general classification, but only the isolated cyclists (not part of a team) were eligible.

The organising newspaper l'Auto named Firmin Lambot the meilleur grimpeur. This unofficial title is the precursor to the mountains classification.

Aftermath

One week after the race ended, Germany had declared war on France, starting World War I

World War I

in France. This made the organization of a big cycling race impossible for the next four years, and the Tour de France would start again in 1919

1919 Tour de France

. By that time, Tour de France champions Lucien Petit-Breton

Lucien Petit-Breton

, François Faber

François Faber

and Octave Lapize

Octave Lapize

had died in the first world war.
The winner of the 1914 Tour de France, Philippe Thys, would survive the war, and go on for his third victory in 1920. Henri Pélissier, the runner-up, would win the Tour de France in 1923.

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