It has been exactly 30 years since the name Peugeot last cropped up in the professional peloton, when Roger Legeay's Z-Peugeot team boasted Robert Millar and Gilbert Duclos-Lassalle. The end of the 1989 season marked the end of the longest sponsorship in the sport, and the exit of the most successful team in Tour de France - and perhaps cycling - history.
Over 88 years of both primary and co-sponsorship, Peugeot (and independent riders on Peugeot bikes) won 10 Tours, beating the structure currently known as Movistar into second place by three wins, while Team Sky and Renault boast six apiece. Alongside those victories stood countless Monuments, as well as national and world champions.
The company started out all the way back in 1810, at the Peugeot family foundry in Montbéliard, eastern France. After first producing items such as coffee grinders and saws, the company moved into other areas of manufacture, including bikes. The 'Le Grand Bi' penny-farthing came in 1882 and by the end of the century, the company was mass-producing bicycles.
ADVERTISEMENT
In 1896, Paul Bourillon became world sprint champion on the track riding a Peugeot bike. It was around this time that the company recognised the value of publicity in sponsoring racing cyclists, moving to road racing too. It's fair to say that those early years of sponsorship were a mixed bag – equal parts controversy and success – but the beginning of the 20th century saw the birth of a dynasty. This is the story of Peugeot in professional cycling.
Hippolyte Aucouturier, dubbed 'Le Terrible' by the founder of the Tour de France Henri Desgrange, was the pre-eminent Peugeot racer when the company started sponsoring individual cyclists in 1901. A Paris-Roubaix winner in both 1903 and 1904, he is perhaps better known for his antics at the Tour.
His first participation, in 1903 when three of the six stages lasted over 16 hours, saw him abandon on stage 1 only to return to the race the next day (as was permitted back then) and win two stages. A disqualification for slipstreaming behind a car followed, and the next year things got even worse.
You can read more at Cyclingnews.com
via Cyclingnews Latest Interviews and Features http://www.cyclingnews.com/features/peugeot-a-cycling-dynasty
No comments:
Post a Comment