Saddled with heroics and scandals

Cycling Tour de France: As the centenary Tour of France begins today with a prologue time-trial under the shadow of the Eiffel Tower, Shane Stokes looks back at the origins, heroics and scandals of this epic sporting event

Visionaries, pioneers, reckless gamblers or sadists? Whatever your assessment of them, the Tour de France probably wouldn't exist now but for the likes of Géo Lefèvre and Alphonse Steines. The former was the first to propose a round-France race, an idea initially deemed ludicrous by Henri Desgrange, the man who was to become the first director of the Tour.

"You want to kill the riders?" he demanded.

At the turn of the 20th century Desgrange was editor of the newspaper, L'Auto, which covered motoring and sports such as cycling. He had been looking for a way to publicise his newspaper and to put rival Le Vélo under pressure, particularly after it sued and forced Desgrange to shorten his title from "L'Auto Vélo" in 1902. Printing as L'Auto meant they lost some of their identity, at least with respect to cycling. Something big had to be done.

Desgrange finally agreed to Lefèvre's suggestion when it became clear that the inaugural 2,428-kilometre battle would be divided over six stages, with rest days in-between. Sixty riders set off from Paris on July 1st, 1903; by the time an exhausted Maurice Garin won the contest, on July 19th, France was raving about the race. Le Vélo couldn't compete and soon went out of business.

A gruelling, hugely ambitious event, the Tour proved a continuous success. Steines's own contribution was to take the race into the high mountains for the first time in 1910. Once again, Desgrange had thought the idea too severe, but finally allowed Steines to go on a reconnaissance before the Tour to see if it would indeed be feasible.

His assistant risked life and limb to walk over the Tourmalet in the Pyrenees, a route made well-nigh impassable by heavy snow and the threat of wild bears. Once down the other side, he sent a telegram to Desgrange, containing the white lie which would see the riders labour up that same climb one month later. - "Crossed Tourmalet. Very good road. Perfectly feasible."

The Tour de France has grown massively since then, attracting bigger crowds, huge television audiences and more money for Desgrange's old paper, now called L'Equipe. In terms of a marketing exercise, it was a remarkable coup.

And as a sporting event, it has thrown up some of the most amazing imagery, exploits and anecdotes in the history of sport. Good and bad, the list is numerous. The contests. The clashes. The duels in hail, rain and baking sun. We remember Coppi and Bartali, Anquetil and Poulidor, Merckx and Ocana, Hinault and LeMond, shoulder to shoulder, attacking and defending, looking for a moment of weakness to strike, to damn the other's challenge. Kelly and Vanderaerden, chasing green. Roche and Delgado, disputing yellow.

LeMond and Fignon in 1989. Indurain and Riis in '96. Ullrich and Pantani in '98. And Armstrong and Ullrich in 2001.

We remember the violent scenes and skulduggery of the early Tours, riders attacked, bicycles sabotaged, contestants catching trains, nails and glass strewn on unsurfaced roads. Punches were thrown and shots were fired, leading Desgrange to declare the ruin of the race.

But the Tour marched on. Through the first World War, where many of the early riders were killed, including three of the first 10 winners. Through the second World War, where Bartali used his bike on secret mercy missions and riders such as Coppi were held as prisoners.

And through other wars, those dealing with le dopage. Dark moments such as Tom Simpson's death on Mont Ventoux, in 1967. Race-leader Micheal Pollentier's ejection from the race 11 years later. Delgado's positive/not positive result in 1988. And of course L'affaire Festina, which almost brought the Tour to a juddering halt five years ago.

Virenque and his cronies nearly killed the sport, but at least that sad, sorry mess brought about increased drug testing and awareness, a realisation the old way couldn't continue. Cycling has some way to go; it is, at least, heading down the road other sports are dithering about.

When Desgrange used to wax on about the Tour in L'Auto, it was with a peculiar grandiloquence which at times likened the riders to the old gods of legend. The tone was significant. Their feats were heroic, the battles intense, and the imagery of riders on bikes struggling with nature, and against each other, captivated the public much as the old tales did. Like the old gods, they too were fallible, corruptible, given to a full range of emotions and capable of great extremes of behaviour.

One hundred years of Le Tour has thrown up the whole gamut - cowardice, cheating, betrayal and violence, but also honour, determination, loyalty and great, great courage.

Perhaps it is that bipolar nature which so attracts, or perhaps it is more simply the great spectacle of the race. Whatever the reason, Lefèvre, Steines and Desgrange would undoubtedly approve.