Items related to The Art of the Cycling Jersey: Iconic Cycle Wear Past...
The Art of the Cycling Jersey celebrates the cycling jersey in all its forms. Cycling enthusiast and author Chris Sidwells explores the most important designs in cycling history, as well as the teams, riders, and races where each piece was worn. Organized chronologically, this is the story of the cycling jersey from the first simple garments that early cyclists wore in the 1900s, to the technology-laden jerseys top riders and Tour de France winners wear today.
Cycling jerseys represent many different things. For a cyclist they must be functional. For team sponsors they must stand out and increase brand awareness. For cycling fans they help pick out their favorite riders and identify a race or competition leader. Jerseys show who is a world or a national champion, and in some races, jerseys represent a competitor’s nationality.
But cycling jerseys have evolved into something bigger. They can evoke good times or bad times, success or failure. Above all, jerseys mark the great occasions of cycling and speak of its history, personalities, and style. With more than 200 color photographs and insightful commentary, The Art of the Cycling Jersey is a great gift and must-have book for any style-conscious, road-racing enthusiast.
Cycling jerseys represent many different things. For a cyclist they must be functional. For team sponsors they must stand out and increase brand awareness. For cycling fans they help pick out their favorite riders and identify a race or competition leader. Jerseys show who is a world or a national champion, and in some races, jerseys represent a competitor’s nationality.
But cycling jerseys have evolved into something bigger. They can evoke good times or bad times, success or failure. Above all, jerseys mark the great occasions of cycling and speak of its history, personalities, and style. With more than 200 color photographs and insightful commentary, The Art of the Cycling Jersey is a great gift and must-have book for any style-conscious, road-racing enthusiast.
"synopsis" may belong to another edition of this title.
About the Author:
Chris Sidwells is a bestselling author, journalist, photographer, and broadcaster who reports on every aspect of cycling and cycles. His work has been featured in Cycle Sport, Cycling Weekly, Men’s Fitness, and GQ, and he is the author of A Race for Madmen: A History of the Tour de France, Tour Climbs: The Complete Guide to Every Mountain Stage on the Tour de France, The Long Race to Glory: How the British Came to Rule the Cycling World, and Complete Bike Manual. He lives in the United Kingdom.
Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.:
CHAPTER 1
THE CYCLING JERSEY IS BORN
This chapter looks at the first clothes cyclists used for racing, and traces how they changed over time, from adapted street clothing to cycling- specific gear, which resulted in the birth of the cycling jersey.
Competitors at the Porte Maillot in Paris for the start of the first ever Paris-Roubaix race, held on April 19, 1896. The start choice is a happy coincidence, as maillot is the French word for "cycling jersey."
Early Cycling Clothing
1868-1900
Cycling clothing, such as plus-fours and knickerbockers, and jackets with longer sleeves, appeared as soon as cycling became popular in the 1860s and '70s. The first racers wore similar garments, although they were lighter and a little more streamlined than those used for everyday cycling. Rudimentary velodromes were constructed for racing, and track cycling became really popular. As it evolved, track racers wore sleeker clothing, shorts, and tight tops.
THE FIRST RACE
It's possible that there were other bike races before May 31, 1868--in fact, there were other races held in the Parc St. Cloud in Paris that day-- but it's the 1-kilometer (0.63 mile) race, won by a British cyclist, James Moore, that is the most talked about, and the most written about. It was probably the main event on a card of races that was organized by the Olivier brothers, who were pioneer bike manufacturers from the Compagnie parisienne des vélocipèdes.
Male leisure cyclists wore normal clothing in the late 1880s, but some women wore knickerbockers, which was an important step in the emancipation movement.
Moore, who was born in Suffolk, England, and moved to Paris with his parents, won the race on a boneshaker wooden bike, which had iron tires, at an average speed of 14.4 miles per hour (23.2 kph). He was wearing plus fours and a shirt and tie, with a buttoned jacket. Dashing attire, topped off with a shallow, open-crown round-brimmed hat.
Moore also won the first place-to-place road race, Paris to Rouen, on November 7, 1869. He was on his boneshaker bike again, taking 10 hours 45 minutes for the 76 miles (129 km), and his clothing was very similar to what he wore for the Parc St. Cloud race, except his jacket was finished with braided pockets and lapels.
Riders in this 1886 race at the Alexandra Palace in London are wearing some of the first clothing designed for cycle racing.
TRACK CYCLING
Despite the efforts of Moore in France and people like John Mayall junior, who set place-to-place records in England, road racing didn't really catch the public's imagination at first. They preferred to watch racing on prepared cinder tracks.
This kind of racing was especially popular in the UK. In an effort to make the racing faster and more entertaining, the size of the front wheel was increased (the pedals of early bikes were attached directly to the front wheel, meaning that a larger front wheel would allow a greater distance to be covered by each pedal revolution). The result was the penny-farthing bike, which had a huge front wheel and a tiny back one. For their Varsity match on June 16, 1874, which was held on the Lillie Lane cinder track in London, Oxford's H.P. Whiting and the Hon. Ion Keith Falconer of Cambridge wore white cotton knickerbockers with long woollen socks and long-sleeved woollen vests.
Whiting beat Falconer in a 25-mile (40-km) race, recording a time of 1 hour 41 minutes and 16.5 seconds (Victorians were sticklers for exact timing). His winning margin was 100 yards (91 m), and the victory was quite a surprise, considering the shorter Whiting rode a penny-farthing with a 54- inch (137-cm) front wheel, while the much taller Falconer's bike had a 60- inch (152-cm) front wheel.
At first, track cycling was a sport for the wealthy, but professional racers soon took over from amateurs such as Whiting and Falconer, especially after the invention of the chain-driven safety cycle. With a chain-driven bike, speed depended more on the rider's fitness, strength, and determination, and less on the length of his legs. Furthermore, the big cash prizes on offer in some races, plus the growth of betting, created a financial incentive for tough working-class athletes, who were highly motivated to make money.
Racers were split into sprinters and stayers, and crowds flocked to see sprint speed merchants and powerful stayers, who were often paced in their races by tandems, then triplets and quadruplets, all in the name of increasing the speed, the danger, and the spectacle.
Riders at the start of a track race for penny-farthing bikes in Niagara Falls in the USA. Early track races like this were fast, but became more so with the invention of the chain-driven bike.
Track racing became popular throughout Europe and the United States, with riders like the American A.A. Zimmerman, Constant Huret and Edmond Jacquelin of France, and the Englishman Frank Shorland making a fortune from racing in front of packed crowds on both sides of the Atlantic.
These track racers wore wool shorts and vests, which were much more body- hugging and aerodynamic than the clothing road cyclists wore at the time. Track cycling also gave the world its first African-American sports star. His name was Marshall Walter Taylor.
MAJOR TAYLOR
Taylor was born in Indiana in 1878 and was the first African-American world champion in cycling and only the second black man to win a world title in any sport, after the Canadian boxer George Dixon.
Taylor's first job, when he was 12 years old, was to perform bike tricks outside a Chicago bike shop while wearing a soldier's uniform. It earned him the nickname "Major." He started racing on the road at 16, and it wasn't long before he was winning, but it was on the track that his blistering sprint served him best.
Taylor became a professional at 18 and was soon beating everyone in America. In 1899 he set a new world record. Riding behind a tandem, he took 1 minute and 18 seconds to cover 1 mile (1.6 km). That's 45.56 miles per hour (73.32 kph). He later won the world championship in Montreal over half a mile (0.8 km). In 1902 he was contracted to ride 57 races in Europe and he won 40 of them. Major Taylor continued winning races and breaking records, as well as the barriers of racism, until 1910, when he retired from racing. At his peak, Taylor looked surprisingly like a modern track cyclist. His cycling clothes were made from wool, but they were always tight-fitting and very aerodynamic. He raced in long-and short-sleeved jerseys, even sleeveless ones, and there are pictures of him wearing what looks like a one-piece knitted cycling suit, rather like the skinsuits track racers wear today. His outfits were always brightly colored, but the most flamboyant was a white top with a blue collar and sleeves, which he wore with skin-tight blue shorts that had a contrasting ring around each leg. Knotted around his middle Taylor wore a Stars and Stripes flag.
Major Taylor riding an early chain-driven track bike. His low crouch, tucked-in elbows, and figure-hugging woolen outfit all improved his aerodynamics.
Maurice Garin's White Cotton Jacket
1903
Maurice Garin won the first-ever Tour de France in 1903. In those days, racers didn't ride in teams, so they were free to choose their own clothing. Some wore shorts, and some wore tights on their legs, while on top they had a light undershirt, with sweaters or jackets over this. For the 1903 Tour de France Maurice Garin raced mostly in a distinctive white jacket. Once he led the race, after winning the marathon first stage of 292 miles (467 km) from Paris to Lyon, the organizers gave him a green armband to wear as race leader.
Maurice Garin was born in the Aosta Valley in northwest Italy, but moved with his family to northern France out of economic necessity during his early teens. Rural Italy was poor, and there was work in France's industrial north, but the free movement of labor through Europe wasn't allowed. Garin's father had to smuggle his family out of Italy in ones and twos, which gave rise to some myths that emerged as Maurice became famous.
Maurice Garin, winner of the first Tour de France in 1903, poses with his bike. His choice of white tops not only made him stand out to spectators, but also helped him stay cool.
One of these was that his father swapped Maurice for a whole cheese. If a cheese did change hands, it was probably payment for transporting Maurice north. The other myth, which claims that Garin worked as a chimney sweep, is partly true. He did work as a sweep for a very short time, while passing through Reims on his way north, but kids were smuggled through networks and again, young Garin's work was probably a means of payment for that.
Eventually, though, he made it north, started cycling, took French nationality, and became a pro racer in 1893. Garin was good and he won most of the big races of his day, including Paris-Roubaix, which he won twice.
THE FIRST TOUR
There were six stages in the first Tour de France, each of them a few days apart to give stragglers time to finish one and recover for the next, and they were huge. Four of the six stages were over 250 miles (400 km), and the shortest was 168 miles (268 km). The winner of that stage, Charles Laeser, took 8 hours 46 minutes to cover the distance, while the last man, Arsène Millocheau, took over 14 hours.
Early cycling jackets were made of cotton or Alpaca wool, the cotton often waxed as a partial means of waterproofing. Sweaters were made from wool yarn, which kept its shape quite well and would soak up sweat to some extent, giving the riders a degree of comfort.
La Française-Dunlop was one of the first professional teams, and its star rider was Maurice Garin. This is the team line up for the 1910 Paris- Roubaix.
Jackets had large hip pockets and could be buttoned up as far as the neck. Sweaters also had pockets stitched onto the chest area. Rear pockets in pullovers were a later addition. It was the sweater that evolved slowly into the more familiar racing jersey.
The first cycling jerseys were plain wool, but bicycle manufacturers who sponsored early professional riders soon saw the publicity possibilities of having their names on the jerseys. So in the early years of the twentieth century, bike manufacturers' names were embroidered onto some woolen jerseys, often in a rough copy of the script used in the manufacturer's logo. They were stitched by hand, using the same thick wool the jersey was made from, although in a contrasting color. This relatively crude method was improved with the introduction of lighter, thinner wool yarns to make cycling jerseys. The embroidered letters on some of those were quite exquisite.
Alcyon
1909-1955
Alcyon was a French bicycle manufacturer that also made cars and motorcycles. The word alcyon is French for "kingfisher," and the Alcyon team raced on kingfisher-blue bikes and wore kingfisher-blue jerseys. Four Alcyon riders--François Faber, Octave Lapize, Gustave Garrigou, and Odile Defraye--won the Tour de France from 1909 to 1912. Alcyon won again with Nicolas Frantz in 1927 and 1928, and then with Maurice De Waele in 1929. Its riders also won five Tours during the 1930s, although they represented their national team during this period, rather than Alcyon. The Alcyon pro cycling team continued until 1954, and Alcyon stayed on as a cosponsor of the Tour until 1958.
THE TEAM
Alcyon's sponsorship of cycling began when professional road racing was a purely individual endeavor and ended long after it had become a sport in which teams work to put one of their riders into a winning position. During that time Alcyon riders won every big race there is.
François Faber on his Alcyon bike. In 1909 the Luxembourg rider became the first foreigner to win the Tour de France. At 230 £ds (92 kilograms), he is still the heaviest to win the race.
The team won all five of the biggest single-day races in the sport, known as the Monuments of Cycling. They are Milan-San Remo, the Tour of Flanders, Paris-Roubaix, Liège-Bastogne-Liège, and the Tour of Lombardy, referred to nowadays simply as Il Lombardia. Alcyon won the Tour de France and Vuelta a España, four World Road Race titles, and its riders were National Champions of France, Belgium, and Luxembourg on the road and in cyclo-cross.
In total, the team won 120 world-class races, which makes it very hard to pick the top Alcyon rider. Octave Lapize has a claim, although his glittering career was cut short by the First World War, during which he was killed in fighting. The Belgian Sylvère Maes was another great Alcyon rider. The best, however, at least as far as the Tour de France is concerned, was a French rider, André Leducq.
André Leducq won two Tours de France for the French national team, plus the Paris-Roubaix, Paris-Tours, and Critérium International for Alcyon.
Leducq won the Tour de France twice in the 1930s, although he was riding for the French national team when he did it. He also won 19 stages in the Tour, and was runner-up overall in 1928 and fourth in 1927.
THE JERSEY
Although Alcyon no longer exists as a bike brand and withdrew entirely from team sponsorship at the end of the 1950s, the kingfisher-blue jersey still exists in the pro peloton today, but only at the world championships and Olympic Games.
In 1930 the Tour de France boss Henri Desgrange declared that from then onward his race would be open to professionals, but only those professionals selected by their national federations for national, and later, regional teams. When that happened the Belgian Cycling Federation chose a black jersey with one red and one yellow band around the chest as the Belgian national team jersey.
The understated elegance of the Alcyon team jersey, designed to reflect the simple grace, but at the same time effectiveness, of the bikes Alcyon produced.
However, various Belgian racers complained that the predominantly black jersey was too hot to race in, and so in 1948 the federation changed the background of the jersey to kingfisher blue--the same as that worn by the Alcyon team. The federation added black to the yellow and red chest bands, creating a design that's still the Belgian national team jersey today. Many Belgian cycling fans think that the choice of the blue background color was due to the number of Belgian riders who had ridden in the Alcyon team, although there has been no official confirmation of this.
OCTAVE LAPIZE
In 1910, Octave Lapize won the first Tour de France stage to cross the highest passes of the Pyrenees. The stage ran for 203 miles (326 km) from Bagnères-de-Luchon to Bayonne, and the riders had to climb the Col de Peyresourde, the Col d'Aspin, the Col du Tourmalet, and the Col d'Aubisque, all of which were uncharted territories for cyclists.
Octave Lapize in 1911, when he won Paris-Roubaix, Paris-Tours, Paris- Brussels, and the French national road race title.
THE CYCLING JERSEY IS BORN
This chapter looks at the first clothes cyclists used for racing, and traces how they changed over time, from adapted street clothing to cycling- specific gear, which resulted in the birth of the cycling jersey.
Competitors at the Porte Maillot in Paris for the start of the first ever Paris-Roubaix race, held on April 19, 1896. The start choice is a happy coincidence, as maillot is the French word for "cycling jersey."
Early Cycling Clothing
1868-1900
Cycling clothing, such as plus-fours and knickerbockers, and jackets with longer sleeves, appeared as soon as cycling became popular in the 1860s and '70s. The first racers wore similar garments, although they were lighter and a little more streamlined than those used for everyday cycling. Rudimentary velodromes were constructed for racing, and track cycling became really popular. As it evolved, track racers wore sleeker clothing, shorts, and tight tops.
THE FIRST RACE
It's possible that there were other bike races before May 31, 1868--in fact, there were other races held in the Parc St. Cloud in Paris that day-- but it's the 1-kilometer (0.63 mile) race, won by a British cyclist, James Moore, that is the most talked about, and the most written about. It was probably the main event on a card of races that was organized by the Olivier brothers, who were pioneer bike manufacturers from the Compagnie parisienne des vélocipèdes.
Male leisure cyclists wore normal clothing in the late 1880s, but some women wore knickerbockers, which was an important step in the emancipation movement.
Moore, who was born in Suffolk, England, and moved to Paris with his parents, won the race on a boneshaker wooden bike, which had iron tires, at an average speed of 14.4 miles per hour (23.2 kph). He was wearing plus fours and a shirt and tie, with a buttoned jacket. Dashing attire, topped off with a shallow, open-crown round-brimmed hat.
Moore also won the first place-to-place road race, Paris to Rouen, on November 7, 1869. He was on his boneshaker bike again, taking 10 hours 45 minutes for the 76 miles (129 km), and his clothing was very similar to what he wore for the Parc St. Cloud race, except his jacket was finished with braided pockets and lapels.
Riders in this 1886 race at the Alexandra Palace in London are wearing some of the first clothing designed for cycle racing.
TRACK CYCLING
Despite the efforts of Moore in France and people like John Mayall junior, who set place-to-place records in England, road racing didn't really catch the public's imagination at first. They preferred to watch racing on prepared cinder tracks.
This kind of racing was especially popular in the UK. In an effort to make the racing faster and more entertaining, the size of the front wheel was increased (the pedals of early bikes were attached directly to the front wheel, meaning that a larger front wheel would allow a greater distance to be covered by each pedal revolution). The result was the penny-farthing bike, which had a huge front wheel and a tiny back one. For their Varsity match on June 16, 1874, which was held on the Lillie Lane cinder track in London, Oxford's H.P. Whiting and the Hon. Ion Keith Falconer of Cambridge wore white cotton knickerbockers with long woollen socks and long-sleeved woollen vests.
Whiting beat Falconer in a 25-mile (40-km) race, recording a time of 1 hour 41 minutes and 16.5 seconds (Victorians were sticklers for exact timing). His winning margin was 100 yards (91 m), and the victory was quite a surprise, considering the shorter Whiting rode a penny-farthing with a 54- inch (137-cm) front wheel, while the much taller Falconer's bike had a 60- inch (152-cm) front wheel.
At first, track cycling was a sport for the wealthy, but professional racers soon took over from amateurs such as Whiting and Falconer, especially after the invention of the chain-driven safety cycle. With a chain-driven bike, speed depended more on the rider's fitness, strength, and determination, and less on the length of his legs. Furthermore, the big cash prizes on offer in some races, plus the growth of betting, created a financial incentive for tough working-class athletes, who were highly motivated to make money.
Racers were split into sprinters and stayers, and crowds flocked to see sprint speed merchants and powerful stayers, who were often paced in their races by tandems, then triplets and quadruplets, all in the name of increasing the speed, the danger, and the spectacle.
Riders at the start of a track race for penny-farthing bikes in Niagara Falls in the USA. Early track races like this were fast, but became more so with the invention of the chain-driven bike.
Track racing became popular throughout Europe and the United States, with riders like the American A.A. Zimmerman, Constant Huret and Edmond Jacquelin of France, and the Englishman Frank Shorland making a fortune from racing in front of packed crowds on both sides of the Atlantic.
These track racers wore wool shorts and vests, which were much more body- hugging and aerodynamic than the clothing road cyclists wore at the time. Track cycling also gave the world its first African-American sports star. His name was Marshall Walter Taylor.
MAJOR TAYLOR
Taylor was born in Indiana in 1878 and was the first African-American world champion in cycling and only the second black man to win a world title in any sport, after the Canadian boxer George Dixon.
Taylor's first job, when he was 12 years old, was to perform bike tricks outside a Chicago bike shop while wearing a soldier's uniform. It earned him the nickname "Major." He started racing on the road at 16, and it wasn't long before he was winning, but it was on the track that his blistering sprint served him best.
Taylor became a professional at 18 and was soon beating everyone in America. In 1899 he set a new world record. Riding behind a tandem, he took 1 minute and 18 seconds to cover 1 mile (1.6 km). That's 45.56 miles per hour (73.32 kph). He later won the world championship in Montreal over half a mile (0.8 km). In 1902 he was contracted to ride 57 races in Europe and he won 40 of them. Major Taylor continued winning races and breaking records, as well as the barriers of racism, until 1910, when he retired from racing. At his peak, Taylor looked surprisingly like a modern track cyclist. His cycling clothes were made from wool, but they were always tight-fitting and very aerodynamic. He raced in long-and short-sleeved jerseys, even sleeveless ones, and there are pictures of him wearing what looks like a one-piece knitted cycling suit, rather like the skinsuits track racers wear today. His outfits were always brightly colored, but the most flamboyant was a white top with a blue collar and sleeves, which he wore with skin-tight blue shorts that had a contrasting ring around each leg. Knotted around his middle Taylor wore a Stars and Stripes flag.
Major Taylor riding an early chain-driven track bike. His low crouch, tucked-in elbows, and figure-hugging woolen outfit all improved his aerodynamics.
Maurice Garin's White Cotton Jacket
1903
Maurice Garin won the first-ever Tour de France in 1903. In those days, racers didn't ride in teams, so they were free to choose their own clothing. Some wore shorts, and some wore tights on their legs, while on top they had a light undershirt, with sweaters or jackets over this. For the 1903 Tour de France Maurice Garin raced mostly in a distinctive white jacket. Once he led the race, after winning the marathon first stage of 292 miles (467 km) from Paris to Lyon, the organizers gave him a green armband to wear as race leader.
Maurice Garin was born in the Aosta Valley in northwest Italy, but moved with his family to northern France out of economic necessity during his early teens. Rural Italy was poor, and there was work in France's industrial north, but the free movement of labor through Europe wasn't allowed. Garin's father had to smuggle his family out of Italy in ones and twos, which gave rise to some myths that emerged as Maurice became famous.
Maurice Garin, winner of the first Tour de France in 1903, poses with his bike. His choice of white tops not only made him stand out to spectators, but also helped him stay cool.
One of these was that his father swapped Maurice for a whole cheese. If a cheese did change hands, it was probably payment for transporting Maurice north. The other myth, which claims that Garin worked as a chimney sweep, is partly true. He did work as a sweep for a very short time, while passing through Reims on his way north, but kids were smuggled through networks and again, young Garin's work was probably a means of payment for that.
Eventually, though, he made it north, started cycling, took French nationality, and became a pro racer in 1893. Garin was good and he won most of the big races of his day, including Paris-Roubaix, which he won twice.
THE FIRST TOUR
There were six stages in the first Tour de France, each of them a few days apart to give stragglers time to finish one and recover for the next, and they were huge. Four of the six stages were over 250 miles (400 km), and the shortest was 168 miles (268 km). The winner of that stage, Charles Laeser, took 8 hours 46 minutes to cover the distance, while the last man, Arsène Millocheau, took over 14 hours.
Early cycling jackets were made of cotton or Alpaca wool, the cotton often waxed as a partial means of waterproofing. Sweaters were made from wool yarn, which kept its shape quite well and would soak up sweat to some extent, giving the riders a degree of comfort.
La Française-Dunlop was one of the first professional teams, and its star rider was Maurice Garin. This is the team line up for the 1910 Paris- Roubaix.
Jackets had large hip pockets and could be buttoned up as far as the neck. Sweaters also had pockets stitched onto the chest area. Rear pockets in pullovers were a later addition. It was the sweater that evolved slowly into the more familiar racing jersey.
The first cycling jerseys were plain wool, but bicycle manufacturers who sponsored early professional riders soon saw the publicity possibilities of having their names on the jerseys. So in the early years of the twentieth century, bike manufacturers' names were embroidered onto some woolen jerseys, often in a rough copy of the script used in the manufacturer's logo. They were stitched by hand, using the same thick wool the jersey was made from, although in a contrasting color. This relatively crude method was improved with the introduction of lighter, thinner wool yarns to make cycling jerseys. The embroidered letters on some of those were quite exquisite.
Alcyon
1909-1955
Alcyon was a French bicycle manufacturer that also made cars and motorcycles. The word alcyon is French for "kingfisher," and the Alcyon team raced on kingfisher-blue bikes and wore kingfisher-blue jerseys. Four Alcyon riders--François Faber, Octave Lapize, Gustave Garrigou, and Odile Defraye--won the Tour de France from 1909 to 1912. Alcyon won again with Nicolas Frantz in 1927 and 1928, and then with Maurice De Waele in 1929. Its riders also won five Tours during the 1930s, although they represented their national team during this period, rather than Alcyon. The Alcyon pro cycling team continued until 1954, and Alcyon stayed on as a cosponsor of the Tour until 1958.
THE TEAM
Alcyon's sponsorship of cycling began when professional road racing was a purely individual endeavor and ended long after it had become a sport in which teams work to put one of their riders into a winning position. During that time Alcyon riders won every big race there is.
François Faber on his Alcyon bike. In 1909 the Luxembourg rider became the first foreigner to win the Tour de France. At 230 £ds (92 kilograms), he is still the heaviest to win the race.
The team won all five of the biggest single-day races in the sport, known as the Monuments of Cycling. They are Milan-San Remo, the Tour of Flanders, Paris-Roubaix, Liège-Bastogne-Liège, and the Tour of Lombardy, referred to nowadays simply as Il Lombardia. Alcyon won the Tour de France and Vuelta a España, four World Road Race titles, and its riders were National Champions of France, Belgium, and Luxembourg on the road and in cyclo-cross.
In total, the team won 120 world-class races, which makes it very hard to pick the top Alcyon rider. Octave Lapize has a claim, although his glittering career was cut short by the First World War, during which he was killed in fighting. The Belgian Sylvère Maes was another great Alcyon rider. The best, however, at least as far as the Tour de France is concerned, was a French rider, André Leducq.
André Leducq won two Tours de France for the French national team, plus the Paris-Roubaix, Paris-Tours, and Critérium International for Alcyon.
Leducq won the Tour de France twice in the 1930s, although he was riding for the French national team when he did it. He also won 19 stages in the Tour, and was runner-up overall in 1928 and fourth in 1927.
THE JERSEY
Although Alcyon no longer exists as a bike brand and withdrew entirely from team sponsorship at the end of the 1950s, the kingfisher-blue jersey still exists in the pro peloton today, but only at the world championships and Olympic Games.
In 1930 the Tour de France boss Henri Desgrange declared that from then onward his race would be open to professionals, but only those professionals selected by their national federations for national, and later, regional teams. When that happened the Belgian Cycling Federation chose a black jersey with one red and one yellow band around the chest as the Belgian national team jersey.
The understated elegance of the Alcyon team jersey, designed to reflect the simple grace, but at the same time effectiveness, of the bikes Alcyon produced.
However, various Belgian racers complained that the predominantly black jersey was too hot to race in, and so in 1948 the federation changed the background of the jersey to kingfisher blue--the same as that worn by the Alcyon team. The federation added black to the yellow and red chest bands, creating a design that's still the Belgian national team jersey today. Many Belgian cycling fans think that the choice of the blue background color was due to the number of Belgian riders who had ridden in the Alcyon team, although there has been no official confirmation of this.
OCTAVE LAPIZE
In 1910, Octave Lapize won the first Tour de France stage to cross the highest passes of the Pyrenees. The stage ran for 203 miles (326 km) from Bagnères-de-Luchon to Bayonne, and the riders had to climb the Col de Peyresourde, the Col d'Aspin, the Col du Tourmalet, and the Col d'Aubisque, all of which were uncharted territories for cyclists.
Octave Lapize in 1911, when he won Paris-Roubaix, Paris-Tours, Paris- Brussels, and the French national road race title.
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ISBN 13: 9781623367374
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The Art of the Cycling Jersey: Iconic Cycle Wear Past and Present
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Rodale Books
(2017)
ISBN 10: 1623367379
ISBN 13: 9781623367374
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Hardcover
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Book Description Hardcover. Condition: new. New. Seller Inventory # Wizard1623367379
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The Art of the Cycling Jersey: Iconic Cycle Wear Past and Present
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Rodale Books
(2017)
ISBN 10: 1623367379
ISBN 13: 9781623367374
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Hardcover
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Book Description Hardcover. Condition: new. New Copy. Customer Service Guaranteed. Seller Inventory # think1623367379
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The Art of the Cycling Jersey: Iconic Cycle Wear Past and Present
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Book Description Condition: new. Seller Inventory # FrontCover1623367379
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The Art of the Cycling Jersey: Iconic Cycle Wear Past and Present
Published by
Rodale Books
(2017)
ISBN 10: 1623367379
ISBN 13: 9781623367374
New
Hardcover
Quantity: 1
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Book Description Hardcover. Condition: new. Brand New Copy. Seller Inventory # BBB_new1623367379
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