Jean Robic - Tour de France

Tour De France

The Tour de France restarted after the war and Robic — still largely unknown — was selected for the regional team from north-west France, which meant largely from Brittany. "He was hardly interviewed by journalists; his retirement on the first day would not have earned him more than a line in small type at the bottom of an obscure page of the papers," said de Latour. Robic, recently married, told his wife Raymonde he would bring her the Tour's yellow jersey as a wedding present.

The first stage, from Paris to Lille was won by Ferdi Kübler of Switzerland. Robic came ninth at 2m 9s. Robic won the stage on the fourth day, from Luxembourg to Strasbourg, then rode well through the Alps. René de Latour said:

And yet the journalists—I among them—still didn't think Robic a Tour winner. We thought so more than ever when, the next day, the route included the great Galibier, and Robic was out of the picture, with the Franco-Italian Camellini unapproachable up there in the snows. It seemed that Robic could not ride well two days running—and consistency is the biggest quality needed in the Tour.

The Tour then had easy stages along the Mediterranean where he could recover before riding still more strongly in the Pyrenees, leading the race over the Aubisque, Tourmalet and Peyresourde on the day from Luchon to Pau. The time he gained moved him to fifth place, and the 139 km time trial to third.

It was on the last day, from Caen, that he secured the race. The leader was Pierre Brambilla and tradition had it that the race leader was left unchallenged to win the Tour when it reached Paris. Robic, however, attacked at half-distance on the two-kilometre hill to the village of Bonsecours, outside Rouen. Another Frenchman, Edouard Fachleitner, went with him. So too did Brambilla, only to become sick from the effort. The main field was uncertain what to do and unfavourable to Brambilla so soon after the war because he was riding for a team of Italians living in France. It left the chase until too late. René de Latour wrote:

Robic had nothing to lose but his third place—end everything to gain. He jumped away as if his life depended on it. Luckily I had swapped from my car to the pillion of a motor-bike, and watched from close quarters every moment of the drama. When Robic opened a gap of a few lengths, Brambilla made a terrific effort to get back, and it seemed that was that. Then, from the bunch behind, that great rider, Fachleitner, sprinted past them both. Robic bounded on his wheel; Brambilla failed—and lost the Tour.

A group of riders were ahead of Robic and Fachleitner. They had lost too much time during the month that the Tour had lasted to challenge for race victory and so Léo Veron of the French national team told Lucien Teisseire to drop back and help Fachleitner. The three joined up 100 km from the finish and Fachleitner attacked several times. Robic countered him each time and then Teisseire took over. Robic took no notice because Teisseire was no danger. It was then, Fachleitner said, that Robic told him:

That seemed straightforward (C'était honnête) to Fachlietner, "So I rode. In my head I was thinking: 'If he cracks or if he crashes, it'll be me who wins the Tour...' But he didn't crack and he didn't crash. He paid the 100,000 francs, not to me but to the French national team, which was the rule. Which brought me another outburst from René Vietto. 'You poor fool ,' he said to me, 'you should have asked for a lot more! What's this going to be worth once we've shared it between us?' Right up until his death, he kept saying to me 'You didn't ask enough.'"

Robic, who until then had never led the race, reached the finish at the Parc des Princes 13 minutes ahead of Brambilla. The stage was so fast that it finished an hour ahead of schedule. Legend has it that Brambilla buried his bike in his garden in disgust. More certain is that Robic gave his only yellow jersey to the St-Anne d'Auray basilica, where it still is, in thanks to Anne, patron saint of Bretons.

The twist to Robic's victory is that he wasn't the fastest rider in the race. Fachleitner had taken 3m 32s less to complete the Tour. It was the time bonuses that Robic picked up in the Pyrenees that made the difference.