Decline and Death
Hugo Koblet was a handsome man whose fame brought beautiful women and a lifestyle that affected his career. He was "the most charming of men to talk to," said Jock Wadley. René de Latour wrote in Sporting Cyclist: "Koblet had not an enemy at all. His ready and kindly smile came from deep down inside, and one knows from the start that this was a man without rancour, a rare thing to say of anybody who has raced in top competition on the road where the intense physical struggle often leads to jealousy and dispute."
He never rode again at the same level as the 1951 Tour de France. Jean Bobet said Koblet began to suffer in the mountains at 2,000m, then 1,500, then at 1,000 until "we saw him unable to ride over the smallest hill.". The author Olivier Dazat said photographs showed not the handsome man he had been but a rider suddenly aged, worried and preoccupied. René de Latour wrote: "There is a question mark about Hugo Koblet's life, the mystery of why he was never as good again as in the 1951 Tour. After this year, his pedalling had less power. Soon after that magnificent win, Koblet was invited to Mexico to follow the national amateur tour. When he came back he was still, it seemed, the same incredibly easy pedaller. But the efficiency was partly gone. He visited specialists and took courses of treatment, but without any real success. He went to Mexico in 1951 never came back from the land of guitars and sombreros. And nobody knows why!"
He came second in the Giro d'Italia in 1951 and 1952 and retired in 1958.
Six years after his retirement, Koblet died at 39, four days after a car crash, with speculation that his death may have been suicide. He had been profligate with his money and was in debt. He was being pursued for unpaid tax and his marriage had broken up. A witness, Émile Isler, saw Koblet driving his white Alfa Romeo at 120-140kmh. between Zürich and Esslingen. He drove past a pear tree, turned then drove back. He passed it again finally turned a third time and drove into it.
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