1910 Octave Lapize
In 2017 it is 100 years ago that TOUR DE FRANCE winner OCTAVE LAPIZE was killed in action during the Great War of 1914-1918.
Octave Lapize (1887-1917) was a French professional road racing cyclist and track cyclist.
Most famous for winning the 1910 Tour de France and a bronze medal at the 1908 Summer Olympics in the men's 100 kilometres, He was a three-time winner of one-day classics, Paris–Roubaix and Paris–Brussels.
Lapize is noted for looking at some Tour officials on the climb of the Col du Tourmalet in the 1910 Tour de France and yelling, "Vous êtes des assassins! Oui, des assassins!' ("You are murderers! Yes, murderers!"). The stage in question, Luchon - Bayonne, was 326 kilometers in length, featured 7 brutal climbs, a.o. Peyresourde, Aspin, Tourmalet and Aubisque and was raced on unsealed roads with single-gear bicycles. This was indeed the Tour's first time in the high mountains with two stages in the Pyrenees.
The First World War ended the cycling career of the former Tour winner. As a fighter pilot in the French army, Octave Lapize was shot down near Flirey, Meurthe-et-Moselle on 14 July 1917. Severely injured, he died in a hospital in Toul.
1910 Octave Lapize
In 2017 it is 100 years ago that TOUR DE FRANCE winner OCTAVE LAPIZE was killed in action during the Great War of 1914-1918.
Octave Lapize (1887-1917) was a French professional road racing cyclist and track cyclist.
Most famous for winning the 1910 Tour de France and a bronze medal at the 1908 Summer Olympics in the men's 100 kilometres, He was a three-time winner of one-day classics, Paris–Roubaix and Paris–Brussels.
Lapize is noted for looking at some Tour officials on the climb of the Col du Tourmalet in the 1910 Tour de France and yelling, "Vous êtes des assassins! Oui, des assassins!' ("You are murderers! Yes, murderers!"). The stage in question, Luchon - Bayonne, was 326 kilometers in length, featured 7 brutal climbs, a.o. Peyresourde, Aspin, Tourmalet and Aubisque and was raced on unsealed roads with single-gear bicycles. This was indeed the Tour's first time in the high mountains with two stages in the Pyrenees.
The First World War ended the cycling career of the former Tour winner. As a fighter pilot in the French army, Octave Lapize was shot down near Flirey, Meurthe-et-Moselle on 14 July 1917. Severely injured, he died in a hospital in Toul.