by Zach Bigalke

Created on: February 14, 2008

Cycling, if nothing else, is all about perseverance. As dedicated as one might stay to training, diet, and preparation, incidents beyond any of our control will inevitably happen as we pedal along the road. The titans of cycling are those men who manage to ride through the misfortunes...

A seven-time French cyclocross champion, podium finisher at the Tour de France and Paris-Roubaix, and a victor in both Milano-San Remo and Paris-Tours, Eugene Christophe is remembered not for his accolades but for those victories which got away. Back in the budding beginning of professional cycling, Christophe was one of the dominant riders of his generation. Yet the archaic and evolving rules of the nascent sport continually prevented the talented Frenchman from ever reaching the pinnacle of his national tour.

In 1912, Christophe was the strongest rider in the Tour yet lost the race due to its being decided by points rather than overall time spent cycling on the road. Because the Belgian team of Odiel Defraye was able to put their leader in better position at the finishing line of most stages, Christophe - despite finishing with the best overall time and winning three stages - ended in second place. The next year would prove even worse...

In the virtual lead on the road during stage six of the 1913 Tour, Christophe was racing down the Tourmalet toward Luchon when his fork snapped. The rules of professional cycling back then prohibited any outside assistance to the riders. Christophe, bloodied from his crash, ran several miles with his bicycle until finding a blacksmith's forge in the village of Ste. Marie de Campan. With race officials watching, Christophe lost precious hours as he repaired his fork... and lost ten more minutes, penalized by the race officials for requesting the assistance of a boy to work the bellows. Christophe remounted and pedaled onward, eventually finishing seventh in Paris.

There were proud times, certainly. In the 1919 Tour, Christophe was awarded the first yellow jersey on the road in Tour history. He entered stage fourteen with a thirty-minute lead over his competitors. In a bizarre twist of fate, his fork once again betrayed his shot at the top step of the podium. Losing over two hours as he repaired the fork, Christophe nonetheless rode into position to finish second behind Firmin Lambot. But in the final stage, a slew of tire punctures allowed Jean Alavoine to cycle past Eugene, relegating Christophe to third.

Christophe enjoyed a long and successful career. His cycling prowess netted him numerous classics and podium finishes in races large and small. But the fact remains that his victory total could have been even greater in his twenty-two seasons. Despite all this, or perhaps because of his persistence in the face of such adversity, Christophe will always be remembered as one of the true titans of cycling...

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