自行车公开赛历史

    The race was founded as a publicity¹ event for the newspaper L'Auto (ancestor of the present l'?quipe) by its editor and co-founder, Henri Desgrange, to rival the Paris-Brest et retour ride (sponsored by Le Petit Journal), and Bordeaux-Paris. The idea for a round-France stage race is also credited to one of his journalists, Géo Lefèvre, with whom Desgrange had lunch at the Café de Madrid in Paris on 20 November 1902). Promotion² of the Tour de France certainly proved a great success for the newspaper; circulation leapt from 25,000 before the 1903 Tour to 65,000 after it; in 1908 the race boosted circulation past a quarter of a million, and during the 1923 Tour it was selling 500,000 copies a day. The record circulation claimed by Desgrange was 854,000, achieved during the 1933 Tour. Today, the Tour is organised by the Amaury Sport Organisation³ (ASO), part of the media group that owns l'?quipe.

    The tour is a "stage race", divided into a number of stages, each stage being a race held over one day. Although the number of stages has varied⁴ in the past, recently the tour has consisted of around 20 stages, with a total length of between 3,000 and 4,000 km.

    Most stages take place in France though it is very common to have a few stages in nearby countries, such as Italy, Spain, Switzerland, Belgium, Luxembourg and Germany, but also non-neighbouring countries such as the Republic of Ireland, United Kingdom and the Netherlands.

    The three weeks usually includes two rest days, which are sometimes used to transport the riders long distances between stages.

    In recent years, the first stage is preceded by a short individual time trial (1 to 15 km), called the prologue⁵. The traditional finish is in Paris on the Champs-?lysées. In between, various stages occur, including a number of mountain stages, individual time trials and a team time trial. The remaining stages are held over relatively⁶ flat terrain⁷. With the variety of stages, sprinters may win stages, but the overall winner is almost always a master of the mountain stages and time trials.

    The itinerary⁸ of the race changes each year; however, some of the visited places, especially mountains and passes, recur⁹ almost annually¹⁰ and are famous on their own. The most famous mountains are those in the hors-categorie (peaks where the difficulty in climbing is beyond categorization), including the Col du Tourmalet, Mont Ventoux, Col du Galibier, the Hautacam and Alpe d'Huez. Although the tour is often won in the mountain stages, the length and variety of terrain ensures that only an all-round rider could possibly win the race.

    Other major stage races include the Giro d'Italia (Tour of Italy) and the Vuelta a Espa?a (Tour of Spain). The Giro d'Italia, Tour de France and World Cycling Championship comprise the Triple Crown of Cycling.

    一年一度的环法自行车赛是目前世界上规模最大、比赛路线最长的公路自行车越野比赛，也是欧洲国家一系列公路自行车比赛中历史最悠久的比赛。它是由法国自行车运动员、记者亨利·德格朗热于1903年发起创办的。当年7月1日举行的第一届环法自行车赛只有60名选手参赛。比赛全程2428公里，历时19天。其后，每一届环法自行车赛都在每年7月举行，参赛选手逐渐增多，并且有众多来自世界各国的职业自行车运动员参加，赛程延长至4000公里左右，包括平地和山路，路程一般要遍布法国各地，有时也延伸到邻国，终点均为法国首都巴黎的香榭丽舍大街。比赛分段计时，各段累计时间最少者获胜。

    随着环法自行车赛的声势不断扩大，比赛的难度不断增大，其影响不断扩大，吸引了越来越多的法国人和欧洲一些国家的人沿路观看，法国主要电视台每天都进行报道或实况转播。比赛冲刺之日，香榭丽舍大街更是人山人海，如盛大节日一般。