The Tour de France Began as a Newspaper Promotion

At the turn of the 20th century, the biggest sports newspaper in France was *Le Vélo*. A rival paper, *L'Auto*, was launched on distinctive yellow-colored paper to stand out, but it was struggling to compete. The rivalry was intensely political, stemming from the infamous Dreyfus Affair which had split the original paper's staff. Desperate for a way to crush its competitor, editor Henri Desgrange and his team devised a radical publicity stunt: a cycling race so long and arduous it would capture the nation's imagination—a tour of France.

The inaugural 1903 race was a brutal experiment, covering nearly 2,500 kilometers in just six mammoth stages. Cyclists rode on heavy, fixed-gear bikes over unpaved roads, often through the night, with no team support. Of the 60 men who started, only 21 reached the finish line in Paris. The public, however, was enthralled by the daily drama of heroes and villains chronicled exclusively in the pages of *L'Auto*. The gamble paid off spectacularly, with the paper's circulation tripling and its rival, *Le Vélo*, going out of business shortly after. The world's most prestigious cycling race was born not just of sporting ambition, but of a bitter newspaper war.