I would liek to see this happen in the tour again. It would make for good entertainment
From
http://www.cyclingnews.com/features/...woodland_garin
Quote:
You can see pictures of old-time riders with wine bottles in their racks. In the absence of food stations or team cars, there are pictures of riders breaking into their 10-hour stages by sitting in a restaurant with a plate of food and yet another bottle of plonk. It was just the way it was.
After winning Paris-Brest-Paris
Photo ©: AFP  And it was the way it stayed until the 1960s. The Tour's organisers limited the water that riders could accept on the move. Anything they wanted above the limit had to be obtained from village pumps, springs or from helpful spectators. Or it had to be stolen from bars.
The chasse à la canette - the romantic name for jumping off your bike and running into a bar to steal any drink that could be picked up - was a shameful if colourful episode of Tour history that made for good pictures but a poor image. The big stars didn't do it but their domestiques did and they were expected to race back to the bunch to hand out whatever they had plundered.
Maurice Garin
Photo ©: Roger Thomas  Vin Denson, when he was a domestique for Rik van Looy, spoke English but only elementary Dutch and French. When van Looy bellowed "Denson… café!" in French, Denson knew his leader wanted a drink. Come the next bar, Denson brought van Looy a bidon. Van Looy, puzzled he hadn't been presented with a glass bottle, sniffed the contents and, with a wrinkled nose of contempt, poured the whole lot on the road.
"It was that day", Denson recalled, "that I learned that café meant not only 'coffee' but 'bar'." |
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