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Tour de France Prizes

Winner's Prizes from the First Tour de France in 1903

BikeRaceInfo Tour de France Database

Histoire du Tour de FranceHistorian and writer Jean-François Mignot has very kindly sent me a list of the prizes won in the Tour de France from the first edition in 1903.

Mignot's history of the Tour de France (it's in French) can be purchased from Amazon.fr by just clicking on the cover of his book on the right.

After more than a century of inflation, currency changes and war, understanding the value of these prizes is difficult. Here's my take on the 1903 Tour de France winnings won by Maurice Garin:

Garin pocketed a total 6,125 of francs for his exploit (3,000 for overall first place plus stage wins, etc), enough to buy a gas station where he worked the rest of his life after retiring from racing. To this day, a station still stands on the spot of Garin's old place, but no one working there has any idea about the importance of the former owner. Garin is quite forgotten.

Adjusting for currency exchange rates and inflation across a century can be dangerous, but those 6,000 francs Garin won should be something like $30,000 in today’s U.S. dollars.  A worker at the De Dion-Bouton car factory (in 1900 the largest automobile maker in the world) in Paris made between five and seven francs a day (about 1,500 francs a year) and a trained craftsman like a boiler maker could expect to make about 2,000 francs a year.

But, Mr. Mignot is both fearless and tireless and has taken each year's prizes and converted them to 2013 U.S. Dollars to make it easier for American readers to understand the prizes' value.

European readers should note that the US Dollar/Euro exchange rate has been volatile. Mr. Mignot has used 1.308 US Dollars to the Euro in 2013 in his conversion calculations.

Monetary Units: In the columns using currency of current era, that is what was paid at the time of the race: Francs until 1959, "new Francs" from 1960 to 2001, Euros from 2002

First prize in currency of era

 

Total prize pool in currency of era

First prize in 2013 euros

Total prize pool in 2013 euros

First prize in 2013 dollars

 

Total prize pool in 2013 dollars

1903 3,000   20,000 11,828 78,851 15,471   103,138
1904 5,000   21,000 19,993 83,969 26,151   109,833
1905 4,000   25,000 16,010 100,063 20,941   130,884
1906 5,000   25,000 19,756 98,779 25,841   129,204
1907 4,000   25,000 15,586 97,415 20,387   127,420
1908 4,000   30,000 15,236 114,270 19,929   149,467
1909 5,000   25,000 19,083 95,416 24,961   124,805
1910 5,000   25,000 18,509 92,547 24,211   121,053
1911 5,000   30,000 16,842 101,052 22,030   132,177
1912 5,000   32,500 17,029 110,691 22,275   144,785
1913 5,000   39,900 16,469 131,426 21,542   171,907
1914 5,000   45,000 16,469 148,224 21,542   193,880
1915 - 1918: No Tours held
1919 5,000   50,000 6,378 63,783 8,343   83,428
1920 15,000   80,765 13,926 74,984 18,216   98,080
1921 15,000   80,000 15,898 84,787 20,794   110,903
1922 10,000   80,000 11,029 88,228 14,425   115,404
1923 10,000   100,000 9,936 99,356 12,996   129,959
1924 10,000   100,000 8,723 87,231 11,410   114,099
1925 15,000   99,000 12,194 80,483 15,951   105,273
1926 15,000   109,000 9,373 68,111 12,260   89,091
1927 12,000   100,000 7,182 59,854 9,395   78,290
1928 12,000   100,000 7,197 59,974 9,414   78,447
1929 10,000   150,000 5,647 84,709 7,387   110,800
1930 72,000   606,000 40,338 339,508 52,762   444,081
1931 25,000   650,000 14,575 378,938 19,064   495,655
1932 30,000   700,000 19,198 447,955 25,111   585,931
1933 30,000   749,000 19,833 495,157 25,941   647,671
1934 30,000   737,610 20,702 509,005 27,079   665,785
1935     1,092,050 821,804     1,074,931
1936 100,000   1,000,000 70,134 701,336 91,736   917,357
1937 200,000   800,000 111,500 446,001 145,844   583,375
1938 100,000   900,000 49,076 441,682 64,192   577,726
1939 100,000   900,000 46,037 414,336 60,217   541,957
1940 - 1946: No Tours held
1947 500,000   4,580,000 26,844 245,894 35,113   321,633
1948 600,000   7,000,000 20,324 237,111 26,584   310,144
1949 1,000,000   12,000,000 29,923 359,078 39,140   469,678
1950 1,000,000   14,000,000 27,203 380,840 35,582   498,144
1951 1,000,000   18,278,000 23,390 427,527 30,595   559,211
1952 1,000,000   28,000,000 20,903 585,279 27,341   765,552
1953 2,000,000   35,000,000 42,529 744,251 55,628   973,489
1954 2,000,000   38,445,000 42,359 814,249 55,406   1,065,048
1955 2,000,000   36,685,000 41,981 770,043 54,912   1,007,226
1956 2,000,000   38,000,000 40,289 765,495 52,699   1,001,277
1957 2,000,000   40,000,000 39,116 782,314 51,164   1,023,277
1958 2,000,000   40,000,000 33,984 679,682 44,452   889,033
1959 2,000,000   41,710,000 32,030 667,991 41,896   873,741
1960 20,000   400,000 30,887 617,749 40,401   808,023
1961 20,000   500,000 29,901 747,518 39,111   977,763
1962 20,000   583,425 28,558 833,086 37,355   1,089,687
1963 20,000   550,000 27,250 749,387 35,644   980,208
1964 20,000   543,200 26,354 715,785 34,472   936,257
1965 20,000   414,275 25,712 532,584 33,631   696,626
1966 20,000   424,700 25,036 531,632 32,747   695,381
1967 20,000   541,300 24,401 660,419 31,917   863,836
1968 20,000   574,850 23,328 670,508 30,513   877,034
1969 20,000   600,000 21,904 657,130 28,651   859,535
1970 20,000   605,525 20,822 630,400 27,235   824,572
1971 20,000   470,600 19,736 464,391 25,815   607,429
1972 20,000   552,000 18,584 512,916 24,308   670,901
1973 20,000   660,000 17,320 571,546 22,654   747,590
1974 30,000   802,650 22,849 611,327 29,887   799,623
1975 30,000   842,695 20,437 574,084 26,732   750,910
1976 100,000   1,004,500 62,158 624,374 81,303   816,689
1977 100,000   1,168,490 56,817 663,900 74,317   868,389
1978 100,000   1,227,545 52,078 639,279 68,118   836,185
1979 100,000   1,338,120 47,002 628,938 61,479   822,659
1980 100,000   1,487,930 41,375 615,626 54,119   805,247
1981 130,000   2,324,000 47,431 847,926 62,041   1,109,098
1982 150,000   2,207,220 48,952 720,320 64,030   942,188
1983 160,000   2,304,260 47,642 686,121 62,316   897,455
1984 160,000   2,561,450 44,359 710,151 58,023   928,887
1985 120,000   3,003,050 31,446 786,940 41,131   1,029,328
1986 300,000   4,500,680 76,547 1,148,384 100,125   1,502,101
1987 300,000   6,284,700 74,246 1,555,374 97,114   2,034,449
1988 808,000   7,567,250 194,711 1,823,551 254,685   2,385,228
1989 1,500,000   8,104,215 348,572 1,883,267 455,936   2,463,338
1990 2,000,000   10,073,450 449,480 2,263,907 587,926   2,961,220
1991 2,000,000   9,017,850 435,543 1,963,829 569,696   2,568,714
1992 2,000,000   10,162,950 425,335 2,161,327 556,343   2,827,044
1993 2,000,000   11,000,000 416,995 2,293,471 545,435   2,999,890
1994 2,200,000   11,597,450 451,027 2,377,618 589,949   3,109,956
1995 2,200,000   12,091,250 443,487 2,437,417 580,087   3,188,174
1996 2,200,000   12,002,250 434,792 2,372,036 568,713   3,102,653
1997 2,200,000   11,972,150 429,636 2,338,030 561,970   3,058,174
1998 2,200,000   12,019,650 426,649 2,330,990 558,063   3,048,965
1999 2,200,000   14,964,950 424,536 2,887,803 555,299   3,777,284
2000 2,200,000   15,500,500 417,469 2,941,357 546,055   3,847,333
2001 2,200,000   16,470,750 410,637 3,074,320 537,119   4,021,250
2002 335,390   2,664,035 403,027 3,201,283 527,165   4,187,320
2003 400,000   2,877,705 470,849 3,387,409 615,876   4,430,775
2004 400,000   3,000,000 461,030 3,457,728 603,034   4,522,753
2005 400,000   3,000,000 452,493 3,393,696 591,866   4,438,998
2006 450,000   3,200,000 500,890 3,561,887 655,171   4,658,994
2007 450,000   3,200,000 493,687 3,510,661 645,749   4,591,990
2008 450,000   3,200,000 480,240 3,415,040 628,160   4,466,917
2009 450,000   3,200,000 479,760 3,411,625 627,532   4,462,450
2010 450,000   3,200,000 472,556 3,360,399 618,110   4,395,446
2011 450,000   3,412,546 462,951 3,510,762 605,546   4,592,122
2012 450,000   3,414,246 453,890 3,509,384 593,694   4,590,320
2013 450,000   2,023,300 450,001 2,023,304 588,607   2,646,508