1933 Tour | 1935 Tour | Tour de France Database | 1934 Tour Quick Facts | 1934 Tour de France Final GC | Stage results with running GC | The Story of the 1934 Tour de France
Map of the 1934 Tour de France
The Golden Sayings of Epictetus is available as an audiobook here.
4,363 km raced at an average speed of 30.36 km/hr
60 starters (40 on national teams and 20 are independent touristes-routiers) and 39 classified finishers
23 stages with a half-stage for the Tour's first-ever individual time trial. French team rides won 19 stages.
Antonin Magne took the lead and with the energetic backing of the French team, held it to the end.
René Vietto became a Tour legend when twice in the Pyrenees he gave a wheel to Magne, destroying his own chances.
Time bonuses: 90 and 45 seconds for the first and second-place riders in each stage in the case of a sprint.
If the victory was solo, the bonus was the winner's lead, up to 2 minutes. The same rule applied to the first rider to the top of the mountains in the climbers' competition.
1934 Tour de France Complete Final General Classification:
Climbers' Competition:
1934 Tour stage results with running GC:
Stage 1: Tuesday, July 3, Paris - Lille, 262 km
GC after Stage 1:
9. Romain Gijssels @ 2min 13sec
10. Roger Lapébie s.t.
Stage 2: Wednesday, July 4, Lille - Charleville, 192 km
GC after Stage 2:
Stage 3: Thursday, July 5, Charleville - Metz, 161 km
Places 7 - 15 given same time and place
GC after Stage 3:
Stage 4: Friday, July 6, Metz - Belfort, 220 km
Major ascent: Ballon d'Alsace
42. Vasco Bergamaschi @ 10min 28sec
GC after Stage 4:
Stage 5: Saturday, July 7, Belfort - Evian, 293 km
Major ascent: Faucille
Le Grevès and Speicher awarded tie for first place and they share the time bonus. Tour Encyclopedie says photos clearly show Le Grevès the winner.
And indeed, this photo of the stage five finish shows Le Grevès the winner.
Places 6 - 22 given same time and place
GC after Stage 5:
Stage 6: Monday, July 9, Evian - Aix les Bains, 207 km
Major ascents: Aravis, Tamié
Places 9 - 16 given same time and place
GC after Stage 6:
Stage 7: Tuesday, July 10, Aix les Bains - Grenoble, 229 km
Major ascent: Galibier
GC after Stage 7:
Stage 8: Wednesday, July 11, Grenoble - Gap, 102 km
Major ascents: Côte de Laffrey, Bayard
GC after stage 8:
Stage 9: Thursday, July 12, Gap - Digne, 227 km
Major ascents: Vars, Allos
GC after stage 9:
Stage 10: Friday, July 13, Digne - Nice, 156 km
GC after Stage 10:
Stage 11: Sunday, July 15, Nice - Cannes, 125 km
Major ascents: Braus, Castillon, La Turbie
GC after Stage 11:
Stage 12: Monday, July 16, Cannes - Marseille, 195 km
GC after Stage 12:
Stage 13: Tuesday, July 17, Marseille - Montpellier, 172 km
Places 9 - 13 given same time and place
18. René Vietto @ 6min 3sec
GC after Stage 13:
Stage 14: Wednesday, July 18, Montpellier - Perpignan, 177 km
GC after Stage 14:
Stage 15: Friday, July 20, Perpignan - Aix les Thermes, 158 km
Major ascent: Puymorens
Places 6 - 14 given same time and place
GC after Stage 15:
Stage 16: Saturday, July 21, Aix les Thermes - Luchon, 165 km
Major ascents: Port, Portet d'Aspet, Ares
11. Dante Franzil @ 7min 41sec
12.
Frans Bonduel @ 8min 37sec
18. René Vietto s.t.
GC after Stage 16:
Stage 17: Sunday, July 22, Luchon - Tarbes, 91 km
Major ascents: Peyresourde, Aspin
22. Giuseppe Martano @ 12min 59sec
GC after Stage 17
Stage 18: Monday, July 23, Tarbes - Pau, 172 km
Major ascents: Tourmalet, Aubisque
GC after Stage 18:
Stage 19: Wednesday, July 25, Pau - Bordeaux, 215 km
Places 10 - 38 given same time and place
GC after Stage 19:
Stage 20: Thursday, July 26, Bordeaux - La Rochelle, 183 km
Places 7 - 37 given same time and place
GC after Stage 20:
Stage 21A: Friday, July 27, La Rochelle - La Roche sur Yon, 81 km
Places 7 - 39 given same time and place
GC after Stage 21A:
Stage 21B: Friday, July 27, La Roche sur Yon - Nantes 90 km Individual Time Trial.
This is the Tour's first-ever individual time trial.
GC after Stage 21B:
Stage 22: Saturday, July 28, Nantes - Caen, 275 km
GC after Stage 22:
Stage 23 (final stage): Sunday, July 29, Caen - Paris, 221 km
The Story of the 1934 Tour de France
This excerpt is from "The Story of the Tour de France", Volume 1 If you enjoy it we hope you will consider purchasing the book, either print, eBook or audiobook. The Amazon link here will make the purchase easy.
The 1934 Tour's story is one of the greatest and most famous in the history of racing. Its tale of noble sacrifice electrified French sports fans and created one of its most endearing and enduring heroes.
The Tour de France as we now know it was almost completely in place by 1933. The only major missing component was the individual time trial. Team time trials had been an integral part of the Tour in the late 1920s, but never had a rider been sent out as a lone man against the clock in the Tour. The origins of the inclusion of the time trial make for an interesting story and give another insight into the complex mind of Henri Desgrange.
The newspaper L'Auto carried most of the costs of the Tour because of the introduction of the national team format in 1930. The burden grew with this change because the trade teams no longer covered the housing, travel and feeding of the riders while they raced the Tour. The basic purpose of the Tour de France was to stir up excitement for news of the Tour that L'Auto could then be in the best position to satisfy. Other journalistic competitors were eating into L'Auto's information franchise. One newspaper in particular gave L'Auto and its editor Henri Desgrange, who was also the Tour boss, cause for concern.
L'Auto was a morning paper, reporting the details of the previous day's stage in full. Paris-Soir was an evening paper and was getting the story of the day's stage, with results, into that same evening's edition. In order to make its deadline Paris-Soir had its writers report the race on the fly. As a stage progressed, the writers following the race would write a few pages and hand them off to be phoned in. Desgrange's paper, which had the results the following morning, was selling old news.
An undated photo of Henri Desgrange |
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Paris-Soir's sports editor Gaston Bénac and his paper followed a hallowed tradition by starting a bicycle race. Not just any race. He started the Grand Prix des Nations, a time trial that eventually became the unofficial world championship of time trialing. Benac's first edition was in 1932 and was not at all well received by the professional riders. Bénac had trouble getting enough of them to enroll in his first race. The sport of time trialing hadn't become the essential fixture that it is in today's racing scene. He did succeed, however. One of the main protagonists in the 1933 Tour, Maurice Archambaud, won the first Grand Prix des Nations. Raymond Louviot, also a French rider, won the 1933 Grand Prix des Nations.
If the patient reader has been following this Tour history from the beginning, one thing should be clear by now. Desgrange was adaptable. He was always willing to change his Tour if he thought he could improve it. He didn't seem to care where the idea came from. If it were a good idea, after a bit of consideration, he would use it. If an innovation didn't work, it was dropped. Seeing the success French riders were having in his antagonist's competition, Desgrange quite happily adopted the individual race against the clock for the Tour. He placed the Tour's first crono as the second part of a 2-stage day, late in the schedule of the 1934 Tour. The last 2 Tours (1932 and 1933) had ended up being very close affairs. Only the huge 4-minute time bonuses in the 1932 edition made Leducq's win seem big. A 90-kilometer time trial coming with only 3 stages to go could be decisive.
Many riders were unhappy with this new element. Climber René Vietto thought it just a test of dull, brutish horsepower when a bike race should be a contest that tested both head and legs. Vietto even cited Desgrange's book with that same title (La Tête et Les Jambes) to make his point. Others thought it would negate the effect of good teamwork since the individual time trial was, well, an individual effort. The rider's objections were met and overcome by 2 forces. This first was the power of the fine, exciting drama of a lone man on his bike in what has become known as the 'race of truth'. The second was the immediate success of French riders in the discipline. That sealed the time-trial's destiny as a crucial part of the Tour. It also gave new balance to the race as the powerful rouleurs could take time back from the smaller climbers who couldn't ride as fast on the flats. Climbing is a test of a rider's relative power output. Time trialing measures a racer's absolute horsepower. Now, to win the Tour, a racer had to have both qualities.
The French team for the 1934 Tour was another magnificent collection of outstanding athletes. The team's core was made up of Georges Speicher, 1933's Tour winner and World Champion, future Tour winner Roger Lapébie, previous Tour winner Antonin Magne, and Maurice Archambaud, who had held the Yellow Jersey for much of 1933's Tour. Rounding out the French squad were Charles Pélissier, René Le Grevès and a 20-year-old rider named René Vietto. Vietto, a hotel bellboy before he turned pro, had shown from the beginning a startling ability to climb. There was some debate about his inclusion in the team because of his youth but his talent silenced the naysayers.
Instead of riding as an independent touriste-routier as he had in 1933, gifted climber Giuseppe Martano headed an Italian team that did not measure up to his talent. Belgium sent a lackluster squad of whom only 2 found their way to Paris. The rest started abandoning in stage 2.
Of the 60 riders who started Tuesday, July 3 in Paris, the French national team was in a league of their own. The race was theirs to lose.
From the first stage of this clockwise Tour (Alps first), the French were off to the races. 1933 Tour winner Georges Speicher started where he had left off the year before by winning the first stage and again donning his Yellow Jersey. Speicher's time in Yellow was very short. The next day during the Lille to Charleville stage there was a split in the pack. 11 men beat the field to the finish by more than 15 minutes. Antonin Magne, "Tonin the Silent", winner of the 1931 Tour, was in this lead group. His second place that day gave him the lead in the General Classification. The Yellow Jersey stayed a French possession, passing from Speicher to his teammate Magne.
The French, from Speicher's stage 1 win, put on an impressive display of power. René Le Grevès won the second stage, Roger Lapébie took the third and fourth stages. Le Grevès and Speicher finished in a near dead heat at the end of stage 5. After looking at the photo finish the judges gave the stage win to Le Grevès but split the time bonus between them. Speicher took stage 6 with its climbs over the Aravis and the Tamié. All this time Magne kept a firm grip on the Yellow Jersey.
So, before the heavy climbing in the Alps, here was the General Classification:
Stage 7 from Aix-les-Bains to Grenoble went over the great Galibier. There the ex-bellhop from Cannes showed what a brilliant talent he was. René Vietto won the stage with a 3½-minute gap on the field. Giuseppe Martano was second, with Antonin Magne and several others right on his wheel. The rest of the field started coming in almost 12 minutes later.
The next day, stage 8 with the Laffrey and Bayard climbs, Martano was first but Magne was only 7 seconds behind. Vietto came in 21 seconds behind his leader.
Stage 9: Italian rider Edoardo Molinar crests the Vars. Vietto is up ahead. The 2 riders would maintain this relationship over the Allos. Vietto finished 2 minutes and 23 seconds ahead of Molinar. |
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Stage 9 was another Vietto showcase. He was first over both of the major climbs of the day, the Vars and the Allos. He continued down the road and soloed in for the stage victory. 3 days later Vietto finished off the Maritime Alps in the Nice to Cannes stage by being first over the Braus, the Castillon and La Turbie. He beat Martano in the sprint thereby denying the Italian racer the time bonus that the stage win would have given him. Magne finished the stage 3½ minutes later. Magne still held the lead, but Martano had made the gap dangerously close. After the Alps and the 3 wonderful mountain stage wins by young Vietto, the General Classification stood thus:
During the first 2 stages Vietto had lost a lot of time with several flat tires. Barring that misfortune he would have been in serious contention for the lead. As we will see, misfortune should be Vietto's middle name.
The stages between the Alps and the Pyrenees were another series of French romps with victories in stages 12, 13, and 14 by Lapébie, Speicher, and Lapébie respectively.
The next stage, number 15 from Perpignan to Ax-les-thermes, is the real beginning of the story of Vietto's sacrifice and his rise to immortality. On one of the earlier climbs of the day Magne tried to test Martano with an attack, but Martano was not to be dropped. The big climb of the day was the 25-kilometer long road up the Puymorens. René Vietto led Magne and Martano over the top. On the descent Magne crashed and broke the wooden rim of his front wheel. Seeing the Yellow Jersey's misfortune, Martano jumped away in an effort to put distance between himself and Magne.
"René, give me your bike," Magne demanded of Vietto
"No, but take my front wheel."
Vietto dutifully gave his team leader the front wheel of his bike. Unfortunately, Magne's frame was bent in the crash. When Georges Speicherwho had been behind on the climbshowed up, Magne took Speicher's bike. Magne was able to hook up with Lapébie and chase down Martano and the rest of the leaders. Magne limited his time loss that day to a mere 45 seconds and kept his Yellow Jersey. Vietto had to wait several minutes for the support car to bring him a replacement. He and Speicher finished together, 4½ minutes behind the stage winner Lapébie.
There is a picture of Vietto, weeping by the side of a mountain road, the front wheel of his bike missing. He knows that the Tour is going down the road without him. In some pictures of the scene a man in street clothes holds a smashed wheel in his hands. Vietto's anguish, 70 years later, still moves me when I see this picture. I wasn't the only one affected by the scene. The entire cycling world was touched by the scene of a man who made a huge sacrifice and was abject in the realization of the cost of that gift. The next day the newspapers proclaimed him Le Roi René (King René).
Things did not get better for the brilliant young climber. The next day, the stage from Ax-les-Thermes to Luchon was another big day of climbing with the Port, Portet d'Aspet and the Ares passes to overcome. Vietto was first over the Port and rode ahead of his team leader Magne who was keeping an eye on second place Giuseppe Martano. Over the next mountain, the Portet d'Aspet, Vietto was slightly ahead of Magne. He eased a bit so that he could be with Magne on the descent. Magne was still following Martano when he hit a rock and crashed. This time Magne wrecked his rear wheel. Vietto, thinking that Magne would be joining him shortly, continued. This was over a half-century before earphones. Often, in the "fog of war", riders are confused about what is actually going on in a race. A Tour course marshal on a motorcycle zoomed up ahead and told Vietto that his team leader had crashed and was stranded without any teammates. Lapébie was off the front and the rest of the team was well behind.
Hearing the news, Vietto turned around and rode back up the mountain against the tide of descending riders in order to reach his leader. Magne couldn't believe his good fortune. He grabbed Vietto's bike and took off after Lapébie who was now waiting for him and could help him regain the leaders. Adriano Vignoli, the stage winner, was long gone, but Magne and Lapébie did catch Martano and the rest of the riders who were up the road. Again Vietto had to wait for the service car to give him a new bike. He came in over 8 minutes after Vignoli, but only about 4 minutes after Magne, Lapébie and Martano. Vietto’s selfless move preserved Magne’s lead of 2 minutes, 57 seconds over Martano.
But, was everybody happy? Not Vietto, who had a sharp tongue. He complained that Magne didn't really know how to ride a bike and that Lapébie had taken off looking for a stage win instead of sticking with Magne. Magne, on the other hand, was profoundly grateful to both Vietto and Lapébie for saving his race.
The General Classification after stage 16:
Stage 17 was where Magne sealed his victory in the 1934 Tour de France. Since the second stage he had been the leader, but Martano had been able to keep it close. Only great good fortune and a team that would do anything to make sure one of its own won the Tour had allowed Magne to keep the Yellow Jersey. On the road from Luchon to Tarbes, over the great Peyresourde and Aspin climbs, Magne built a lead that was almost invulnerable to challenge. Vietto was first over the Peyresourde but Magne led over the Aspin and came in alone, over 6 minutes ahead of Vicente Trueba, nearly 8 minutes ahead of Vietto. More tellingly, Martano wasn't able to stay with Magne and finished 13 minutes behind him. The gap in the General Classification between Magne and Martano was now 19 minutes, 47 seconds after time bonuses.
The next day, stage 18, Magne lost 4 minutes to Martano. Again, having a brilliant team was invaluable. René Vietto was first over the 2 major climbs, the Tourmalet and the Aubisque and won the stage with Lapébie coming in second. Martano was third, but Vietto had scooped up most of the time bonuses that were in play that day, minimizing Martano's possible time gain.
Stage 18: Vietto flies away on the Tourmalet. He held his solo lead over the Aubisque and all the way to the finish, beating the day's second place rider, Roger Lapébie, by 2 minutes and 57 seconds. |
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The French continued to win stages. The race for the Yellow Jersey was almost finished with the major climbing completed and the Tour heading back to Paris. There was one obstacle left in the way of Magne's likely triumph and that was the Tour's first individual time trial, 90 kilometers from La Roche-sur-Yon to Nantes. On the afternoon of Friday, July 27, Antonin Magne made history by winning the Tour's first individual time trial. He beat his teammate Lapébie, who came in second, by over a minute. He crushed Giuseppe Martano, besting him by 8 minutes. Magne's decisive time-trial win made it clear that he was truly the deserving victor.
The Tour was settled. Magne had taken the Yellow Jersey on the second stage and held it for the balance of the Tour. The time gaps between Magne and the rest of the peloton were huge, more like the Tours of a decade before. The French made the 1934 Tour their private property. Not only did Magne win the General Classification, the French team won 19 stages, King of the Mountains and Team General Classification. Yet, without Vietto's and Speicher's willingness to sacrifice everything for him, Magne's chances would have been doubtful. Would Martano have been higher up in the standings if he had not suffered two broken frames? Undoubtedly. But, to win a 3 week race one must have both strength and good luck.
The final 1934 Tour de France General Classification:
Climber's Competition:
Vietto remained convinced until his death that he could have won the 1934 Tour if he could have kept riding up the mountain and left Magne to wait for a spare. I don't think so. Before the Tour hit the mountains he had lost a huge amount of time. He lost an additional near 10 minutes in the time trial. Vietto's class was real. He still won the King of the Mountains and came in fifth in General Classification. But he wasn't a complete enough rider to win the Tour. We'll run into "King René" again in this history. He will wear the Yellow for many days in the future, but he would never wear it in Paris as the overall winner.
Still, the French love a gallant man and Vietto was that. He became a hero and to this day is remembered with fondness for his sacrifices. He earned a terrific amount of money racing after the Tour because the French were so taken by his generosity. Sadly, he was swindled out of his winnings later in life.
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