Tour de France
History and general description
The race was founded as a publicity event for the newspaper L’Auto (ancestor of the present l’Équipe) by its editor, Henri Desgrange, to rival the Paris-Brest et retour (PBP) ride sponsored by Le Petit Journal and Bordeaux-Paris sponsored by Le Vélo. In the early days of the race, it was a near-continuous endurance event. Racers slept by the side of the road and were required to avoid all assistance, but several competitors in the second Tour de France were disqualified for taking a train part of the way. These days, the tour is a “stage race”, divided into a number of stages, each stage being a race held over one day.
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