Hippolyte Aucouturier
Aucouturier in 1903
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| Personal information | |
|---|---|
| Full name | Hippolyte Aucouturier |
| Born |
17 October 1876 La Celle, France |
| Died | 22 April 1944 (aged 67) Paris, France |
| Team information | |
| Discipline | Road |
| Role | Rider |
| Professional team(s) | |
| 1900 - 1908 | Individual |
| Major wins | |
| Tour de France, 5 stages Paris Roubaix (1903, 1904) |
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Hippolyte Aucouturier (17 October 1876 in La Celle, Allier, France – 22 April 1944 in Paris, France) was a French professional road bicycle racer. Aucouturier, a professional between 1900 and 1908, won two stages at the first Tour de France in 1903 and won three stages and finished second in the 1905 Tour de France. He also won Paris–Roubaix twice, in 1903 and 1904. His elder brother Francois was also a racing cyclist.
Aucouturier was an outspoken man whom the Tour organiser, Henri Desgrange, referred to in L'Auto as Le Terrible.
The 1903 Paris–Roubaix, on 11 April, was decided when Aucouturier organised a chase to bring back a group which had escaped on the côte de St-Germain. Aucouturier took up the pursuit on the way to Pontoise, taking with him Louis Trousselier and others. They caught the fugitives and a new group formed on the côte d'Ennery. Aucouturier, recovered from typhoid the previous year, tested the group repeatedly before Doullens. He entered the velodrome at Roubaix alongside Claude Chapperon, 50 metres ahead of the others.
Tradition had it that riders changed bikes at the entrance to the stadium, taking specialist track bikes to ride the three laps of the velodrome to the finish. Bikes waited for all the remaining riders and Chapperon mistakenly took Trousselier's machine. In the time it took him to realise his error and change to his own bicycle, Aucouturier passed him and took a 100m lead to win.
Aucouturier came to the Tour de France having won Paris–Roubaix. Speculation was that he and another prominent rider, Maurice Garin, would fight out the race between them. The paper published their picture and that of the German, Joseph Fischer on its front page on 1 July 1903. But Aucouturier abandoned after La Palisse, 320 km into the first stage, with stomach cramp said to be brought on by drinking too much. Nobody now knows if this means what it says, perhaps from unclean water, or if referred to drinking wine and sniffing ether, both aimed at numbing the pain of long days riding on bad roads with little food. The previous year he had had typhoid fever and he may not have recovered.
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