'Le Miroir des Sports', 1933 onwards now online

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A fellow collector and bike connaisseur bought an A3 scanner and is now enjoying scanning 'Le Miroir des Sports' (TdF magazine/journal), starting with 1933 :shock:

Impressive pics and covering of yesteryears Tour de France issues. Take a look overhere >>>

cyclingpassions.eu

The series starts with the oldest. More coming :)

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1933-07-08%2B-%2BMiroir%2Bdes%2BSports%2B716%2B-%2B27th%2BTour%2Bde%2BFrance%2B-%2B034A.jpg
 
Just had a look at most of them. Look at the mountain road surfaces.
Two spares were probably not enough. And the piece about alloy rims overheating causing the tubulars to come off, and riders burning their hands on the rims.
I am old enough to have carried a spare tubular like that, and raced on wood rims.
Rene Vietto with the typical Azureen shallow bars, but sad the picture of him blown.

Amazing.
 
No multiple gears, just double sided hubs. Terrible road surface over the cols - and how well did those brakes work on the descents?! No or very rudimentary lever hood rubbers, baggy shorts and jerseys, no helmets, bendy sole shoes, no team cars. Stopping for food at the official feeding stations. And the 'tourist-routier' guys basically doing it all on their own!

Some bikes can be seen with chain oilers on the seat tube.

And this is 30 years(ish) after the first one, imagine what that was like!

Another world - another time!
 
Now with 1938, and Super Champion gears. I thought I saw Vicini still had a Margherita, the old back pedal change model. What do you think young Ned?
 
keithglos":4b9z727s said:
Now with 1938, and Super Champion gears. I thought I saw Vicini still had a Margherita, the old back pedal change model. What do you think young Ned?
Click to expand...

Haven't looked yet! Give us a chance! ;)

EDIT - yes, you're correct. Bartali of course was using a Margherita (or something very similar) as were a couple of other riders. Bartali used one because he had a stake in the company I believe.
 
Now I looked right through, Bartali has clearly a Vittoria Margherita.
After a double sided hub a back pedal change was a luxury.
I tried a Campagnolo Paris Roubaix back pedal gear in 1955, the main problem was, like the Super Champion, the need to feed the chain straight on to the cogs. And scaring the rest of the bunch.
Interesting how concerned they were with chain tension, the Super Champion had a control to pull the tension arm up a little.
 
there are 100s of those magazines in my grandad loft in france .

great read .
 
Now up to 1949. This was the first of these Mags I actually bought. The famous picture of Apo looking at Bartali's drink.
Only the Italians now have quick release hubs, but Bartali is still on the Super Champion/ Osgear, all the others on Simplex.
I saw a couple of handlebar controls too, Van Steenbergen and Goldschmit.
 
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