Alexander Gayer

Alexander Gayer (back row, 3rd from right) with racing drivers from his training school, including Bruno Büchner (2nd row, 2nd from left)

Alexander Gayer (* 1849 in Csakathurn , Warasdin County ) was an Austrian sports teacher in the 1890s. He is considered to be the first professional cycling trainer in history.

Alexander Gayer was the owner of a metal goods factory in Graz , where he carried out bicycle repairs out of enthusiasm for cycling. In 1882 he became member No. 30 of the Grazer Bicycle Club (GBC) and was briefly its kit manager. In the following year he was third in the first road race held in Styria .

From 1895 Gayer headed the Graz training school in the courtyard of his workshop , probably on behalf of Johann Puch . There he trained numerous racing drivers from Austria and abroad who achieved national and international success. Among them were Bruno Büchner , Franz Seidl , the later six-time Danish world champion Thorvald Ellegaard , Franz Gerger , Karl Käser , Emile Huet and Oskar Breitling . The amateur cyclist and journalist Michelangelo von Zois , a great admirer of Gayer, also trained in his school and received advice on seat meat from him: “You know, my dear Baron, such races are not made with your legs, but with you ... won. " Although doping was part of the agenda among the racing drivers at the time, Gayer is said to have refused such stimulants: " Gayer, too, sometimes gave his people a drink before the start, but that was nothing other than Schilcher, a very light Styrian one Red wine."

Later that was Trainierschule Gayer obviously identical to the Styria -Rennmannschaft. Gayer's daughter Paula (born in 1873) was also a cyclist and raced touring races.

Individual evidence

1. ^ Residential register, City Archives Graz
2. ↑ Doping in a self- experiment at Graz University on graz.radln.net

Web links

• Wolfgang Wehap: Biographical bike lexicon Styria . Special edition exhibition “Radkult” Leoben 2012, p. 45 f. (PDF; 5.1 MB)