Arthur Linton

Arthur Linton (left) with Choppy Warburton (2nd from left), Jimmy Michael (2nd from right) and his brother Tom

Arthur Vincent Linton (born November 28, 1868 in Seavington St. Michael , † July 23, 1896 in Aberdare ) was a Welsh cyclist .

Arthur Linton, together with his two brothers Tom and Sam and Jimmy Michael, formed a group of internationally successful cyclists who all came from the Welsh town of Aberaman. He himself was born in Seavington St. Michael, England, where his father ran a pub. In the early 1870s, his family moved to Wales .

Linton, who worked as a miner at the age of 13, began doing local bike races as a teenager. In 1893, the trainer Choppy Warburton , notorious for his doping practices, became aware of him and his manager. In 1894 Linton first defeated the French champion Jules Dubois and narrowly lost to the Italian champion (name unknown), which is why he was celebrated as Champion Cyclist of the World on his return home . Between 1894 and 1896 he also set five world records.

In 1896 Linton won the London Six Day Race . In the same year he won at Bordeaux – Paris , but had to share this victory with Gaston Rivierre due to irregularities on both sides . Four weeks later he started the 24-hour race Bol d'Or , where he completely exhausted himself and had to give up. A little later, Linton died of typhus . However, it is considered to be the first doping death in the history of cycling; His immune system is said to have been so weakened by taking illegal drugs that his body had nothing to counter the infection, although this assumption has not been proven. However, Warburton's other protégés, Linton's brother Tom, Albert Champion and Jimmy Michael , also died at a young age. Contemporary sources attributed his death to the total physical exertion in the Bordeaux – Paris race, from the consequences of which he no longer recovered.

In 2009 a plaque in memory of Arthur Linton was unveiled at the Lintons house in Aberdare.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Arthur Linton on sixday.org.uk
2. ↑ Velo Gotha , Brussels 1984, p. 286
3. ^ Report of the Death of Arthur Linton on sixday.org.uk
4. ↑ Joe Turner: Portrait of Choppy Warburton on cycling4fans.de
5. ↑ Les Woodland: This Island Race . Mousehold Press, Norwich 2005, pp. 36 (English).
6. ↑ arthur-linton.co.uk ( Memento of the original from July 20, 2015 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. 

Web links

Commons : Arthur Linton  - Collection of Images, Videos and Audio Files

• Arthur Linton in the Radsportseiten.net database
• seavingtonwebmuseum.org.uk