Victor Fontan

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Victor Fontan Road cycling
Victor Fontan (1929)
Victor Fontan (1929)
To person
Date of birth June 18, 1892
date of death 2nd January 1982
nation FranceFrance France
discipline Road cycling
Driver type Mountain specialist
Team (s)
1926
1927
1928–1929
1930 		Areli-Hutchinson
Elvish
Elvish-Fontan-Wolber
Elvish Wolber
Most important successes
Tour de France
1928 : 7th and 9th stages
1926, 1927 Tour of Catalonia
1927 Tour of the Basque Country
Last updated: April 19, 2015

Victor Fontan (born June 18, 1892 in Pau , † January 2, 1982 in Saint-Vincent ) was a French cyclist .

Athletic career

Victor Fontan grew up in Nay . His father was a shoemaker and he himself learned to be a carpenter. From 1910 he raced as an amateur and in 1913 won the Toulouse – Bordeaux race . The First World War , in which he was wounded two times in the leg as a soldier, interrupted his racing career. He was not released from service until 1920.

From 1923 the now 31-year-old Fontan competed as a professional, initially independently, and from 1926 in various teams. In his first year as a professional he won the Tour du Sud-Ouest race , followed by a second place in 1924 and a third place in 1925. In 1926 and 1927 he won the Tour of Catalonia and in 1927 he won the Tour of the Basque Country ahead of André Leducq and Lucien Buysse . In 1928 he finished fourth in the overall ranking of the Giro d'Italia .

Fontan, an excellent mountaineer ( grimpeur ), started four times in the Tour de France , but only arrived in Paris once . In 1928 he won two stages and was seventh overall. In 1929 he drove in yellow for one day , but at the same time with Nicolas Frantz and André Leducq, which is unique in Tour history. A stage later, he wore the yellow jersey again, but this time alone, after he had also won the classification on the Col du Tourmalet . Fontan was 37 years old at the time, making him one of the oldest wearers of the yellow jersey in the history of the tour.

On the next stage from Luchon to Perpignan , which started at 4 a.m. and covered 323 kilometers, Fontan fell after seven kilometers - probably because he was avoiding a dog - and the fork of his bicycle broke. He went to the next town and knocked on the doors of the residents who were still sleeping until someone lent him a spare bike. At that time, the rule on the tour was that you had to arrive at the finish with the bike you started on or that you could only change the bike with the approval of an official. However, the officials were not within reach, which is why Fontan carried his defective bike on his back. Soon, however, he ran out of strength, his deficit grew bigger and bigger, and finally he gave up. Two radio reporters found him sitting by the fountain of Saint-Gaudens with tears . Her interview with the crying Fontan was broadcast on the radio two hours later, and the French felt so much for him that the tour operator, Henri Desgrange , was compelled to change the rule from the following year, so that the drivers would be theirs Were allowed to exchange a wheel without a permit.

Miscellaneous

After participating in the Tour de France in 1930 , Victor Fontan ended his sporting career and opened a transport company in Nay. A plaque on his former home reminds of him there, and the everyone's race Sur les traces de Victor Fontan has been held for several years . In 2012, a house for assisted living in Nay was named La résidence Victor Fontan after him and was officially opened in the presence of his daughter and son.

Fontan's son is the renowned cardiac surgeon Francis Fontan , who developed the Fontan Circulation , named after him , with which children born with only one ventricle can be operated on and reach adulthood. The children treated in this way are called Fontan children .

Web links

Commons : Victor Fontan  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Jean Jacques Stockli: Victor Fontan, coureur cycliste. In: villedenay.fr. Retrieved April 18, 2015 (French).
  2. ↑ Stage 7: Les Sables d'Olonne - Bordeaux (clm par équipes) - La Grande Boucle. In: lagrandeboucle.com. Retrieved April 18, 2015 (French).
  3. ↑ Stage 10: Luchon - Perpignan - La Grande Boucle. In: lagrandeboucle.com. Retrieved April 18, 2015 (French).
  4. ↑ Cyclopunk: Daily Cycling Facts June 30, 2012. In: cyclopunk.blogspot.de. June 30, 2012, accessed April 18, 2015 .
  5. ↑ Randonnée Cyclotouriste Sur les traces de Victor Fontan (PDF file)
  6. ↑ La résidence Victor-Fontan inaugurée. In: larepubliquedespyrenees.fr. Retrieved April 19, 2015 .
  7. ↑ Tanja Königshagen: Cultural evening for the benefit of children with fountain hearts. In: business-on.de. August 30, 2014, accessed April 19, 2015 .
personal data
SURNAME Fontan, Victor
BRIEF DESCRIPTION French cyclist
DATE OF BIRTH June 18, 1892
PLACE OF BIRTH Pau
DATE OF DEATH 2nd January 1982
Place of death Saint Vincent