La Sportive (cycling team)

La Sportive is a former French professional cycling team/cycling consortium that was active from 1918 to 1921.

History

Many of the bicycle factories that sponsored cycling teams in the early part of the 20th century suffered and some were even destroyed during the World War I. There was little money around for sponsorship of a team and as a result several businesses ran a joint team that they called La Sportive. The La Sportive Consortium was also ran in order to keep the sport alive during the tough postwar years. The member companies which included Alcyon, Armor, Automoto, Clément, La Française, Gladiator, Griffon, Hurtu, Labor, Liberator, Peugeot and Thomann combined their resources and are said to have equipped around half of the peloton. They are also said to have controlled the rider’s salaries. [cite web|url= http://www.ebykr.com/?p=51|title= Cycles Automoto: Setting the Standard|publisher=EBykr|accessdate=2007-11-04] La Sportive won the Tour de France in 1919, 1920, and 1921 with Firmin Lambot, Philippe Thys and Leon Scieur. [cite web|url= http://www.cyclingnews.com/features/?id=2006/woodland_training_camp|title= Norbert Peugeot: The inventor of the training camp|publisher=Cyclingnews.com|accessdate=2007-11-04] Eugène Christophe was riding with a grey La Sportive jersey when, while leading the 1919 Tour de France, Desgrange gave him the first maillot jaune to wear in the history of the race. [cite web|url=http://www.memoire-du-cyclisme.net/palmares/lambot_firmin.php|title=Firmin Lambot (Belgique)|publisher=Memoire du cyclisme.net|accessdate=2007-11-12] .

The consortium disappeared in 1922 with the member companies re-starting up their own cycling teams. These teams included Peugeot cycling team, the Automoto cycling team and the Alycon cycling team. During the three years of which the La Sportive consortium existed, the member companies were in the process of rebuilding their teams and it is possible that these riders rode for these teams as well as the La Sportive consortium. The victories are from the La Sportive riders during the years that they rode for the team. However it is possible that the riders may have rode for a second team or perhaps one of the member companies of the La Sportive consortium.

elected victories

*Tour de France General Classification 1919, 1920, 1921 Second overall 1920 and 1921
*FRA Road Race championships 1919
*BEL Road Race Championships 1919
*Paris-Roubaix 1919, 1920
*Liège-Bastogne-Liège 1920, 1921
*Giro di Lombardia 1920
*Bordeaux-Paris 1919
*Paris-Brussels 1919, 1920
*Tour of Belgium 1919, 1920
*Bordeaux-Paris-Bordeaux 1920
*Paris-Brest-Paris 1921

References