1909 Tour de France

July 5 to August 1

Results, stages with running GC, photos and history

1909 Tour Quick Facts:

Quick details:

Winner: François Faber (Alcyon)
Stages: 14
Distance: 4,497 kilometers
Average Speed: 28.658 km/hr
Starters: 150
Classified finishers: 55

In 1909 the General Classification was calculated on points, lowest total winning.

François Faber, from Luxembourg, was the Tour's first foreign winner.

In the listings below, riders whose affiliation is isole are independent riders responsible for all of their own equipment and travel expenses.

1909 Tour de France Complete Final General Classification:

François Faber (Alcyon) 37 points
Gustave Garrigou (Alcyon) 57 pts
Jean Alavoine (Alcyon) 66 pts
Paul Duboc (Alcyon) 70 pts
Cyrille Van Hauwaert (Alcyon) 92 pts
Ernest Paul (isole) 95 pts
Constant Ménager (Le Globe) 102 pts
Louis Trousselier (Alcyon) 114 pts
Eugéne Christophe (isole) 139 pts
Aldo Bettini (isole) 142 pts
Julien Maitron (Le Globe) 148 pts
Georges Fleury (Le Globe) 152 pts
Alfred Fauré (isole) 205 pts
Mario Gajoni (Legnano) 210 pts
Attilio Zavatti (Legnano) 241 pts
Jules Deloffre (Nil-Supra) 252 pts
Joseph Habierre (isole) 296 pts
Ildebrando Gamberini (Felisina) 305 pts
Alfred Le Bars (isole) 317 pts
Emile Lachaise (isole) 327 pts
Lucien Leman (isole) 341 pts
Léon Rabot (isole) 343 pts
Georges Oudin (isole)345 pts
Amédee Dutiron (isole): 351 pts
Robert Lecointe (isole) 351 pts (tied with Dutiron for 24th)
Pierre Langlade (isole): 404 pts
Angelo Magagnoli (Felsina): 407 pts
Antony Wattalier (isole) 411 pts
Alfred Vaidis (isole): 450 pts
Henri Alavoine (isole): 467 pts
Paul Boillat (isole): 471 pts
Amleto Belloni (isole): 477 pts
René Chaude (isole): 479 pts
Joseph Leblanc (isole): 481 pts
August Denizot (isole): 484 pts
August Dufour (isole): 491 pts
Antoine Fauré (isole): 495 pts
Albert Lagagnier (isole): 518 pts
Rodolphe Meili (isole): 548 pts
Louis Gardent (isole) : 549 pts
Alcide Rivière (isole): 556 pts
François Roche (isole): 561 pts
Lucien Colin (isole): 569 pts
André Herbelin (isole): 573 pts
Giovanni Perucca (isole): 579 pts
Eugène Leroy (isole): 610 pts
Camille Mathieu (isole): 613 pts
Charles Ponson: 620 pts
Paul Piétrois (isole): 633 pts
Louis Di Maria (isole): 648 pts
Henri Anthoine (isole): 649 pts
Henri Ory (isole): 651 pts
Ernest Goujon (isole): 659 pts
Alfred Guidez (isole): 670 pts
Georges Devilly (isole): 713 pts

1909 Tour stage results with running GC:

Stage 1, Monday, July 5: Paris - Roubaix, 272 kilometers

Cyrille Van Hauwaert (Alcyon): 9hr 18min
François Faber (Alcyon) s.t.
Octave Lapize (Biguet) s.t.
Andre Blaise (isole) s.t.
Eugéne Christophe (isole) s.t.
Ernest Paul (isole) s.t.
Gustave Garrigou (Alcyon) @ 10min
Louis Trousselier (Alcyon) s.t.
Carlo Galetti (Legnano) s.t.
Odile Defraye (Biguet-Dunlop) s.t.

General Classification:

Cyrille Van Hauwaert: 1 point
François Faber: 2
Octave Lapize: 3

Stage 2, Wednesday, July 7: Roubaix - Metz, 398 kilometers.

François Faber (Alcyon): 14hr 9min
Octave Lapize (Biguet) @ 33min
Henri Cornet (Nil-Supra) @ 42min
Constant Ménager (Le Globe) s.t.
Gustave Garrigou (Alcyon) @ 1hr 1min
Charles Cruchon (Biguet-Dunlop) @ 1hr 2min 30sec
Eugène Christophe (isole) @ 1hr 10min
Paul Duboc (Alcyon) @ 1hr 20min
Cyrille Van Hauwaert (Alcyon) @ 1hr 28min
Jean Alavoine (Alcyon) @ 1hr 48min

General Classification:

François Faber: 3 points
Octave Lapize: 5
Cyrille Van Hauwaert: 10

Stage 3, Friday, July 9: Metz - Belfort, 259 kilometers

Major ascent: Ballon d'Alsace

François Faber (Alcyon): 9hr 28min
Gustave Garrigou (Alcyon) @ 33min
Eugène Christophe (Isole) @ 1hr
Ernest Paul (isole) s.t.
Constant Ménager (Le Globe) s.t.
Cyrille Van Houwaert (Alcyon) @ 1hr 9min
Paul Duboc (Alcyon) @ 1hr 26min
Jean Alavoine (Alcyon) @ 1hr 28min
Julien Maitron (Le Globe) s.t.
Julien Gabory (Le Globe) s.t.

General Classification:

François Faber: 4 points
Gustave Garrigou: 14
Eugène Christophe: 15

Stage 4, Sunday, July 11: Belfort - Lyon, 309 kilometers

Major ascent: Cerdon

François Faber (Alcyon) 10hr 44min
Constant Ménager (Le Globe) @ 10min
Gustave Garrigou (Alcyon) @ 25min
Jean Alavoine (Alcyon) @ 28min
Cyrille Van Hauwaert (Alcyon) @ 35min
Paul Duboc (Alcyon) s.t.
Ernest Paul (isole) @ 1hr 8min
Georges Fleury (Le Globe) @ 1hr 15min
Eugène Christophe @ 1hr 33min
Julien Maitron (Le Globe) @ 1hr 44min

General Classification:

François Faber: 5 points
Gustave Garrigou: 17
Cyrille Van Hauwaert: 21

Stage 5, Tuesday, July 13: Lyon - Grenoble, 311 kilometers.

Major ascents: Les Echelles, Col de Porte

François Faber (Alcyon) 11hr 12min
Gustave Garrigou (Alcyon) @ 5min
Cyrille Van Hauwaert (Alcyon) @ 12min
Paul Duboc (Alcyon) @ 17min
Julien Maitron (Le Globe) @ 17min 30sec
Constant Ménager (Le Globe) @ 19min
Jean Alavoine (Alcyon) @ 23min
Ernest Paul (isole) @ 30min
Aldo Bettini (isole) @ 35min
Augustin Ringeval (Nil-Supra) @ 48min

General Classification:

François Faber: 6 points
Gustave Garrigou: 19
Cyrille Van Hauwaert: 24

Stage 6, Thursday, July 15: Grenoble - Nice, 345 kilometers.

Major ascents: Bayard, Cote de Laffrey

François Faber (Alcyon) 12hr 9min
Jean Alavoine (Alcyon) @ 1min
Paul Duboc (Alcyon) @ 1min 1sec
Constant Ménager (Le Globe) s.t.
Gustave Garrigou (Alcyon) @ 24min
Charles Cruchon (Biguet-Dunlop) @ 50min
Aldo Bettini (isole) @ 51min
Cyrille Van Houwaert (Alcyon) @ 54min
Louis Trousselier (Alcyon) s.t.
Attilio Zavatti (Legnano) @ 1hr 12min

General Classification:

François Faber: 7 points
Gustave Garrigou: 24
Cyrille Van Hauwaert: 32

Stage 7, Saturday, July 17: Nice - Nîmes, 345 kilometers.

Ernest Paul (isole) 12hr 43min
Louis Trousselier (Alcyon) @ 17min
Gustave Garrigou (Alcyon) s.t.
François Faber (Alcyon) s.t.
Jean Alavoine (Alcyon) s.t.
Charles Cruchon (Biguet-Dunlop) @ 18min
Paul Duboc (Alcyon) @ 23sec
Cyrille Van Houwaert (Alcyon) @ 32min
Constant Ménager (Le Globe) @ 43min
Goerges Fleury (Le Globe) s.t.

General Classification:

François Faber: 11 points
Gustave Garrigou: 27
Cyrille Van Hauwaert: 40

Stage 8, Monday, July 19: Nîmes - Toulouse, 303 kilometers.

Jean Alavoine (Alcyon) 10hr 10min
Ernest Paul (isole) s.t.
Cyrille Van Hauwaert (Alcyon) @ 20sec
Louis Trousselier (Alcyon) s.t.
François Faber (Alcyon) @ 1min
Julien Maitron (Le Globe) s.t.
Constant Ménager (Le Globe) @ 4min
Paul Duboc (Alcyon) @ 8min
Charles Cruchon (Biguet-Dunlop) @ 9min
Augustin Ringeval (Nil-Supra) @ 14min

General Classification:

François Faber: 16 points
Gustave Garrigou: 35
Cyrille Van Hauwaert: 41

Stage 9, Wednesday, July 21: Toulouse - Bayonne, 299 kilometers

Constant Menager (Le Globe) 9hr 59min
Julien Maitron (Le Globe) @ 4min
Georges Fleury (Le Globe) @ 4min 10sec
Jean Alavoine (Alcyon) @ 13min
Gustave Garrigou (Alcyon) @ 13min
Paul Duboc (Alcyon) s.t.
Louis Trousselier (Alcyon) s.t.
Ernest Paul (isole) s.t.
Eugène Christophe (isole) @ 23min
François Faber (Alcyon) @ 46min

General Classification:

François Faber: 26 points
Gustave Garrigou: 40
Cyrille Van Hauwaert: 46

Stage 10, Friday, July 23: Bayonne - Bordeaux, 269 kilometers

François Faber (Alcyon) 8hr 2min
Paul Duboc (Alcyon) s.t.
Gustave Garrigou (Alcyon) @ 7min
Louis Trousselier (Alcyon) s.t.
Eugéne Christophe (isole) @ 13min
Aldo Bettini (isole) @ 19min
Charles Cruchon (Biguet-Dunlop) @ 19min 20sec
Frédéric Saillot (Biguet-Dunlop) @ 33min
Georges Fleury (Le Globe) @ 47min
Ernest Paul (isole) @ 55min

General Classification:

Francois Faber: 27 points
Gustave Garrigou: 43
Paul Duboc: 58

Stage 11, Sunday, July 25: Bordeaux - Nantes, 391 kilometers

Louis Trousselier (Alcyon) 12hr 47min
François Faber (Alcyon) @ 8min
Jean Alavoine (Alcyon) @ 9min
Paul Duboc (Alcyon) s.t.
Eugéne Christophe (Isole) s.t.
Gustave Garrigou (Alcyon) @ 20min
Ernest Paul (isole) @ 38min
Jules Deloffre (Nil-Supra) @ 1hr 44min
Aldo Bettini (isole) s.t.
Cyrille Van Houwaert (Alcyon) s.t.

General Classification:

François Faber: 29 points
Gustave Garrigou: 49
Paul Duboc: 62

Stage 12, Tuesday, July 27: Nantes - Brest, 321 kilometers

Gustave Garrigou (Alcyon) 11hr 18min
François Faber (Alcyon) @ 7min
Cyrille Van Hauwaert (Alcyon) @ 8min
Jean Alavoine (Alcyon) s.t.
Paul Duboc (Alcyon) s.t.
Louis Trousselier (Alcyon) s.t.
Ernest Paul (isole) s.t.
Aldo Bettini (isole) s.t.
Jules Deloffre (Nil-Supra) @ 21min
Mario Gajoni (Legnano) @ 37min

General Classification:

François Faber: 31 points
Gustave Garrigou: 50
Paul Duboc: 67

Stage 13, Thursday, July 29: Brest - Caen, 415 kilometers.

Paul Duboc (Alcyon) 15hr 2min
Jean Alavoine (Alcyon) @ 7min
François Faber (Alcyon) s.t.
Louis Trousselier (Alcyon) s.t.
Gustave Garrigou (Alcyon) s.t.
Cyrille Van Houwaert (Alcyon) s.t.
Ernest Paul (isole) @ 32min
Eugène Christophe (isole) s.t.
Aldo Bettini (isole) s.t.
Julien Maitron (Le Globe) @ 48min

General Classification:

François Faber: 34 points
Gustave Garrigou: 53
Paul Duboc: 68

Stage 14 (final stage), Sunday, August 1: Caen - Paris, 251 kilometers

Jean Alavoine (Alcyon): 8hr 53min
Louis Trousselier (Alcyon) @ 6min 30sec
François Faber (Alcyon) @ 6min 36sec
Gustave Garrigou (Alcyon) @ 7min 32sec
Paul Duboc (Alcyon) s.t.
Aldo Bettini (isole) s.t.
Julien Maitron (Le Globe) s.t.
Jules Deloffre (Nil-Supra) s.t.
Ernest Paul (isole) @ 8min
Eugène Christophe (isole) @ 20min

1909 Tour de France Complete Final General CLassification

The Story of the 1909 Tour de France

This excerpt is from "The Story of the Tour de France", Volume 1 If you enjoy it we hope you will consider purchasing the book, either print or electronic. The Amazon link here will make either purchase easy.

Always the adaptable opportunist, Desgrange abandoned his 1908 requirement that all the riders compete on Tour-supplied frames. The teams went back to riding their own bikes. Still, the bikes of all riders were stamped by the Tour organization to make sure that the riders started and finished with the same machine. Desgrange never let go of this plan to take the riders off their own factory produced and sponsored bikes. In 20 years we'll see this idea come back with a vengeance.


	Big François Faber, Petit-Breton's heir apparent.

Petit-Breton said that he was passing the baton to his teammate François Faber. The 1909 Tour would be a worthy test for the big man from Luxembourg. Faber was nicknamed "The Giant of Colombes" for the suburb of Paris that he then called home. For the time, he was truly a large man, being about 6 feet (1.86 meters) tall and weighing 200 pounds (91 kilos). Even today, that is huge for a man in the business of winning Grand Tours.

Alcyon had finally put together a first-class team, hiring Faber away from Peugeot. The Alcyon manager, Alphonse Baugé, who earlier had been an inexperienced neophyte, was now a knowledgeable and wily veteran.

The peloton for the start of the 1909 edition was big. 150 riders decided to take their chances. If they had known what they were in for, they might have reconsidered. The riders were forced to compete, even by the standards of the time, under appalling conditions.

Cyrille Van Houwaert won the first of the 14 stages. Then Faber went on a tear. He performed the unequaled feat of winning 5 stages in a row.

The second stage, 398 kilometers from Roubaix to Metz, was ridden entirely in freezing rain. Faber, all power and strength, rode the second half of that stage solo in a magnificent breakaway. He was now leading in the General Classification.

Stage 3 went over the Ballon d'Alsace. Faber took the snow and ice-covered mountain by himself and finished a half hour in front of Gustave Garrigou. The next rider, Eugene Christophe, came in an hour later.

Stage 4 was another epic Faber adventure. Coming into Lyon, the finish town, he broke his chain. The most famous picture of Faber shows him pushing his bike at a full run on the wet streets of Lyon, his right hand holding his bike by the bars, no chain to be seen. The crowd is thick and deep, all bundled up against the strange cold weather of that July. Even with all this trouble, he still beat the next rider by 10 minutes.


Another talented member of the 1909 Alcyon squad, Paul Duboc finished 4th in the General Classification.

The man was unbelievable. The next stage, which took in the Col de Porte, was held in wind so strong that Faber was twice knocked off his bike. He even had a horse knock him down and kick his bike away. Still Faber remounted and pressed on and again won alone.

He wasn't done. Stage 6, with the Col Bayard and Côte de Laffrey didn't slow down the huge Faber. Yet again he won alone.

The General Classification after stage 6:

1. François Faber: 7 Points

2. Gustave Garrigou: 24 points

3. Cyrille Van Houwaert: 32 points

Faber had some bad luck in the next few stages, but won again in stage 10. The weather during that first week had been so bad that after 7 stages 77 riders abandoned.

The final stage saw another rider with a broken chain run with his bike for a victory. Jean Alavoine got his crippled bike across the line first for the 13th Alcyon stage victory out of a possible 14. Alcyon took the first 5 places in the final stage and the first 5 places in the final General Classification. Their dominance was more complete than Peugeot's in the 1908 Tour. Faber's victory is also notable in that the stages he won were the hardest and run in the worst weather.


His chain broken, the famous picture of Faber running for the finish line in the rain in stage 4.

The Final 1909 Tour de France General Classification:

1. François Faber (Alcyon): 37 points

2. Gustave Garrigou (Alcyon): 57 points

3. Jean Alavoine (Alcyon): 66 points

4. Paul Duboc (Alcyon): 70 points

5. Cyrille Van Houwaert (Alcyon): 92 points

6. Ernest Paul (Isolé or independent and Faber's half-brother): 95 Points



A couple of pictures from the end of the 1909 Tour. Above, 3rd-place Jean Alavoine and winner Faber. Below, a smiling Faber surrounded by racing fans.

A few postscripts to the 1909 Tour:

It is thought that the 1909 Tour was raced in the coldest weather ever.

François Faber, being a citizen of Luxembourg, was the first foreigner to win the Tour.

François Faber was every bit the hero his race fans thought he was. In World War One the powerful giant died, shot in the back while carrying a wounded comrade back to the French lines through no man's land.