One man has already died, many suffer greatly, in this, the severest of all bicycle races.
The struggle to win the Tour de France is like an ancient Greek myth. A Hercules on wheels, each contestant must endure rigours and survive perils. And, unlike Hercules, he must be a human billboard. With his shorts proclaiming a breakfast food and his jersey a cigarette, he must pedal for 24 days and 2,300 miles over cobbles, tracks and motorways, labouring up mountains and hurtling down, always threatened by exhaustion, by collision, and by punctures that can send him slithering into ravines or under following cars. Jack Pizzey followed this year's Tour and its one British rider, as 150 grim contestants and the gaudy publicity cavalcade exploded into sleepy villages, through ripening vineyards, past crowded beaches and over snow-capped Alps to the Champs Elysees, victory and glory. It's a beautiful trip - as long as you're not on a bike.
Film cameraman ALAN STEVENS Sound recordist RON CRABB Editor PETER COWER
Producer ROBERT TONER