View source for Roger Walkowiak

{{short description|French cyclist}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=February 2017}}
{{Infobox cyclist
| name = Roger Walkowiak
| image = Portrait de Roger Walkowiak (2008).jpg
| caption = Walkowiak in 2008
| fullname = Roger Walkowiak
| nickname = Walko
| birth_date = {{Birth date|df=yes|1927|3|2}}
| birth_place = [[Montluçon]], [[French Third Republic|France]]
| death_date = {{death date and age|2017|2|6|1927|3|2|df=y}}
| death_place = [[Vichy]], France
| height = 
| weight = 
| discipline = Road
| role = Rider
| ridertype = All-rounder
| amateuryears1 = 
| amateurteam1 = 
| proyears1 = 1951–1952
| proteam1 = Gitane–Hutchinson
| proyears2 = 1953–1954
| proteam2 = {{UCI team code|Peugeot|1953}}
| proyears3 = 1955
| proteam3 = Gitane–Hutchinson
| proyears4 = 1956
| proteam4 = {{UCI team code|Saint-Raphael|1956}}
| proyears5 = 1957–1959
| proteam5 = {{UCI team code|Peugeot|1957}}
| proyears6 = 1960
| proteam6 = {{UCI team code|Saint-Raphael|1960}}
| majorwins = '''[[Grand Tour (cycling)|Grand Tours]]'''
:'''[[Tour de France]]'''
::[[General classification in the Tour de France|General classification]] ([[1956 Tour de France|1956]])
:'''[[Vuelta a España]]'''
::2 individual stages ([[1956 Vuelta a España|1956]], [[1957 Vuelta a España|1957]])
}}
'''Roger Walkowiak''' ({{IPA|fr|ʁɔ.ʒe wal.kov.jak|pron}}; 2 March 1927 – 6 February 2017) was a French [[road bicycle racer]] who won the [[1956 Tour de France]]. He was a professional rider from 1950 until 1960. He died on 6 February 2017 at the age of 89.<ref>http://www.ouest-france.fr/tour-de-france/tour-de-france-roger-walkowiak-vainqueur-en-1956-est-decede-4785940 "Tour de France. Roger Walkowiak, vainqueur en 1956, est décédé", 7 February 2017.</ref>

==Early life==
Walkowiak grew up in [[Montluçon]] in central [[France]]. His father emigrated to France from [[Lublin]] in [[Poland]]. He began racing after [[World War II]] as he was unable to find a job as a metalworker.<ref>{{cite web |last1=Ryan |first1=Barry |title=1956 Tour de France winner Roger Walkowiak dies aged 89 |url=https://www.cyclingnews.com/news/1956-tour-de-france-winner-roger-walkowiak-dies-aged-89/ |website=Cyclingnews |access-date=19 July 2024 |date=7 February 2017}}</ref>

==The 1956 Tour de France==
From 1930 the [[Tour de France]] had been contested by national and regional teams. Roger Walkowiak was recruited for the French regional ''Nord-Est-Centre'' team, representing the North-east and Centre of France, despite coming from Montluçon in the South-West. He was the only rider available at late notice to replace an original team member, [[Gilbert Bauvin]], who had been promoted to France's main team.

Walkowiak escaped on the 7th stage from [[Lorient]] to [[Angers]] in a group of 31 riders that won that day by over 18 minutes. The advantage was enough to give him the [[yellow jersey]] of the overall race lead. At this stage the race's stars did not consider this 'insignificant' rider to be a risk.

Walkowiak lost the jersey to [[Gerrit Voorting]] at the end of stage 10 which took some of the pressure off his shoulders. In the [[Pyrenees]] Belgium's [[Jan Adriaensens]] took the lead. At [[Aix-en-Provence]] (stage 15) Dutchman [[Wout Wagtmans]] took the jersey, but Walkowiak was still well placed.

On the Alpine stage 18 ([[Torino]]–[[Grenoble]]), the climbing specialist [[Charly Gaul]] ([[Luxembourg]]), who had lost a lot of time in the flat stages, attacked to try and win the [[King of the Mountains|King of the Mountains competition]] (which he eventually did, beating [[Federico Bahamontes]]). Gaul's attack split the field; Wagtmans lost 16 minutes and Walkowiak took back the yellow jersey after losing only 8 minutes to Gaul on the day.

For the last four stages, Walkowiak defended his lead, reaching the finish at the [[Parc des Princes]] on 28 July just over a minute ahead of Gilbert Bauvin. The race was won in a then record speed of 36.268&nbsp;km/h.

[[File:NL-HaNA 2.24.01.04 0 907-9148.jpg|upright=1.35|thumb|Walkowiak winner at the [[Parc des Princes]]]]

Walkowiak's win was poorly received by the professional peloton and the public. "The applause sounded like a lamentation", the organiser, [[Jacques Goddet]], wrote in ''[[L'Équipe]]''. The crowd was disappointed that the race had been won by an unknown and not by the rising star [[Jacques Anquetil]], who had decided against riding. Walkowiak became the second rider to win the Tour without winning on any of the individual day's stages that make up the race.

Nevertheless, Jacques Goddet always considered Walkowiak his favourite winner, calling him an all-rounder who had used his legs to win and his head to secure his winning position. France, however, remained unimpressed and for many years, Walkowiak's name passed into the language, so that do something "à la Walko" meant to succeed unexpectedly or without panache.

That reaction depressed Walkowiak. He rode the Tour the following year, but slipped from top of the field to almost the bottom. He rode the Tour of Spain, the [[Vuelta a España]], in 1957 and won a stage, raced a further two years and then retired to run a bar in the area from which he had left, as an unknown, to win the Tour de France. When even his customers teased him about winning the Tour, he lost confidence still more and went back to working on a lathe in the car factory in Montluçon that had employed him as a young man.

It took many years to persuade Walkowiak that there was merit in what he had done and, though he lived quietly in south-west France, he did talk about the day he became the unknown who won the world's greatest cycling race. After the death of [[Ferdi Kübler]] on 29 December 2016, Walkowiak was for a short while the oldest Tour de France winner still alive. Following Walkowiak's death in February 2017, the oldest living Tour winner was [[Federico Bahamontes]], who won the Tour in 1959.<ref>http://www.ouest-france.fr/tour-de-france/tour-de-france-roger-walkowiak-vainqueur-en-1956-est-decede-4785940 "Tour de France. Roger Walkowiak, vainqueur en 1956, est décédé", 7 February 2017.</ref>

==Career achievements==
===Major results===
{{div col}}
;1951
:3rd Tour de Dordogne
;1952
:2nd Tour de l'Ouest 
:3rd G.P de Vals-les-Bains
;1953
:2nd Paris-Côte d'Azur
;1954
:3rd Tour de l'Ouest
;1955
:2nd [[1955 Critérium du Dauphiné Libéré|Critérium du Dauphiné Libéré]]
;1956
:1st [[File:Jersey yellow.svg|20px]] Overall [[1956 Tour de France|Tour de France]]
:1st Stage 13 [[1956 Vuelta a España|Vuelta a España]]
:3rd Circuit du Cher
;1957
:1st Stage 8 [[1957 Vuelta a España|Vuelta a España]]
;1958
:2nd Boucles du Bas-Limousin
:3rd Tour du Sud-Est
;1960
:3rd Tour de l'Aude
:3rd Circuit d'Auvergne
{{div col end}}

=== Grand Tour results timeline ===
{| class="wikitable"
|- 
|
! scope="col" | 1951
! scope="col" | 1952
! scope="col" | 1953
! scope="col" | 1954
! scope="col" | 1955
! scope="col" | 1956
! scope="col" | 1957
! scope="col" | 1958
|-
! scope="row" | [[Giro d'Italia]]
|align="center" |DNE
|align="center" |DNE
|align="center" |DNE
|align="center" |DNE
|align="center" |DNE
|align="center" |DNE
|align="center" |DNE
|align="center" |DNE
|-
|align="right" |Stages won
|align="center" | —
|align="center" | —
|align="center" | —
|align="center" | —
|align="center" | —
|align="center" | —
|align="center" | —
|align="center" | —
|-
|align="right" |Mountains classification
|align="center" | —
|align="center" | —
|align="center" | —
|align="center" | —
|align="center" | —
|align="center" | —
|align="center" | —
|align="center" | —
|-
|align="right" |Points classification
|align="center" style="color:#888888;"| N/A 
|align="center" style="color:#888888;"| N/A 
|align="center" style="color:#888888;"| N/A 
|align="center" style="color:#888888;"| N/A 
|align="center" style="color:#888888;"| N/A 
|align="center" style="color:#888888;"| N/A 
|align="center" style="color:#888888;"| N/A 
|align="center" style="color:#888888;"| N/A
|-
! scope="row" | [[Tour de France]]
|align="center" style="background:#DDDDDD;"| [[1951 Tour de France|57]]
|align="center" | DNE
|align="center" style="background:#DDDDDD;"| [[1953 Tour de France|47]]
|align="center" | DNE
|align="center" style="background:#AAAAAA;"| [[1955 Tour de France|DNF-11]]
|align="center" style="background:#00ff00;"| [[1956 Tour de France|1]]
|align="center" style="background:#AAAAAA;"| [[1957 Tour de France|DNF-18]]
|align="center" style="background:#DDDDDD;"| [[1958 Tour de France|75]]
|-
|align="right" |Stages won
|align="center"| 0
|align="center"| —
|align="center"| 0
|align="center"| —
|align="center"| 0
|align="center"| 0
|align="center"| 0
|align="center"| 0
|-
|align="right" |Mountains classification
|align="center"| NR
|align="center"| —
|align="center"| NR
|align="center"| —
|align="center"| NR
|align="center" style="background:#EEE8AA;"| 6
|align="center"| NR
|align="center"| NR
|-
|align="right" |Points classification
|align="center" style="color:#888888;"| N/A 
|align="center" style="color:#888888;"| N/A 
|align="center"| NR
|align="center"| —
|align="center"| NR
|align="center" style="background:#DDDDDD;"| 16
|align="center"| NR
|align="center"| NR
|-
! scope="row" | [[Vuelta a España]]
|rowspan=4 align="center" style="color:#888888;"| N/A 
|rowspan=4 align="center" style="color:#888888;"| N/A 
|rowspan=4 align="center" style="color:#888888;"| N/A 
|align="center"| DNE
|align="center"| DNE
|align="center" style="background:#AAAAAA;"| DNF
|align="center" style="background:#DDDDDD;"| 15
|align="center"| DNE
|-
|align="right" |Stages won
|align="center"| —
|align="center"| —
|align="center"| 1
|align="center"| 1
|align="center"| —
|-
|align="right" |Mountains classification
|align="center" style="color:#888888;"| N/A 
|align="center" style="color:#888888;"| N/A 
|align="center" style="color:#888888;"| N/A 
|align="center" style="color:#888888;"| N/A 
|align="center" style="color:#888888;"| N/A
|-
|align="right" |Points classification
|align="center" style="color:#888888;"| N/A 
|align="center" style="color:#888888;"| N/A 
|align="center" style="color:#888888;"| N/A 
|align="center" style="color:#888888;"| N/A 
|align="center" style="color:#888888;"| N/A
|}
{{grandtourlegend}}

==Tour de France==
*1951 – 57th
*1953 – 47th
*1956 – 1st
*1958 – 75th

==Bibliography==
* Woodland, L., ''Yellow Jersey Companion to the Tour De France'', Yellow Jersey Press, London 2003 {{ISBN|0-224-06318-9}}
* ''The Tour De France: The Official Centennial 1903 – 2003'', Weidenfeld Nicolson, London 2004 {{ISBN|1-84188-239-9}}

== References ==
{{Reflist}}

==External links==
*[http://www.memoire-du-cyclisme.net/palmares/walkowiak_roger.php Palmares at memoire-du-cyclisme.net {{in lang|fr}}]
*{{Cycling Archives|7231}}
*[http://www.pezcyclingnews.com/?pg=fullstory&id=3723 The story of the 1956 tour and the epilogue at pezcyclingnews.com]

{{Tour de France Yellow Jersey}}
{{Authority control}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Walkowiak, Roger}}
[[Category:1927 births]]
[[Category:2017 deaths]]
[[Category:Sportspeople from Montluçon]]
[[Category:Cyclists from Allier]]
[[Category:French male cyclists]]
[[Category:French people of Polish descent]]
[[Category:Tour de France winners]]
[[Category:French Vuelta a España stage winners]]
[[Category:20th-century French sportsmen]]