Originally Posted by zonatandem

Been following the TdeF since the late 1930s (yes, am THAT old).
Remember when broters Romain and Sylvere Maas each won. Great riders like Coppi, Poulidor, Gaul, Bartali, Merckx, Hinault, LeMond.
Born/raised in Europe, we always got the news of the tour the next day in our newspaper and eventually on the radio.
Finally in the US it started to be covered on TV.
Ligget/Sherwin/Roll are great commentators. When you get more minutes of the same inane commercials than actual coverage, it does becomes very annoying.
Ever since teams are now commercially sponsored rather being regional/national teams it's become very $$$-driven.
Doping is now prevalent; used to see Belgian riders put beer and 2 raw eggs in their bidon (alu water bottles), put a raw steak in their shorts when they had saddle issues; no such thing as team cars and directeurs and soigneurs but riders did carry 2 spare sew-up tires criss-crossed over their shoulders and a real pump!
In the old days when a TdeF winner won, he was lucky to have enough money to open up a local bar; now they become rich/famous/millionaires.
Vive le Tour!
Pedal on!
Rudy/zonatandem