Roger Walkowiak

Roger Walkowiak (2 March 1927 to 6 February 2017) was a French road racing cyclist who turned professional in 1950 and rode until 1960. He grew up in Montluçon in central France, the son of a father who had emigrated from Lublin in Poland, and began racing after the Second World War because he could not find work as a metalworker. He is remembered for winning the 1956 Tour de France as a late replacement on the Nord-Est-Centre regional team, taking the yellow jersey on stage 7 and again on stage 18 without winning a single stage of the race. The victory was poorly received at the time, and his name became a French byword for succeeding unexpectedly or without panache. He later rode the 1957 Vuelta a España, won a stage there, retired to run a bar and went back to factory work in Montluçon.