Saturday, July 6, 2013

L'Histoire de René Pottier

It was in 1905 that, for the first time, mountain climbing was included in a professional bicycle race. It was the Tour de France, and the mountain was the beautiful Ballon d'Alsace.

In the lead, happy like a Greek god, was René Pottier. He was first, and everybody knew he was going to win, because once the mountain was tamed nothing else could have stopped him.

He would certainly have won, if at the last moment he hadn't fallen into Acquaspazio.

You see my friends, on that mountain there's a pass called Col du Ballon d'Alsace where dimensional residues of Acquaspazio have been accumulating for centuries. The activity of these unknown forces is very arbitrary, and fundamentally random.


That year, the ugly Hippolyte Aucouturier was to win the Tour de France instead.





No one ever heard of René again, but, since 1905, he travels through Acquaspazio on his bicycle, and has visited almost all of it.

Oh! And if you do encounter René and his bike, he will still ask you: "Sorry, do you know the way for Paris?