A Century of Cycling Brevets

On the 11th September 2021, the cycling community will have the opportunity to mark the centenary of riding Brevets. Brevet, which is the French word for test, describes a ride with individual pacing, while this style is better known as “Randonneuring” in its motherland and several other countries. Following the first Audax-titled ride from Rome to Naples in 1897, group rides had already been flourishing whenever peacetime allowed it and by 1921, over 4500 French cyclists had earned their Audax. In 1920, due to a split between Henri Desgrange, who had set up the Audax rules (and also the Tour de France) and the Audax Club Parisien (ACP), the ACP developed their own rules, which allowed for individual pacing. The first event organised in the new allure libre or free pacing style was a 200 km ride on Sunday, 11th September 1921 in Paris. The peloton group started at 5 in the morning at the Porte Maillot and the final control closed at 9 in the evening. Of the 77 registered cyclists, apparently all managed to complete the course within the 16 hour time limit, including a married couple and a one-armed veteran. The fastest finishers were Messieurs Lavenarde and Girardot in 10:19 h (Source: L’écho des Sports, 13.9.1921). Originally limited to 200 km, the first 300 km Brevet was introduced in the next year, followed by increasingly longer distances in the years to come. From 1927, club sections in different parts of France were beginning to organise local brevets as well, and in 1976 international brevets were homologised by the ACP. The mandatory group riding style remains popular in France and other countries, where it is known as Audax or Euraudax, and is organised by the Union des Audax Francais (UAF), which also supervises other endurance sports. As British cycling tends to lean stronger towards individual time trials than the more group-ride oriented French tradition, the free-pacing style caught on in the UK, where it has become synonymous with Audax since. In 2019, over 3500 events were homologised worldwide in 2019, before COVID struck. However, in order to celebrate the centenary of the first brevets, more than 200 low-risk outdoor rides will be (hopefully) started in the weekend of the 11th September and an arrivee rewarded with a special medal.