Beautiful loser: Tour honors ‘Poupou’
Long before France won the soccer World Cup in 1998, French sports fans loved nothing more than a magnificent loser. On Tuesday, the Tour de France honored just such a man – Raymond Poulidor, one of France's most popular sportsmen, who became known as the eternal runner-up – when the ninth stage started from the 68-year-old's home village of St Leonard de Noblat. Forty years ago, Poulidor beat Jacques Anquetil in an epic stage battle to the top of the Puy de Dome that split the population watching on France's only television channel and the many fans who had gathered on the extinct