This global cycling monument is known by several names or epithets.
Let’s focus on its name, ‘The Hell of the North’.
Contrary to popular belief, this nickname initially comes from landscapes ravaged by the First World War.
Indeed, a few zealous Parisian journalists, curious to scout the route of the 1919 edition, discovered upon arrival a land devastated by the Great War.
Nothing was left standing, no trees, no roads, just landscapes of desolation and a traumatized population struggling to recover. It was journalist Victor Breyer who wrote: “The riders will truly cross the Hell of the North.”
This same journalist had written to the editor of VELO magazine and organizer of the first PARIS ROUBAIX in 1896, urging him to cancel this “diabolical project,” which he considered dangerous for the riders.
In fact, the day before the first edition, after scouting the first part of the route up to Amiens in a Panhard 6CV, and finishing the next day by bicycle to Roubaix, he ended up exhausted by the cobbled roads and the rain….
There’s no mystery, the legend was born.
At the origin of the invention of Paris-Roubaix, it’s important to understand that cycling races were not numerous and resembled what we would today call ultra-distance events (Bordeaux-Paris or Paris-Brest-Paris). Thus, Paris-Roubaix was a good “training” for tackling these long distances. This event was even described as “nervous” because it was completed in only 9 hours….
Thus, Paris-Roubaix has retained this qualifier, ‘Hell of the North,’ relating to the horror of war, which has been transposed to the race itself, no less brutal and interminable.
Why? The extreme difficulty of the race now comes from the 60 km of cobbled sectors out of the 260 km course. The irregularity of these roads imposes a permanent challenge of pure strength, balance, bike handling, and strategy on cyclists, as one must ride at the front in single file to have a chance of finishing.
But winning is another difficulty entirely, as you need to conserve the necessary strength to face the final kilometers against the wind, sometimes rain, and the onset of hunger pangs.
Finally, the velodrome calls upon your qualities as a puncher-bluffer-sprinter at the end of the effort. Anyone who has never ridden on a track cannot understand.
We remember the first, rarely the second, and even less the third…
