1923: The Mystery of Lot 212 and a Tour de France Obsession

by Ned Boulting

The story of an obsession. When cycling commentator Ned Boulting bought a length of Pathé news film featuring a stage of the Tour de France from 1923 he set about learning everything he could about it - taking him on an intriguing journey that encompasses travelogue, history and detective story.

In the autumn of 2020 Ned Boulting (ITV head cycling commentator and Tour de France obsessive) bought a length of Pathé news film from a London auction house. All he knew was it was film from the Tour de France, a long time ago. Once restored it became clear it was a short sequence of shots from stage 4 of the 1923 Tour de France. No longer than 2.5 minutes long, it featured half a dozen sequences, including a lone rider crossing a bridge.

Ned set about learning everything he could about the sequence – studying each frame, face and building – until he had squeezed the meaning from it. It sets him off in fascinating directions, encompassing travelogue, history, mystery story – to explain, to go deeper into this moment in time, captured on his little film.

Join him as he explores the history of cycling and France just five years after WWI – meeting characters like Henri Pélissier, who won the Tour that year but who would within the decade be shot dead by his wife's lover. And Theophile Beeckman – the lone rider on the bridge.

Genres: Nonfiction, Cycling, History, Sports, Audiobook, Biography

288 pages, Paperback

Published March 25, 2025

Reviews

[Christopher Whalen · Rating 4 out of 5]

I really enjoyed this book, the result of Ned Boulting’s lockdown obsession with a 2.5-minute film of stage 4 of the 1923 Tour de France. It’s a brilliant piece of historical detective work to unpick each scene of the film, identify the riders and race officials, and paint a broad canvas of the cultural and historical context. My main problem with the book, and the reason I didn’t rate it 5 stars, is that there’s too much Ned in it. This is not necessarily the author’s fault; he could have done with a more stringent editor to cut the slightly cringey scenes. Yes, it’s a personal story of what happens to him; but the book is at its best when going on tangents into what was going on in France in 1923 and sketching the biographies of the riders.

[Matt · Rating 5 out of 5]

Chapeau. As we say in cycling circles. A story about how an obscure piece of Tour de France film from 1923 shapes Boulting’s covid years and shines a certain light on what was happening a hundred years and ago and what is happening now. In one sense it’s a very random book and in another a fascinating insight into the world a century back. He nicely mixes cycling ephemera with both historical and contemporary geo politics. The book is something of a surprise but delightful for that. I’ve always enjoyed Boulting’s previous books and his podcasts and commentary. Another triumph, Ned.

[Lance · Rating 3 out of 5]

Review: During the height of the COVID pandemic in 2020, author Ned Boulting bought a spool of film that featured a clip from stage 4 of the 1923 Tour de France. This book could be considered a dedication to the obsession that Boulting soon had to find out as much information as he could about the people in the film clip and the events surrounding that race.

Boulting does a yeoman’s job of research, interviews (as best he could during lockdowns) and writing in order to gain this material. The book itself covers a lot of material and that is both good and bad. The bad: Boulting diverges a lot from the film and the race and writes much about French and German history and important figures. It is interesting, but it takes a lot of attention away from the main topic – the race and the stage 4 winner, Theofile Beekman.

Beekman is the lone rider who crosses a bridge (which had its own history, covered by Boulting, of course) on the film and he won stages but the overall winner was Henri Pélissier. The stories of Beekman, Pelissier and others in the race were really interesting as were the writings about the Tour itself. Had the book concentrated on the riders, the pieces in the film and the riders, it would have been a much better read.

I wish to thank Bloomsbury Sport for providing a copy of the book in exchange for an honest review.

[Tara · Rating 5 out of 5]

The rating disclaimer here is that i am a huge Ned Boulting fan, so I was probably always going to enjoy anything he writes or creates. The meandering between bike race, world history post -WWI, and the modern mystery to track down clues and connections worked for me.

[Clara · Rating 4 out of 5]

4/5

[Alex Rogers · Rating 2 out of 5]

Ned’s fascinating find IS fascinating and a genius lens through which to view a period in the world which has been lost to pre-war assumptions. The tale of a talented forgotten rider is brought to life in its magnificent ending. However, I cannot ignore the needless details about process, covid furniture, and the riders’ distant relatives which are jarring. Leave out more of the behind the scenes and Ned’s at his shining best.

[Blasr · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5* Not sure how to classify the book. Much of it is history. I did not like (nor approve of) the sections where NB invents dialogue for the historical figures. Felt a tad dis-jointed. Good to be able to access and see the film.

[Steve Chilton · Rating 4 out of 5]

Just love the story building that Boulting has done from the finding of a short length of Pathe film at an auction. He detaile his detailed and diligent research, which illuminates an aspect of the history of cycling, being centred around the 1923 Tour de France. An absorbing read.

[Mike Finch · Rating 3 out of 5]

I found it interesting but it's over detailed in the most obsessive way possible. Some of the related material is so spurious it's ridiculous. It was hard going but I admired it rather than enjoyed it I think!

[Matt Barker · Rating 4 out of 5]

A very interesting read if you’re into cycling and history. It’s the story of Boulting’s research into a short reel of film he acquired during lockdown. He interweaves his research into the film with the historical events of the time.

[Justin Rickwood · Rating 4 out of 5]

Thoroughly enjoyable read—bravo Ned Boulting—but did take me two attempts to get past the first 30 pages. It came alive when Ned started to weave other socio-political and significant historical references circa 1923.

More a detective story than a cycling love story (see Ned’s other books). Gutted I missed the 1923 book tour.

[Darren · Rating 5 out of 5]

I have never read any of Ned's work before but as a cycling fan I have certainly heard his commentary and so I know if anyone could produce a volume like this based off just a 2 1/2 minute film then Ned can!

There are a lot of diversions and tangents and yet it all fits together, some links more tenuous than others. However that is not an issue. This book explores the wider situation in 1923, a period of history I have to admit to not knowing very well at all. The political and military situation of the times is brought to life with ease. This book is not just a history of the Tour De France but also of the geopolitical situation that shapes it.

Overall I found this book fascinating. There are so many little facts and situations that I would never have known about and yet now I want to explore more.

[Richard Pentelow · Rating 2 out of 5]

a bit self indulgent for my taste.

Not sure why I bought this, but it does have good reviews. Just not for me I fear, I skimmed to the end, knowing there would not really be one.

[Malcolm · Rating 3 out of 5]

Some time in the middle of the year when many of us stayed home – 2020 – avoiding a virus, an old friend of Ned Boulting’s got in touch to say he’d seen an item at auction that might be interesting. A couple of weeks later, Boulting found himself the owner of 2½ minutes of Pathé newsreel of an old cycle race (the seller thought the 1930s). All he had to go on for where and when was a map at the beginning of the film showing a route from Brest to Les Sables d’Orlonne, 412 km away and still in Brittany, and an intertitle naming the leader as the peloton crossed a bridge as Beeckman. This engaging and entertaining book is the story of Boulting’s trip down the rabbit hole investigating the what, where, and when of his newly acquired reel.

To put this in context, Boulting is a cycling commentator from British TV, regularly covering the Tour de France and other road races, and like many commentators a cycling fan with a penchant for the sport’s history. He is not an historian – or at least not professionally – and while many will read this book as an exploration of and uncovering of forgotten professional cyclist (and it is), I’m inclined to read it an exploration of an historian’s practice. Starting with his two knowns – the route cycled and a name – Boulting unpacks quite quickly that this the 4th stage of the 1923 Tour de France, and that Beeckman is the Belgian cyclist Théophile Beeckman, a good but never top of the pile cyclist.

Along the way Boulting, as we all do, finds that much of the story of this piece of film, and Beeckman – this becomes a quest for Beeckman – is filled in by snippets, provided by strangers, and marked by red herrings that take him nowhere. There is the helpful archivist in Beeckman’s home town in Belgium, the local historian in Brittany, the staff member at the Pathé archive, the woman who sells old maps, the film restorer, and the guy who owns the second hand book shop. These are the people we, as historians, rely on to provide unconnected pieces of information that we weave into the stories we tell, hoping against the odds to build a convincing narrative of an incomplete past.

But this story is also quite recent. It’s quite conceivable that there are still people alive who knew a young man competing in the Tour de France in 1923 and who died in the late 1950s. Much to his regret, Boulting doesn’t find any such person, but he does find Beeckman’s granddaughter (albeit, born a few years after he died). In doing so he also finds out that the family, let alone the town, know very little about him – so in a sense this is also a tale of the restoration to memory of someone who in his day merited civic parades to celebrate his sporting successes.

Alongside this Beeckman narrative, though, the real joy of this, for me, is Boulting’s diversions as he is led astray by news stories in the local papers, serendipitous events that coincide, tangential moments that open up vaguely cycling related ideas and items. These sit alongside biographies of other participants in the 1923 Tour, race organisers, the stories of the Tour’s development, and its place in a wider cycling culture in France and Belgium. Boulting is also adept at political contextualisation, so in places there are sharp and insightful observations on post-war Franco-German and Belgian-German relations, the continuing effects of the war in France, the path of the Tour through sites that had not yet recovered from their state as battle fields only a few years earlier – torn up landscape and rubble strewn villages. These detours and diversions, these trips down detours and paths that circle around the race’s route put the 1923 Tour into a rich context, and remind me the even a 2½ minute newsreel can provoke questions well beyond the obvious.

I’m not sure many others will get my ‘insights to the historian’s craft’, and it is admittedly idiosyncratic – but there’s a lot going on here, not so much of it about cycling, but I suspect enough to appeal to the cycling aficionado as well as to the historian’s methods geek. All in all, a thoroughly enjoyable summer read.

[Nigel Kotani · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is in its own genre. During lockdown the author, one of the presenters on ITV's coverage of the Tour de France, bought a mystery lot in an online auction comprising film footage of an early Tour de France. He was able to get the footage digitised, and then set about trying to identify what was in the footage, a task which turned into an obsessive attempt to solve a mystery.

One of the great features of the book is that it contains a QR code which, on scanning, takes the reader to the footage itself. The ability to watch the film itself adds more dynamism and accessibility to the book than one might imagine.

At first, he didn't even know which edition of the Tour he was watching because, although the stage route itself is shown on a graphic in the footage, the early Tours apparently all followed the same route. He eventually identified the year as 1923, as per the title of the book, and then started identifying individual people on the film, including that year's winner, Henri Pellissier, his brother Francis, the winner of the following two editions, Ottavio Bottecchia, and the man who founded the Tour itself, Henri Desgrange, which the author believes to be the only known footage of him.

The book is very much a book produced by Covid, in that without the forced inactivity produced by lockdown, it is inconceivable that the author would have found the time to investigate the footage as deeply as he did. By way of example as to the extent of his detective work, he emailed a cycling club based in the region to ask if they could identify a piece of road depicted in the film. I found this aspect of the book highly relatable. We all developed our own form of escapism during lockdown: mine involved me driving trucks all over Europe in a video game; Ned Boulting's led to this book.

Given that it centres on a mere two and a half minutes of silent footage, the book is surprisingly diverse. It goes into a lot of detail of the early Tours de France and the early days of cycle racing generally, including a number of the main characters. It is hard for me, as a cycling fan, to know whether that would be of interest to someone who isn't a fan, but I suspect that most would find it more interesting than they might have expected.

A book solely about cycling would probably not have worked, and the middle section of the book goes into wider themes of the history of the day in France. They include sections on the arts, such as the growth of Dadaism and the Paris inter-war scene, including Ernest Hemmingway, Gertrude Stein and Sarah Bernhardt. It also includes a section on the political climate of the time, which opened my eyes to one of facets of Nazism that appealed to the German public. While I was aware that the harshness of the reparations from World War I had been one of the factors that led to World War II, I hadn't previously realised that the French and Belgians had simply marched into the Ruhr and started confiscating coal to take back to their countries. The big appeal of the 1923 (pre Mein Kampf) version of Hitler is that he opposed this occupation.

The final section of the book is particularly satisfying. The footage centres on a Belgian cyclist, Theophile Beeckman, who launched a forlorn attack during the stage, which was caught within about 20km. Beeckman won a couple of stages of the Tour and finished three times in the top ten. In cycling terms, that constitutes a successful career, though Beeckman seems to have largely been forgotten. In the final section of the book, the author goes to Beeckman's home town to try and find some living relatives and to try and promote wider local knowledge of his success as a cyclist.

This is a book which anyone would find charming and entertaining. On top of that, people with an interest in cycle racing will find it fascinating too.

[Zeb Kantrowitz · Rating 4 out of 5]

Ned Boulting is a life long cycling enthusiast, who in 2020 acquired a piece of Pathe film from the 1923 Tour de France. Because the route was laid out at the beginning of the 2.5 minute snippet he knew where the film was shot. But that was it, he didn't know what year it was shot and never found out how it ended up being offered on an online site for sale.

The film was so fragile that it couldn't be watched until Ned could find someone who could copy it without destroying the old nitrate film. Once he obtained a copy he was able to tell that the film was of the fourth stage of the 1923 Tour de France. But this was an obscure time of the Tour and there was little documentation with which to compare the film.

Boulting spends the years of the Covid shut down tracking down information about the 1923 Tour but also the identity of the riders who are on the film. These were some of the stars of the post-WW1 stars and some of the second level riders. Boulting spends a good part of the time trying to track down information of the man who leads the race at that time of the film.

The rider Theophile Beekman (he had multiple spellings of his name) was just one of those riders who never won the race but did win a couple of stages and finished at respectable times. But there is little information about his life. and that is what makes Ned's obsession so interesting.

[Harry · Rating 2 out of 5]

A pretty poor attempt at Tour history, riddled with errors. Did the 1923 Tourists really climb Hautacam? Did Victor Breyer really nickname Paris-Roubaix the Hell of the North? Was Lucien Buysse really the first domestique? No, no and no again, and no to the many other errors Boulting passes on as fact.

Boulting's research into Théophile Beckmann feels more than a little half-hearted with the all the important discoveries done by others. Mostly it feels like Boulting has tried to craft an image of Beckmann he wants to believe in, a quiet man who spoke with his legs, like the best Tour heroes should. And he ends up not being able to answer the really big question he unearths, such as why Beckmann's move to Alcyon collapsed and he ended up back in a Griffon jersey after having gotten married. And what was the clothing infraction Beckmann was fined for, the wrong sock height?

Most of it is really a self-indulgent lockdown diary, Boulting telling us how horrible the whole thing was, as if he was the only one to endure it.

[Rob · Rating 1 out of 5]

I read 45% but ultimately couldn't finish. When I found myself reading angrily and copy-editing by highlighting passages that were meaningless or not additive, I decided to stop.

I love an academic mystery, but Ned Boulting couldn't pull it off, and ultimately comes off as having too much time on his hands and too subject matter. He namechecks a lot of famous literati, and I began to suspect he was doing this because he was aware his premise was too thin to sustain an entire book. Boulting explores to excessive length every possible connection to this piece of film he collected at auction, and it doesn't make the book better.

The writing exists between memoir, history and fiction, because he surmises what characters were thinking. It's full of meaningless additions like, to take two at random, "Hemingway watched what happened next," and "The crown would soon be there." I'm becoming bored again already.

As a mystery, it fails to sustain interest; as history, it is too loosely organized and too full of conjecture to be convincing.

[C J Busquets · Rating 5 out of 5]

In order to acclaim any book addressing a particular topic, either fiction or non-fiction, it is common to say that anyone will like it, even if you are not interested in the theme. I usually think that this is a bit exagerated. However, I honestly consider that people who does not even know who is Eddy Merckx can enjoy this magnificent narration.
I admit that I am a true cycling fanatic. Nonetheless, this book goes behind the story of the characters of a forgotten short film and dives into the historical context: wars, culture and even some science. But what makes this piece special is how it ends up becoming a family matter that makes you feel like part of it.
All in all, this non-fiction book that saves a talented rider from oblivion is one of the best I have ever read.

[Richard W · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was good. Ned Boulting bids on a mysterious piece of cycling footage in the covid lockdowns and starts on an obsessive quest which takes in a forgotten cyclist, interwar Europe, the early tour de France. It's esoteric at times but I related a lot to Ned's need for answers and the pleasure in investigating a mystery.
It's at its best I think when it talks about this slither of the past giving genuine human connection. So as well as having lots of conversations with bemused archivists, Ned speaks to people connected to the riders and the places in the reel. Those passages speak of a genuine feeling of warmth and interest in forgotten pieces of cycling history.
Here's to our hero Theo Beeckman!

[Kevin Cross · Rating 3 out of 5]

Ned Boulting is one of Britain's best Sports broadcasters and a superb commentator on ITV's cycling coverage. I am a massive sports fan with a deep interest in sporting history so I was excited when this book was chosen at random out of my rather loo large book pile. Therefore I am sorry to admit I found 1923 somewhat underwhelming. Although there is some really interesting facts in the book and some fascinating stories unearthed about the protagonists on Ned's film for some reason I just found myself a bit disengaged from the whole process. I wouldn't be put off reading another of Ned's books and this is probably a fine and interesting book but I just didn't take to it like I hoped I would.

[John Alpha · Rating 1 out of 5]

Self indulgent lock down project that is a painful read. Some interesting parts to it regarding the Pelissiers and other riders of the time. The film clip on which it is based is a fascinating glimpse to a forgotten period. Unfortunately, the book doesn't stick to cycling and becomes a strange mix of European history and Ned annoying people in person and by email. If you want to read an excellent cycling book which goes back to grass roots of the sport try 1 more Kilometre and were in the showers by Tim Hilton. It's far superior and very readable.

This book was seriously boring to the point where I skipped some of it and didn't bother reading to the end. Dismal.

[Sam · Rating 4 out of 5]

A very interesting premise that is actually made all the better by its deliberate lack of focus, being a meandering and all-encompassing journal of discovery. I found the various different digressions to be fascinating and the connections drawn between past and present to be eerily moving. The only thing I didn’t like were the speculative passages written in the voice of the protagonist. It seems a weird and slightly unsettling idea to research so much about someone that you feel comfortable assuming their voice and thoughts. Perhaps the book is just as much about the toll the pandemic took too though!

[Paul · Rating 4 out of 5]

A book written amid Covid lockdowns, when Ned Boulting bought an old film of a cycling race on a whim, and then dug deep to investigate who, when and where he was watching, and what else was happening at the time. Anyone who has watched hours fly by when going down a rabbit hole of family tree research will recognise the addictive joy of uncovering forgotten stories. The juxtaposition of the two worlds a century apart, and the tying together of assorted historical loose threads makes for an entertaining read, not just for cycling enthusiasts.

[Bill Robotham · Rating 1 out of 5]

As others have said, this is a very dull, self indulgent, slightly moaning book. Yes, Ned lockdown was terrible but not as terrible as this book. I mean seriously did you think that spinning out a tiny fraction of film could possibly fill, or deserve, an entire book? The answer is no if you are wondering Ned. I managed to make it half way through before giving up on it.

Very disappointed as I'd understood that Ned Boulting's writing was always supposed to be good.

If possible I would have given this a negative review rating.......

[Jack Austin · Rating 1 out of 5]

I think this was really awful.
Received as a thoughtful gift so struggled through but by gosh, it was hard work.
Ned struggles to convey why any of this matters, it is a vanity project and even as the keenest cyclist, you can’t help by being irritated at its pandemic-era twang of pointless obsession to a topic.
I found the style also very difficult to enjoy, written like a top set GCSE paper, not natural but ticking all the boxes that don’t need to be actually ticked when delivering enjoyable prose

[Adam · Rating 3 out of 5]

The ultimate example of if you are a good enough writer, you can write a book about anything (in this case, a 2mins30sec film from 1923).

Ned Boulting is a fantastic writer and his enthusiasm for researching and telling the story of a forgotten rider leaps off the page. That said, I did find myself drifting at parts, and occasionally it felt like Ned was including lots of historical tangents to make up the pages (albeit very well written ones).

An enjoyable read but you probably need to be a cycling fan to get the most from it.

[Sid Smallman · Rating 4 out of 5]

A quite fascinating account of the laborious investigation of the detail surrounding an obscure forgotten cyclist deserving of his place from obscurity to at least some recognition of his accomplishments. There are a good many diversions from the main narrative that in themselves add to the total picture. If, like me, you admire the tremendous feats of those early cyclists you will undoubtedly enjoy this…

[Sean Lee · Rating 5 out of 5]

Brilliant. Loved this. Basically examines how one man's obsession with a tiny forgotten snippet of newsreel footage ended with him fleshing out the life of a forgotten Belgian cyclist. But not only that, Ned Boulting also reconstructs the time period, the events and the personalities of the era to provide a vivid backdrop to the between-the-wars editions of the Tour de France. Wonderfully written. Recommended to all readers, not just cycling or sports fans.

[Mrs Liza Barber · Rating 5 out of 5]

Much more than the bike race

I am a big fan of road cycle racing and a long time admirer of the author as a broadcaster. This book not only uncovers some little known sporting history (boxing as well as cycling) it also gives an overview of post world war one Europe that is informative and entertaining. It has certainly interested me to the extent that I want to find out more, particularly about the occupation of Germany.