1927 Tour de France

The 1927 Tour de France was the 21st edition, held from 19 June to 17 July over 24 stages and 5,398 km. Nicolas Frantz of Luxembourg, second the year before, won for the first time and would win again in 1928; the race also saw the debuts of two future French winners, André Leducq in fourth and Antonin Magne in sixth. Unhappy with the tactics of the long flat stages, Henri Desgrange introduced separate team starts on most of them, with teams setting off fifteen minutes apart and the touriste-routiers last, so that the stars could not sit in the bunch; the format did not make the race more exciting and was dropped after 1929.