Hi all,
William Fotheringham, author of
Put Me Back On My Bike emailed in and had this to say on the article. You can follow William on Twitter, right here
http://twitter.com/#!/willfoth
"With reference to “The Tom Simpson True Story” there are some points that need some clarification and as the author of the only fully researched biography of Simpson on the market, I can perhaps claim to speak on the issues surrounding Simpson’s death with a degree of authority.
The race facts in the initial piece show that Simpson was a hugely talented, charismatic and motivated cyclist whose physical make-up meant he was best suited to one-day Classic racing, something that only has a tangential relation to his death. It does, however, have some importance as to how we view him now.
As for the “truth” of what happened on July 13, 1967, the correspondent is inaccurate in certain areas. I have not seen any account from Colin Lewis that mentions “little sips” of brandy. The distance between the point where Simpson fell first and where he died appears to be 420 yards, according to a Daily Mail reporter who visited the mountain soon after Simpson’s death. Fans had placed piles of stones on the roadside marking the two points. Again, this is the most accurate report I have seen.
These are minor points. Most importantly, the correspondent states “What killed Simpson were the bad treatment that he received after the collapse.” It is true that the race doctor, Pierre Dumas, was not on the spot immediately, but with the field strung out as it was if Dumas had been right there within seconds that would have been exceptionally lucky. That is not the issue, however.
The substance of what the correspondent writes about Simpson’s treatment is found in a newspaper article written soon after his death by Dr Philippe Decourt which has been widely quoted. The purpose of the article appears to have been to blame Dr Dumas for Simpson’s death, although Decourt would appear to have an interest in blaming the doctor and exonerating the amphetamines, as he claimed to have invented the amphetamine Ortedrine.
The “facts” surrounding Simpson’s treatment are open to interpretation, but it’s worth looking at the alternative view, which is that Simpson died of heart failure due to heat exhaustion/heat stroke. This is not, it should be noted, a classic heart attack, but a condition in which the heart beats faster and faster as the body’s thermal regulation systems break down.
The conditions point to heat stroke: high air temperature - the report of a thermometer bursting at Chalet Renard at 54 degrees has not been confirmed, but it would have been in the 40s at least; dehydration – common in cyclists at the time due to the ban on taking bottles from team cars, but extreme in Simpson – his mechanic Harry Hall told me that Simpson’s skin was dry; use of amphetamines, which increases core body temperature, affects the body’s ability to regulate temperature, and will cause the mind to “over-ride” warning symptoms from the body.
Several of the symptoms shown by Simpson as he rode up the Ventoux were consistent with hyperthermia or heat stroke: confusion (observed by Lucien Aimar), nausea (Colin Lewis), dry skin (Harry Hall). The zig-zagging filmed by Harry Hall before Simpson keeled over is consistent as well, as co-ordination is lost in extreme cases of tachycardia, where the heart beats more rapidly and less efficiently than normal. Death takes place in two or three minutes after the heart enters a final phase: ventricular fibrillation, where the heart is moving but blood is not flowing around the body.
The chances are that Simpson was dead when Dumas got to him. There was a two to three minute window when he might perhaps have been saved after his final collapse, but only if he had fallen off in front of a hospital with an intensive care unit. Simpson was kept still for some time, so that point is irrelevant. Doctors I consulted during the writing of Put Me Back indicated that the adrenalin injection would have been of dubious value. As for keeping head higher than heart, that is only of relevance if the heart is working. The chances are that Simpson’s heart had stopped before the doctor got there. Dumas noted that there was no increase in blood pressure as he applied cardiac massage.
The question is important because of the attempts that have been made ever since Simpson’s death to muddy the waters. Raphael Geminiani and Jacques Anquetil both stated that Simpson’s death was not due to amphetamine use, without backing up their statements.
The life insurance story has been going the rounds for some time, and it was impossible to verify one way or the other in the writing of Put Me Back on my Bike. The argument is not whether Simpson died from amphetamine use as that cannot be verified: death from heat stroke can occur without amphetamines being used. However, the chances that the drug contributed to his death is strong. His use of amphetamines was well documented, according to numerous observers (Lewis, Jean Bobet, Gaston Plaud, Vin Denson, Brian Robinson, Alan Ramsbottom, Pierre Nedelec). Lewis, Bobet, Nedelec and Plaud all state he used large quantities of the drug. Lewis saw him buying the drug; Bobet saw the tablets on his tongue; the autopsy found amphetamines and alcohol in his body. Amphetamine would have contributed strongly to the condition that is most likely to have caused him to die but it was probably not the sole cause of death.
Where the correspondent is right is that Simpson should not be remembered solely for his tragic death. He took drugs but he did so at a very different point in the history of sport from the point at which we are now judging him. The practice had been illegal in France for just over two years when he died and it was unclear whether controls would actually be made to stick.
Drug taking is not inconsistent with being a charismatic, talented, motivated and highly likeable cyclist – just ask David Millar. "