Peking to Paris
Encyclopedia
The Peking to Paris motor race was a race held in 1907 for automobiles between Peking
Beijing
Beijing , also known as Peking , is the capital of the People's Republic of China and one of the most populous cities in the world, with a population of 19,612,368 as of 2010. The city is the country's political, cultural, and educational center, and home to the headquarters for most of China's...

 (now Beijing), China
China
Chinese civilization may refer to:* China for more general discussion of the country.* Chinese culture* Greater China, the transnational community of ethnic Chinese.* History of China* Sinosphere, the area historically affected by Chinese culture...

 and Paris
Paris
Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...

, France
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...

, a distance of 9,317 miles or 14,994 km.

The idea for the race came from a challenge published in the Paris newspaper Le Matin
Le Matin (France)
Le Matin was a French daily newspaper created in 1883 and discontinued in 1944.Le Matin was launched on the initiative of Chamberlain & Co, a group of American financiers, in 1883, on the model of the British daily The Morning News. The direction of the project was entrusted to the French...

 on 31 January 1907, that
"What needs to be proved today is that as long as a man has a car, he can do anything and go anywhere. Is there anyone who will undertake to travel this summer from Peking to Paris by automobile?"

Teams

There were forty entrants in the race, but only five teams ended up going ahead with shipping the cars to Peking. The race was held despite the race committee cancelling the race.
  • Itala, Italian
    Italy
    Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...

    , 7 litre engine, finished 1st, driven by Prince Scipione Borghese and Ettore Guizzardi
  • Spyker
    Spyker
    Spyker was a Dutch car manufacturer, started in 1880 by coachbuilders Jacobus and Hendrik-Jan Spijker, but to be able to market the brand better in foreign countries, in 1903 the 'ij' was changed into 'y'...

    , Dutch
    Netherlands
    The Netherlands is a constituent country of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, located mainly in North-West Europe and with several islands in the Caribbean. Mainland Netherlands borders the North Sea to the north and west, Belgium to the south, and Germany to the east, and shares maritime borders...

    , finished 2nd, driven by Charles Goddard with Jean du Taillis
  • Contal
    Mototri Contal
    The Mototri Contal was a French automobile manufactured from 1907 until 1908. More elaborate than most three-wheelers of its era, it featured Roi-des-Belges bodywork on its more expensive models; the company also manufactured delivery tricycles. Perhaps the high point of the firm's existence was...

    , French
    France
    The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...

    , did not finish, 3 wheeler Cyclecar
    Cyclecar
    Cyclecars were small, generally inexpensive cars manufactured mainly between 1910 and the late 1920s.-General description:Cyclecars were propelled by single cylinder, V-twin or more rarely four cylinder engines, often air cooled. Sometimes these had been originally used in motorcycles and other...

    , driven by Auguste Pons
  • DeDion 1
    De Dion-Bouton
    De Dion-Bouton was a French automobile manufacturer and railcar manufacturer operating from 1883 to 1932. The company was founded by the Marquis Jules-Albert de Dion, Georges Bouton and his brother-in-law Charles Trépardoux....

    , French, finished 3rd, driven by Georges Cormier
  • DeDion 2
    De Dion-Bouton
    De Dion-Bouton was a French automobile manufacturer and railcar manufacturer operating from 1883 to 1932. The company was founded by the Marquis Jules-Albert de Dion, Georges Bouton and his brother-in-law Charles Trépardoux....

    , French, finished 4th, driven by Victor Collignon

The Race

There were no rules in the race, except that the first car to Paris would win the prize of a magnum of Mumm
Mumm
G. H. Mumm & Cie, situated in Reims in northern France, is one of the largest Champagne producers worldwide.- History :It was founded by three brothers, Jacobus, Gottlieb and Phillip Mumm, German winemakers from the Rhine valley and G. Heuser and Friedrich Giesler on March 1, 1827 as P. A. Mumm...

 champagne. The race went without any assistance through country where there were no roads or road-maps. For the race, camels carrying fuel left Peking and set up at stations along the route to give fuel to the racers. The race followed a telegraph route so that the race was well covered in newspapers at the time. Each car had one journalist as a passenger, with the journalists sending stories from the telegraph stations regularly through the race.

It was held during a time when cars were fairly new, and went through remote areas of Asia
Asia
Asia is the world's largest and most populous continent, located primarily in the eastern and northern hemispheres. It covers 8.7% of the Earth's total surface area and with approximately 3.879 billion people, it hosts 60% of the world's current human population...

 where people were not familiar with motor travel. The route between Peking and Lake Baikal
Lake Baikal
Lake Baikal is the world's oldest at 30 million years old and deepest lake with an average depth of 744.4 metres.Located in the south of the Russian region of Siberia, between Irkutsk Oblast to the northwest and the Buryat Republic to the southeast, it is the most voluminous freshwater lake in the...

 had only previously been attempted on horseback. The race was won by Italian Prince Scipione Borghese of the Borghese
Borghese
Borghese is the surname of a family of Italian noble and papal background, originating as the Borghese or Borghesi in Siena, where they came to prominence in the 13th century holding offices under the commune. The head of the family, Marcantonio, moved to Rome in the 16th century and there,...

 family, accompanied by the journalist Luigi Barzini, Sr.
Luigi Barzini, Sr.
Luigi Barzini Sr was an Italian journalist, war correspondent and fascist politician.-Biography:Born at Orvieto, Barzini started his career as a journalist in 1898, working for minor Italian magazines and was almost immediately noticed and hired by Luigi Albertini, then director of the Corriere...

  He was confident and had even taken a detour from Moscow
Moscow
Moscow is the capital, the most populous city, and the most populous federal subject of Russia. The city is a major political, economic, cultural, scientific, religious, financial, educational, and transportation centre of Russia and the continent...

 to St Petersburg for a dinner which was held for the team, and afterwards headed back to Moscow and rejoined the race. The event was not intended to be a race or competition, but quickly became one due to its pioneering nature and the technical superiority of the Italians' car, a 7433 cc 35/45 hp model Itala.

Second in the race was Charles Goddard in the Spyker, who had no money and had to ask others for petrol, and borrowed his car for the race. He was arrested for fraud near the end of the race. Some of the other cars had difficulties in going up ravines, across mud, quicksand and bridges across rivers not designed for vehicles. The Contal cyclecar bogged down in the Gobi desert
Gobi Desert
The Gobi is a large desert region in Asia. It covers parts of northern and northwestern China, and of southern Mongolia. The desert basins of the Gobi are bounded by the Altai Mountains and the grasslands and steppes of Mongolia on the north, by the Hexi Corridor and Tibetan Plateau to the...

 and was not recovered, with the crew lucky to be found alive by locals. Barzini published the book Peking to Paris in 1908, filled with hundreds of pictures.

Re-enactments

Several races have been held to re-enact the event, including the Great Auto Race of 1908
1908 New York to Paris Race
The 1908 New York to Paris Race was an automobile competition consisting of drivers attempting to travel from New York to Paris. This was a notable challenge given the state of automobile technology and road infrastructure at the time. Only three of six contestants completed the course...

 which raced from New York west to Paris (by sea for part of the way). During most of the twentieth century other re-enactments could not be held because of the establishment of the USSR after the 1917 Russian Revolution
Russian Revolution of 1917
The Russian Revolution is the collective term for a series of revolutions in Russia in 1917, which destroyed the Tsarist autocracy and led to the creation of the Soviet Union. The Tsar was deposed and replaced by a provisional government in the first revolution of February 1917...

 until glasnost
Glasnost
Glasnost was the policy of maximal publicity, openness, and transparency in the activities of all government institutions in the Soviet Union, together with freedom of information, introduced by Mikhail Gorbachev in the second half of the 1980s...

 in the early 1990s racers were again allowed on this race.

In 1990 the London To Peking Motor Challenge
London To Peking Motor Challenge
The London to Peking Motor Challenge was a one-time car rally organized by the Jules Verne Society in the Spring of 1990.As the name implied, the rally consisted of a drive from London, UK to Peking, China...

 was held, which raced in the opposite direction as the original race, from London to Beijing. In 1997 there was "The Second Peking to Paris Motor Challenge" made from 94 vintage cars which went a more southern route through Tibet, India, Pakistan, Iran, Turkey, Greece and Italy, which was won by British Phil Surtees and John Bayliss driving a 1943 Willys Jeep. Rosie Thomas, a British novelist, took part in this and funded her team's car by writing a fascinating book detailing her gruelling but exhilarating rally experience ('Border Crossing', isbn 1860498116 ).

On April 18, 2005 a 1973 Fiat 500
Fiat 500
The Fiat 500 is a car produced by the Fiat company of Italy between 1957 and 1975, with limited production of the Fiat 500 K estate continuing until 1977. The car was designed by Dante Giacosa....

 linked Bari
Bari
Bari is the capital city of the province of Bari and of the Apulia region, on the Adriatic Sea, in Italy. It is the second most important economic centre of mainland Southern Italy after Naples, and is well known as a port and university city, as well as the city of Saint Nicholas...

, Italy
Italy
Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...

, to Beijing in a 16000 kilometres (9,942 mi) journey across the whole Russia
Russia
Russia or , officially known as both Russia and the Russian Federation , is a country in northern Eurasia. It is a federal semi-presidential republic, comprising 83 federal subjects...

 and passing through Vladivostok
Vladivostok
The city is located in the southern extremity of Muravyov-Amursky Peninsula, which is about 30 km long and approximately 12 km wide.The highest point is Mount Kholodilnik, the height of which is 257 m...

. The route was partially similar to the original one. Driven for 100 days by Danilo Elia and Fabrizio Bonserio, the old and tiny car was followed along its journey by newspapers and television from all over the world. After the long journey Elia wrote a book entitled La bizzarra impresa (ISBN 88-7480-088-6), in Italian, also available in German by the National Geographic Deutschland (Echt Abgefahren, ISBN 978-3-89405-834-0).

On May 15, 2005 five cars led by Lang Kidby departed Beijing for Paris retracing the original route with very similar cars to the originals; a 1907 Spyker
Spyker
Spyker was a Dutch car manufacturer, started in 1880 by coachbuilders Jacobus and Hendrik-Jan Spijker, but to be able to market the brand better in foreign countries, in 1903 the 'ij' was changed into 'y'...

, a 1907 and a 1912 De Dion-Bouton
De Dion-Bouton
De Dion-Bouton was a French automobile manufacturer and railcar manufacturer operating from 1883 to 1932. The company was founded by the Marquis Jules-Albert de Dion, Georges Bouton and his brother-in-law Charles Trépardoux....

, a 1907 Itala and a Contal Cycle-car replica. This journey was televised by the Australian Broadcasting Corporation
Australian Broadcasting Corporation
The Australian Broadcasting Corporation, commonly referred to as "the ABC" , is Australia's national public broadcaster...

 in a four-part documentary series entitled Peking to Paris. The show was hosted by Warren Brown
Warren Brown (cartoonist)
Warren Brown is an Australian cartoonist and television presenter.He has been an editorial newspaper cartoonist since 1986. He is currently cartoonist for the Sydney's Daily Telegraph, for which he also writes a weekly motoring column....

, one of two drivers on the Itala and a cartoonist with Sydney
Sydney
Sydney is the most populous city in Australia and the state capital of New South Wales. Sydney is located on Australia's south-east coast of the Tasman Sea. As of June 2010, the greater metropolitan area had an approximate population of 4.6 million people...

 newspaper The Daily Telegraph
The Daily Telegraph
The Daily Telegraph is a daily morning broadsheet newspaper distributed throughout the United Kingdom and internationally. The newspaper was founded by Arthur B...

. The Australian crew (driving westward) ran across the Italian Fiat 500 (driving eastward) in a non-planned meeting, somewhere around Krasnojarsk, Russia.

In 2007 the Endurance Rally Association staged a rally to celebrate the centenary of the original 1907 race. Unlike the 1997 event, also staged by Philip Young, which took a southerly route, this event followed more closely the route taken by Prince Borghese in 1907 in the winning Itala. From Beijing competitors went north to the Mongolian border at Zamyn Uud, and as with his original route, north to Ulaan Bataar. The route then went west across Mongolia, crossing the Russian border at Tsagaannuur through Siberia to Moscow, on to St Petersberg (where Prince Borghese attended “a great banqet”) and then through the Baltic States to finish in Paris.
126 veteran, vintage and classic cars took part, the oldest being a 1903 Mercedes. The major challenge of the rally proved to be Mongolia and the Gobi desert with no conventional roads, merely rutted tracks at best. Despite this, no fewer than 106 crossed the finishing line. The rally covered 10,000 miles in 36 days.

External links

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