This is one of my important  photo shooting projects I did while I was in Paris.

 The  anniversary  of 100 years of the Tour de France  (1903- 2003) was celebrated  on 21 July 2003 in Paris. This year  was dedicated to the prestigious event to commemorate the first Tour de France cycling Tour  which has started July 1903.

 For marking 100 years the final day lap to Paris on 21 July 2003, the Tour  had been assigned as the exact   ending lap to the finish as  they did on July 1903. So  departing  the last lap  was from  "Paris- Ville d'Avray" town to the  final end to the heart of Paris. 

It so happened  I was living in this same town. Ville d'Avray.

(https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ville-d%27Avray.) .

This town It is situated in the suburb of  Paris Hauts-de-Seine and as I happened to be there, I felt strongly I had  an obligation and a privilege  to document the event. I think it is because I was  already a great fan of the tour de France.

Then  I tried to prepare  myself for the event,then in advance  went to the "Town Hall", met the authority  and made a request to have a special  press pass, to reach the Tour and access to the " Tour de France Village" ( in Vill D'Avray ) where all the riders prepare  before the Tour . In this village there are lot of things going on.On every  stage of the race the best place for media and photographers is the Village of the tour. That place  gives   more entertaining  media works give into the Tour.

This Pass is reserved for the professionals  who have more privilege from the Tour.

 So my request was refused as I am not a qualified  photo professional and I was advised not to photograph any riders as I might be needing  to have  written royalty  agreements form them to do so. That was  the assistance and the advise they offered me.

Did I get disappointmant? Yes I did. I completely missed the opportunity to enter into the Village of the Tour and document it. But the rest was a great fun and I made my plans.

So as usually I got into the street to document the event on the day of the Tour, move around Paris, all day to hunt my images. So finally I was able to tell a story of this fabulous event that took place form Serve Ville d"Avery to Paris. So I had seen the tour two times th as from the starting point to the end in Paris.

 As this project  goes on a long series of images that it took me about 7 hours or more of work and lot and lot of walking through a massive several hundred thousands of excited crowd.  

I used two  analog cameras lot of films. Also I  minimised the final processing to keep the history as much as natural in vintage aspect to let the history to talk within every image.

 And last not least, this was one of my points test myself to see my limits and capability. 

Every photo grapher will say, they never  go into a boot of another to shoot Tour de France cycling in Paris, because they find lot of photos of shoulders and heads if they do it without a Press pass.

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THANK YOU FOR WATCHING.