While the Olympics are on, I recalled this brilliant obituary of Raymond Poulidor.
Poulidor, a French cyclist, stood on the podium of the Tour de France 8 times but never was on the top step. In 14 tours he lost by a lot of margin.
However, he was the most popular cyclist.
"The more Tours he lost, the more the crowds liked him and the more he earned. At the height of his celebrity, in the mid 1970s, almost half of respondents to one poll made him their first choice as a dinner guest. In 1974 alone more than 4,000 articles were written about him, besides university theses and sociological studies."
Why?
You will find answers in the attached article.
