Emile Daems

Emile Daems
	Daems after winning stage 5 of the 1962 Tour de France
Personal information
Full name	Emile Daems
Born	4 April 1938; Genval, Belgium
Died	17 October 2024 (aged 86); Wavre, Belgium
Team information
Discipline	Road
Role	Rider
Rider type	Sprinter
Professional teams
1960–1962	Philco
1963–1965	Peugeot–BP–Englebert
1966	Solo–Superia
Major wins
	Grand Tours Tour de France 4 individual stages (1961, 1962) Giro d'Italia 2 individual stages (1960) Stage races Giro di Sardegna (1961) One-day races and Classics Giro di Lombardia (1960) Milan–San Remo (1962) Paris–Roubaix (1963) Giro dell'Appennino (1960) Giro del Ticino (1961, 1962)

Emile Daems (4 April 1938 – 17 October 2024) was a Belgian professional road racing cyclist.^[1]

He began his professional career in 1959. Daems, rather small in stature, was very adept at sprinting.

When Daems signed his first professional contract in 1960, it was with the small Italian team Philco. He immediately sprinted to two stage victories in the Giro d'Italia and also won the Tour of Lombardy.

In his neo-professional year, Daems was also included in the Belgian selection for the World Championship on the Sachsenring, Germany. But because Daems had won a criterium at the Sachsenring a few years earlier, he was the only Belgian to refuse to do work for team leader Rik Van Looy (who eventually became world champion). Daems finished 19th.^[2]

In the following years, the headstrong Daems would win the stage race Giro di Sardegna (1961), the Monuments Milan-San Remo (1962) and Paris-Roubaix (1963) and 4 stage victories in the Tour de France.^[3]

In the 1962 Tour de France, he distinguished himself with three victories, first in Saint-Malo and then in Aix-en-Provence, each time solo. But it was especially during the mountainous 18th stage, between Juan-les-Pins and Briançon, that he impressed. Although he was mainly a classics rider, he managed to join the leading group on the col de l'Izoard (last climb of the day), twenty seconds behind Federico Bahamontes. He finally won in Briançon in a sprint of seven riders, ahead of Bahamontes, Jacques Anquetil, Raymond Poulidor and the yellow jersey Joseph Planckaert.^[4]

After a short career of six years, aged 28, Daems quit racing and opened a restaurant. But cycling remained his great love.^[5]

Daems died in Wavre on 17 October 2024, at the age of 86.^[6]