The Millau 100 km: the race that Serge Cottereau brought back from Biel in 1972
This Saturday, September 26, 2026, as on every last Saturday of September for more than half a century, hundreds of runners will set off from Millau for one hundred kilometers of asphalt, limestone plateaus, and hills. Behind the oldest of France's 100 km races, there is one man, a Swiss race, and a small magazine born in Basel a few months earlier: Spiridon.
June 1972: A 1500m runner discovers Biel
In the early 1970s, road running in France was of almost no interest to anyone. The athletics federation swore only by the track; calendars were locked down and regulations were sometimes absurd: runners were forbidden from drinking before the 21st kilometer. Serge Cottereau, born in 1938 and based in Saint-Affrique, in Aveyron, was at the time a high-level middle-distance runner, specializing in the 1500m. Nothing destined him for ultrarunning.
In March 1972, he wrote to the letters-to-the-editor section of Le Miroir de l'Athlétisme, the magazine that then served as a mailbox for non-stadium running enthusiasts. That is where Noël Tamini, founder of Spiridon, spotted his name. In June, Cottereau crossed the border to run the 100 km of Biel, an event created in 1959. He finished third.
What he saw there struck him more than his ranking. Noël Tamini recounts it in his memoirs: in Biel, Cottereau saw "men, women, young people, and old people, all together, with no license required." For a Frenchman accustomed to federal prohibitions, it was a revelation. He returned to Aveyron with a few copies of the second issue of Spiridon, which had arrived just in time at a stand at the race.
September 17, 1972: 68 starters and a wager
Barely three months later, with Bernard Vidal, Serge Cottereau launched the first 100 km race in France in Millau. On September 17, 1972, 68 runners took the start; fewer than forty crossed the finish line. To avoid organizing through the night, this first edition was limited to 15 hours. Cottereau won it himself, and would do so again in 1973, 1974, and 1976.
That day, a student discovered Spiridon: Jean-Claude Moulin, nicknamed "Adolphe." A few months later, he was traveling through the Valais in a 2CV with his friends to meet Noël Tamini. In 1973, he created Marvejols-Mende with them, where they offered meals and lodging to runners who came from afar. An idea that would inspire, the following year, the great post-race meal of Sierre-Zinal. Millau is therefore not an isolated race. It is one of the first links in a chain of popular races that emerged in France in the wake of Spiridon.
A course that forgives nothing
The route has barely changed since its origins. The first 42.2 kilometers form a loop along the Tarn, on both banks, where a marathon is also run. Then comes the round trip to Saint-Affrique (57.8 km), with two severe climbs, including the famous Col de Tiergues, to be crossed in both directions. Since the opening of the Millau Viaduct in 2004, runners pass under this silhouette of steel suspended above the valley.
Regulars know it: you run Millau 15 to 25 minutes slower than a flat 100 km. And yet, the race has kept its nickname as the "Mecca of the 100 km." The men's record still belongs to Jean-Marc Bellocq, an eight-time winner, with a time of 6:28:31 set in 1990. Among women, Stéphanie Gicquel brought it to 8:21:33 in 2023.
The "cent bornard" spirit
If Millau has become a legend, it is not for its times. It is for its free style: walking is authorized, the time limit is generous (18 hours today, with arrivals possible until 2:00 a.m.), and you encounter as many first-time "cent bornards" (100km runners) as you do specialists. The organizers have remained faithful to the amateurism of the early days: no prize money is paid to the winners.
The success has never faltered. The 20th edition drew a record 3,800 starters. Today, about 1,600 participants and 800 volunteers bring each edition to life. Since 2025, the start is given at 8:00 a.m., and a 23 km course has been added to the marathon and the 100 km. Newcomers can thus get a taste of the atmosphere without committing to the entire day.
Serge Cottereau, still striding
The founder himself has never stopped running. In April 2024, at over 85 years old, Serge Cottereau set the best French performance for his age group in the 800m in Rodez. He also recounted the early days of his race in La belle histoire des 100 km de Millau (1982).
More than fifty years later, the race born from a trip to Biel and a handful of magazines tucked into a bag still bears the trace of that momentum: running far, together, at one's own pace, without asking for anything other than to arrive. This is exactly what Spiridon was defending in 1972.
Are you running Millau this Saturday, or are you thinking about it for next year? Our Archives Sportswear pieces draw on the graphic heritage of the magazine Spiridon, the same one Serge Cottereau brought back from Biel.
Sources: Memoirs of Noël Tamini, "Spiridon, histoire de la revue et du mouvement" (Spiridon archives); official website of the Millau 100 km; Radio Totem (April 2024).
