When the peloton rolled through Europe in the late 1950s, one shade of green became closely associated with French racing style: deep emerald with clean white sponsor bands, the trademark look of the Helyett professional cycling team. Wearing a Helyett-inspired vintage jersey today is a way to connect with a French brand that mixed performance, elegance and quiet ambition, and that supported some of the greatest riders of its era, including Jacques Anquetil.
From Operetta To Open Road
The Helyett marque took its name from “Miss Helyett”, an 1890s French operetta by Edmond Audran, giving the company a theatrical, character-based name rather than the surname of a founder. The firm, a French bicycle maker active from 1919, moved from sponsoring individual riders to running a full professional team in 1932. From the start, the brand combined racing ambition with a distinctive visual identity that made its green machines easy to spot.
By 1932 Helyett had established a professional road squad that would race at a high level until 1961, backed over the years by co-sponsors including tyre maker Hutchinson and, later, Leroux and others. Long before Anquetil arrived, the team already had major successes, such as René Vietto’s Paris–Nice victory in 1935.
The Green Knights: 1950s–Early 1960s
Helyett’s best-remembered period came in the second half of the 1950s, when extra sponsors turned the team into Helyett–Leroux–Hutchinson and, later, Helyett–Leroux–Fynsec–Hutchinson–ACBB. During these years the riders wore a characteristic green jersey with a white panel or band for the Helyett name and co-sponsors, a look that modern replica makers often reproduce as an emerald green body with crisp white bands.
In 1956 Helyett returned to the top level with a strong roster including Jacques Anquetil, Seamus (Shay) Elliott and Jean Stablinski, marking the beginning of its truly star-studded “green” era. By 1959 the Helyett–Leroux–Fynsec–Hutchinson–ACBB team was ranked among the world’s top professional teams, underlining how competitive this green‑jersey squad had become.
Jacques Anquetil: Legend In Green, Yellow In July
Jacques Anquetil’s rise to legend is tightly linked to Helyett, but with an important distinction between trade teams and Tour de France teams. Helyett was his professional trade team through much of the late 1950s and early 1960s, and he rode many of his greatest non-Tour races in their colours, helping to cement the association between Anquetil and the green jersey.
In 1957 Anquetil, then 23, won Paris–Nice, confirming himself as an elite stage racer, and he also won the Tour de France for the first time that year. However, the Tour at that time was contested by national and regional teams, not trade teams, so Anquetil took his 1957 Tour victory riding for the French national squad and, as race leader, in the yellow jersey of the Tour rather than a green Helyett trade‑team jersey. It is accurate to say that his Helyett years framed his breakthrough period, but not that he won the 1957 Tour “for Helyett” in team kit.
Records, Races And Helyett Machines
In 1956, before his first Tour win, Anquetil set a new world hour record at the Vigorelli velodrome in Milan, a performance closely associated with his relationship with Helyett. That hour record, along with repeated victories in the GP des Nations (1956, 1957, 1958, 1961) and stage-race wins like Paris–Nice, showcased both his time-trial talent and the competitiveness of the equipment he used.
Helyett’s top racing frames of the period, often referred to as Helyett Spéciale, were built to high contemporary standards, typically using lightweight steel tubing such as Reynolds 531 and French components including Simplex derailleurs. Exact specifications varied by year and rider, so any modern description of a single “canonical” build should be understood as a representative period-correct configuration rather than a one-to-one copy of Anquetil’s personal bikes.
An International, Decorated Squad
The Helyett team was never just about one rider. Over the decades it featured prominent names such as:
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René Vietto – winner of Paris–Nice 1935 and a Tour de France yellow jersey wearer before World War II.
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André Darrigade – world road race champion in 1959 and prolific Tour stage winner, associated with Helyett in its strong late-1950s roster.
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Jean Stablinski – French road champion in 1960 and later world champion (1962), who rode in Helyett colours around the turn of the 1960s.
Irish rider Seamus (Shay) Elliott also rode for Helyett from 1956, making him one of the earliest Irish professionals to succeed on major French teams, though precise “first ever” claims are hard to document conclusively. Together, this international mix of French, Belgian, Irish and other riders gave Helyett a tactical and stylistic depth that went beyond any single star.
Style, Substance And The Helyett Look
The Helyett jersey’s appeal lies in its balance of bold colour and simple design. The team wore a distinctive green kit with a white area for the Helyett name and co-sponsors, often accented by additional stripes or club colours when ACBB was involved, giving it a clean but instantly recognisable profile in the bunch.
Compared with some more cluttered or multi-coloured designs, the Helyett look was relatively restrained, emphasising a solid field of green with sharp, high-contrast branding. Modern replicas that use deep emerald green and crisp white bands capture the essence of this aesthetic, even if small details vary between eras and sponsors.
The End Of A Team, The Growth Of A Legend
The Helyett professional team ceased at the end of the 1961 season, when the sponsor’s support shifted and structures in the pro peloton evolved, with brand-based trade teams returning to the Tour from 1962 onward. Helyett‑branded sponsorship at the highest level effectively ended with the early 1960s, even though Anquetil continued his run of Tour victories with other sponsors.
The company itself was later merged into Gitane in 1966, folding Helyett’s heritage into another major French marque. Today, original Helyett frames—especially in the characteristic green—are sought after by collectors, and period-inspired jerseys remain popular among enthusiasts of classic cycling.
Discover the emerald green Helyett-Leroux cycling jersey from Jacques Anquetil’s breakthrough years with the Helyett team in the late 1950s. Premium replica inspired by the iconic 1957–1961 French trade-team kit; celebrate authentic mid‑century cycling style and history.