domestique

German professional cyclist Udo Bölts (right) riding as a domestique for Jan Ullrich, who went on to win the 1997 Tour de France.

Borrowed from French domestique (“domestic servant, maid”),[1] from domestique (“domestic”, adjective), from Latin domesticus (“of the house, domestic; familiar; native”), from domus (“home, house; place of one's birth or residence, native country”). Doublet of domestic.

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ˌdə(ʊ)mɛˈstiːk/, /ˌdɒ-/

• Audio (Southern England)

  (file)

• (General American) IPA^(key): /dəˌmɛˈstik/
• Rhymes: -iːk
• Hyphenation: do‧mes‧tique

domestique (plural domestiques)

1. (cycle racing) A cyclist on a cycle racing team whose role is to assist the team's designated leaders (for example, by riding in front of them to create a slipstream, or to set the pace), even if at the expense of their own individual performance.

   Synonym: water carrier

   • 2003 July 24, Matt Majendie, “Domestique Bliss”, in BBC Sport‎, archived from the original on 26 October 2021:

     In a recent poll [Sean] Yates was voted one of the top-10 domestiques of all time, a crucial cog to any leader's Tour ambitions. […] To many casual observers, the role of domestique is not a particularly rewarding one. Yates begs to differ.

   • 2006 July 15, “Tour de France 2006: Life is rarely dull among the bottle-carriers and peloton pushers”, in Alan Rusbridger, editor, The Guardian‎, London: Guardian News & Media, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 15 March 2016:

     […] Bram De Groot, a domestique with the Dutch Rabobank team, drops out the back, one arm in the air. The team car responds instantly, swinging out of the line of support vehicles behind the peloton and racing, klaxon sounding, up to De Groot. The window opens and a hand emerges with a bidon (plastic drinks bottle). De Groot places it in his back pocket and the hand emerges with another. This one goes down the back of his shirt, and it is joined by five more. Then off he sprints to deliver them to thirsty team-mates. De Groot is one of the domestiques and this is their lot. They continually drop off, collecting bidons and sprinting back into the peloton with grotesquely bulging shirts.

• pacemaker

• domestique on Wikipedia.Wikipedia
• glossary of cycling on Wikipedia.Wikipedia

• semi-quoted, semiquoted

Learned borrowing from Latin domesticus (“of the house, domestic; familiar; native”), from domus (“home, house; place of one's birth or residence, native country”).

• IPA^(key): /dɔ.mɛs.tik/

• Audio

  (file)

domestique (plural domestiques)

1. domestic

   Antonym: sauvage

domestique m or f by sense (plural domestiques)

1. servant; maid
2. cleaner, housemaid

   Synonym: employé de maison

• → English: domestique
• → German: Domestik

• “domestique” in the Dictionnaire de l’Académie françoise, 4th Edition (1762).
• “domestique” in the Dictionnaire de l’Académie française, 8th Edition (1932–35).
• “domestique” in the Dictionnaire de l’Académie française, 9th Edition (1992-).
• “domestique” in Émile Littré, Dictionnaire de la langue française, 1872–1877.
• “domestique”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012.

domestique

1. inflection of domesticar:
   1. first/third-person singular present subjunctive
   2. third-person singular imperative

domestique

1. inflection of domesticar:
   1. first/third-person singular present subjunctive
   2. third-person singular imperative

• IPA^(key): /domesˈtike/ [d̪o.mesˈt̪i.ke]
• Rhymes: -ike
• Syllabification: do‧mes‧ti‧que

domestique

1. inflection of domesticar:
   1. first/third-person singular present subjunctive
   2. third-person singular imperative