Merckx

rick_chasey

Armstrong should be higher up that list.

tailwindhome

What does it tell us (if anything) that none of the Top 25 are still currently riding?

knedlicky

frenchfighter wrote:

Tbh, they should take away Moser's Giro points and give them to Fignon.
Disgraceful story nicely told here at the bottom of the screen.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mKkbMuc_W5g

Those involved should hang their heads in shame for demonstrating a lack of morals. I thought it was just a heli in the final TT, but from that clip it shows many more instances of skullduggery.

The way the TT is reported in the video, and what Fignon supposedly said, make it sound like the helicopter created a headwind for Fignon, but I always thought the story was the other way around, i.e. if anything the heli provided Moser with a following wind.
Probably both could have been true had the two riders been close, but they weren't to begin with and actually got farther apart.

Fignon riding the mountains is good though (and the podium girls of those days!)

LangerDan

frenchfighter wrote:

Tbh, they should take away Moser's Giro points and give them to Fignon.

Disgraceful story nicely told here at the bottom of the screen.

If you're going to play that game, Fignon should hand over his points for winning the ITT Stage 22 of the '84 Tour to Kelly

frenchfighter

What is the story behind that?

andyp

There was an issue with the timing equipment and it was alleged that everyone was hand timed. Fignon beat Kelly by fractions of a second which, if it were hand timed, would be hard to do accurately.

LangerDan

Fignon and Kelly tied for time at the end of the TT. Supposedly, the organisers then claimed there was some issue with the automatic timing and then reverted to reviewing the hand timing - at the thousandth-of-a-second level - before the French organiser of a French race decided to give the nod to the French rider in the yellow jersey by something like 7/100 of a second. (How you can be that accurate with hand-timing, I'm not sure). I think Kelly commented later that he had been advised by others that he had won by a couple of tenths.

TheBigBean

Surely one big differences between Merckx and the current set of riders is that he wanted to win everything. For example, at the Giro last year, Contador could probably have won more stages and the mountains classification, but he effectively chose not to for various reasons. Merckx tried to win it all.

inkyfingers

So basically, Fignon's whole career was a fraud then?

frenchfighter

Damn, Fignon won 5 stages that Tour!

So just that stage was decided on the nod of the patriotic French?

LangerDan

inkyfingers wrote:

So basically, Fignon's whole career was a fraud then?

Pretty much, yeah. He probably lied about his saddles sores in '89 too

inkyfingers

LangerDan wrote:

inkyfingers wrote:

So basically, Fignon's whole career was a fraud then?

Pretty much, yeah. He probably lied about his saddles sores in '89 too

Yes, he needed the excuse having done sweet FA for the first half of that season and then being beaten in the Tour by some guy that looked like Luke Skywalker.

LangerDan

frenchfighter wrote:

Damn, Fignon won 5 stages that Tour!

So just that stage was decided on the nod of the patriotic French?

It was a great tour. One of the stages was 338km long and took over 9 hours. And Vincent Barteau doing a "Pereiro" on Stage 5 and holding onto to yellow for 11 stages

Oh and Kelly was in the top 10 on 16 separate stages , Fignon managed only a paltry 13 top 10s!

BTW - Fignon "won" six stages - Renault took the TTT as well.

frenchfighter

Wow.

Clements753

Back on topic,

Merckx, nobody will ever be like him. He rode at a time when people trained for themselves by themselves, he was a driven man made by a background of doubt. You can not compare then with now, what you can say is that he went further, harder than anyone else at that time and was just incredible.

I have met him once, they say never meet your hero's, he was fat after his racing days, he couldn't speak English but was over here promoting his newly launched bikes and I shook his hand and had a "moment".

A true giant in all meanings of the word, his stature, his look, his determination, for me the best.

Ron Stuart

For Merckx winning any bike race was an all consuming addiction but it turned into a disease that finally consumed him at a relatively early age (30). In1975 with a combination of injuries and the way Merckx had raced previously led to his demise but his nine years or so at the top produced some of the greatest displays of human sporting achievement ever seen and unlikely to be replicated.
It is speculated that had he raced earlier in a more calculated manner he may well have won more but that wouldn't be Eddy.
Eddy became unpopular in particular with the French because he kept winning :!:
Maybe a problem many others wouldn't mind and maybe it surfaced again with Armstrong :?:

inkyfingers

In Herbie Sykes book "Maglia Rosa" he talks about how the Italians ejected him from the 1969 Giro for "doping" when it was obvious that they were all up to it, but the Italians didn't like him dominating their race. When he came back and won it again in 1970 he had to tacitly agree not to take the wee wee and try and keep his winning margin to a respectable level to make it look like the race was a more open affair and to not embarrass the locals.

Being pretty much certain who is going to win doesn't make for exciting racing and Merckx suffered from that, in the same way that Armstrong did. You could see the beginnings of it last year as well, when Gilbert was winning classics for fun.

disgruntledgoat

Clements753 wrote:

I have met him once, they say never meet your hero's, he was fat after his racing days, he couldn't speak English but was over here promoting his newly launched bikes and I shook his hand and had a "moment".

My wife got me a framed, signed postcard of Merckx for my 30th, best present ever!

timoid.

disgruntledgoat wrote:

Clements753 wrote:

I have met him once, they say never meet your hero's, he was fat after his racing days, he couldn't speak English but was over here promoting his newly launched bikes and I shook his hand and had a "moment".

My wife got me a framed, signed postcard of Merckx for my 30th, best present ever!

My wife got me a limited edition framed signed picture commemerating his 525 victories. After my good bike its my favourite posession.

Looks like this:

frenchfighter

Here is one Merckx I'd ride.

andyp

Is it peurile sexist nonsense Friday again?

:roll:

Ron Stuart

Yep, it is. However she should loose those horrible grey socks and replace those wheels with something from the same era as the rest of the bike then I wouldn't care at all.

inkyfingers

frenchfighter wrote:

Here is one Merckx I'd ride.

She's got more muscular legs than me....

skylla

inkyfingers wrote:

frenchfighter wrote:

Here is one Merckx I'd ride.

She's got more muscular legs than me....

Nicole Whitburn

LangerDan

Ron Stuart wrote:

Yep, it is. However she should loose those horrible grey socks and replace those wheels with something from the same era as the rest of the bike then I wouldn't care at all.

The wheels are from the same era - they are alloy Campag Shamals from the 90s. ( The bike is probably one of the old Team Weinmann framesets from the early 90s)




Can't comment on the provenance of her grey socks....

Pross

I always like to think of Merckx as the old EBH.

Ron Stuart

LangerDan wrote:

Ron Stuart wrote:

Yep, it is. However she should loose those horrible grey socks and replace those wheels with something from the same era as the rest of the bike then I wouldn't care at all.

The wheels are from the same era - they are alloy Campag Shamals from the 90s. ( The bike is probably one of the old Team Weinmann framesets from the early 90s)




Can't comment on the provenance of her grey socks....

Stand corrected then, must be the lack of lighting as I thought they looked like carbon rims :oops:

Still think the socks look ropey though :P

ant41

I will undoubtedly be shouted down as a noob, or someone with limited historical cycling knowledge (true on possibly both counts), but given the fact that Merckx tested positive on at least one occasion (possibly more?) is not not a tad hypocritical to fete him as the greatest of all time whilst giving absolutely no quarter to those in the modern day who are similarly caught? I realise that the efficacy of modern doping outstrips that available 50 years ago, but a positive test is a positive test in any era. It just seems to me that history provides great blinkers . . . .

No_Ta_Doctor

ant41 wrote:

I will undoubtedly be shouted down as a noob, or someone with limited historical cycling knowledge (true on possibly both counts), but given the fact that Merckx tested positive on at least one occasion (possibly more?) is not not a tad hypocritical to fete him as the greatest of all time whilst giving absolutely no quarter to those in the modern day who are similarly caught? I realise that the efficacy of modern doping outstrips that available 50 years ago, but a positive test is a positive test in any era. It just seems to me that history provides great blinkers . . . .

It's a point that comes up fairly often, not just in relation to Merckx.

There are several ways it's usually dealt with:

1) Old doping was haphazard and inefficient, it gave good riders an edge, but not more. Modern doping can turn donkeys into thoroughbreds. In the old days the best riders still won, now an average rider can become all conquering.

2) It's all in the past now, no point in digging it up, we know the sport was also dirty then, but it was bending the rules not blatant cheating, in analogy with football: more like making the most out of a foul than scoring with your hand.

3) Cycling has always and will always be that way, so who cares?

4) We know, but we've got to draw a line somewhere, otherwise we have no cycling history left. From now on we wont let riders get away with it (now being when you draw the line - for me it's the advent of EPO, with a second line in 98 after Festina).

5) Eddy who? Lance is the greatest ever. (Frighteningly ignorant, but there are some people out there that still believe this....)

frenchfighter

Good reply.