7.25.2005
End Of An Era
Well Dave beat me to it, but I had a post bubbling up for the last few weeks about the Tour dee France, and reading his has given me a starting point.
First congratulations go to Armstrong for the previously unthinkable 7th Tour victory. Regardless of his status as a cancer survivor, 7 Victories in the most grueling Bicycle race in the world is no mean feat. Gazzetta dello Sport, an Italian publication lavished praise on high, claiming that Merckx and Hinault (5 time winnwers each) had nothing on him.
With all due respect. That's a load of shit.
Don't get me wrong Armstrong, is the greatest rider in Tour de France history, but that feat alone does not unseat Eddy Mercx as the greatest professional cyclist ever. See, Armstrong has pretty much committed himself to one goal each of the last seven years - riding and winning the tour. In that pursuit Armstrong is unmatched. His place in history is solidified, and rightfully so.
But there is so much more to Pro Cycling than that one event. The pro season starts in earnest in the spring with the "Classics" one day races with names that most americans have never heard, aside from hearing them in passing during the animated ramblings of Paul Sherwin and Phil Ligget, the voices of the Tour for those in the U.S. That's a real shame. Races like Paris Roubaix, Fleche-Wellon, Liège-Bastogne-Liège, the Tour of Flanders - the list literally goes on and on. These are Huge races in theri own right, and many of the riders you see in the Tour actually race them. But not Lance. His singular obsession with the tour is his asterisk, if you will. Time was when top riders would ride a slate of classics, the Giro (Tour of Italy), The Tour, and the World Road Championships. These riders typically had a shot in every race they entered. Lance doesn't accept those distractions, and sped up an already developing trend for top riders to aim for very specific results. The days of a rider pulling a Stephe Roche and winning the Giro, the Tour, and the world Championships in the same season are over. Riders who wish to excell in the tour will likely take a page out of Armstrong's book, and train specifically for that event, cutting large swaths of races out of their calendar to train on the course. This is fine, and we will laud their efforts, and maybe even see another rider dominate multiple tours. But this age of specialists will only serve to cement the past masters as the true kings of the sport.
Eddy Merckx is still the gold standard in my book. His dominance in every aspect of road racing speaks for itself, and to also hold the hour record (an obscure but relevant record) in his career only shows how total his power on a bicycle was.
Lance is a hero to a new era in cycling, let's hope it's a good one.
go and tell me all about it
First congratulations go to Armstrong for the previously unthinkable 7th Tour victory. Regardless of his status as a cancer survivor, 7 Victories in the most grueling Bicycle race in the world is no mean feat. Gazzetta dello Sport, an Italian publication lavished praise on high, claiming that Merckx and Hinault (5 time winnwers each) had nothing on him.
With all due respect. That's a load of shit.
Don't get me wrong Armstrong, is the greatest rider in Tour de France history, but that feat alone does not unseat Eddy Mercx as the greatest professional cyclist ever. See, Armstrong has pretty much committed himself to one goal each of the last seven years - riding and winning the tour. In that pursuit Armstrong is unmatched. His place in history is solidified, and rightfully so.
But there is so much more to Pro Cycling than that one event. The pro season starts in earnest in the spring with the "Classics" one day races with names that most americans have never heard, aside from hearing them in passing during the animated ramblings of Paul Sherwin and Phil Ligget, the voices of the Tour for those in the U.S. That's a real shame. Races like Paris Roubaix, Fleche-Wellon, Liège-Bastogne-Liège, the Tour of Flanders - the list literally goes on and on. These are Huge races in theri own right, and many of the riders you see in the Tour actually race them. But not Lance. His singular obsession with the tour is his asterisk, if you will. Time was when top riders would ride a slate of classics, the Giro (Tour of Italy), The Tour, and the World Road Championships. These riders typically had a shot in every race they entered. Lance doesn't accept those distractions, and sped up an already developing trend for top riders to aim for very specific results. The days of a rider pulling a Stephe Roche and winning the Giro, the Tour, and the world Championships in the same season are over. Riders who wish to excell in the tour will likely take a page out of Armstrong's book, and train specifically for that event, cutting large swaths of races out of their calendar to train on the course. This is fine, and we will laud their efforts, and maybe even see another rider dominate multiple tours. But this age of specialists will only serve to cement the past masters as the true kings of the sport.
Eddy Merckx is still the gold standard in my book. His dominance in every aspect of road racing speaks for itself, and to also hold the hour record (an obscure but relevant record) in his career only shows how total his power on a bicycle was.
Lance is a hero to a new era in cycling, let's hope it's a good one.
go and tell me all about it
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