A FAN’S PERSPECTIVE
riding to victory in a Pyrenean
stage to Guzet-Neige in the
1984 Tour de France. Later
that year we got the CBS
coverage of the 1986 duel
between Bernard Hinault and
Greg LeMond and I became
a fan for life.
I have watched some of
the world’s biggest one day
classics at the roadside but
I prefer to follow a race on
TV. You can see so much
more, and there is a lot to
see. I can watch a six-hour
race from the roll-out to the
podium presentation – as the
race travels through soaring
mountain-scapes or over
ancient, rutted and cobbled
tracks; under a blazing sun
on a four-lane highway in the
UAE; or lashed by rain, driven
sideways into the bunch,
forcing echelons in Brittany.
Road cycling’s arenas are
always spectacular. Whether
it be a five-star luxury ski
resort in Andalusia or a run-
down, red brick Walloon
village in the east of Belgium,
each has its place and
contributes to the race that
flows through it.
Cycling culture is so rich
and full of lore. Unwritten
rules, dos and don’ts which
need to be followed if you
are going to make your way
in the bunch. A rider can
sit on a break and sprint to
the win at the end. There is
nothing in the rules that says
he can’t, but he will only be
allowed to do that once. You
can ride dangerously and put
cyclists around you at risk
for only a short time before
you find there are no gaps
to move up in the bunch
anymore. If a rider high up
on the general classification
moves into the breakaway, he
will politely be asked to drop
back to the bunch because
he will doom the attack’s
chances of succeeding. If he
chooses not to, the others
stop working with him or
attack him. Cycling is a sport
where what goes around
comes around, and there is
so much more than the eye
can see. This means you have
to watch cycling as a season,
not just the occasional race.
The richness of the spectacle
is much greater when you
know why a rider, who
hasn’t gotten the results he
expected this season, is more
nervous in the finale. Or the
rider who goes long range
because he hasn’t been
sprinting well this year. You
need to have watched the
build-up races to the Spring
Classics or the Grand Tours
to know who is showing top
form and who still has work to
do in order to be a contender.
Road racing is considerably
more than a sport. There are
so many factors and nuances
that make it fascinating
for a fan, but at the same
time hard for an outsider to
comprehend. It has been
called ‘high speed chess on
wheels’ but it is substantially
more than that. It has politics,
intrigue and collusion. There
are personality clashes in
the season, in the bunch
and in each team. You think
your average corporate
boardroom sees a lot of
wheeling and dealing – you
need to get into a breakaway
group that is going to go
all the way to the line. A
move starts out with riders
wanting to get away from the
peloton, but they play their
cards close to their chest,
without giving too much
effort in case this attack
doesn’t work and they need
to go again. This morphs
into a more cooperative
situation as the gap grows,
and a camaraderie develops
as it becomes ‘us against
them’. As the line approaches
and the peloton has been
defeated, comrades
then become foes where
ruthlessness and a gambler’s
instinct are often more
valuable than strong legs.
Then there are the race
situations where the ‘road
decides’ the team’s tactics…
Where a champion sits tight
and does no work because
his lesser teammate is up the
road in a move. Or the rider
who makes it into the decisive
move of the race only to have
it chased down by his own
team because they are not
sure he can beat the riders
he is with. Or the rider who
‘sits on’ in the run to the line
because he is sure that he
can’t win the sprint and would
rather risk everything for the
win, than settle for a safe
second.
What other sport has
events that last for 21
consecutive days? Where a
one-day classic has riders
giving everything and
riding each other into the
tar, a stage race is all about
conservation of energy until
the right moment where
everything is unleashed.
It is a gradual building of
suspense that can result
in withdrawal symptoms
for the fan when the race is
finally over and the result
decided. There is always
one eye on the next day,
and the next one. What you
give today you may need
tomorrow. Contemplate the
logistics of an event like this.
Different hotels every night,
vast amounts of equipment
and supplies ferried from
one finish to the next start
so that every morning the
riders climb onto a perfectly
tuned machine in a fresh and
recovered state in order to
Above, from left: A young Donovan van Gelder on the roadside in Europe; waving the South African flag at Le Tour; and Don racing in the 1980s, with strip helmet and toe clips.
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