I was still racing pushbikes around 1993/94 when word started to sneak around the cycling community of a quirky young mountain biker who was smashing all comers and had quickly earned the nickname “The Lung”! His name was Cadel Evans.
All these years later I sit here on a Monday morning basking in the unprecedented national glow that Cadel’s unexpected victory in “La Grand Boucle” has caused in Australia. And enjoying it!
I like Cadel. He is obviously not your typical, alpha male Australian athlete and I think this has caused him quite a few problems in his relationships inside the cycling world and has meant that he is an outsider and not “one of the boys”. Like another legendary Australian cyclist from down around Geelong, Russell Mockridge.
But now after winning the World Road Championship and last night taking the biggest prize of all he has forced respect from those who couldn’t bear to give it to him before. I guess I can identify with him a bit.
In any case it is a remarkable achievement and if it is at all possible to “deserve” a Tour de France victory then Cadel certainly is one of those people who should have got one some time ago.
I have to say that I thought his chance had gone by a few years ago. I reckoned if he rode to the best of his ability he could definitely run into the top four but with the Schleck brothers and Alberto Contador present and correct this year I thought at the age of 34 he wouldn’t be able to handle them. How wrong can one be!
He is the oldest winner in 88 years and I guess that proves that in modern sport age is only a number.
My abiding memory of the Tour will be of his incredible ride up the Galibier in the Alps. With Andy Schleck four minutes up the road and the Tour disintegrating around him he took the bit between the teeth and led the remnants of the field in chase into a block headwind, never looking around, never asking for help. He rode as only the greatest champions have done and retrieved two minutes on the climb and saved the Tour. It was gutsy stuff.
So now he enters the pantheon of Australian sporting greats and it is quite funny to see the clueless sports reporters from the major television networks scramble to get on the bandwagon, desperately trying to make sense of what is going on and interpreting events all wrong! Maybe now they will take more notice of this beautiful sport.
Well done Cadel. You have done something that most of us thought may not ever be done and deserve every bouquet that’s coming. And never again will anyone in Australian cycling have the gall to disrespect you.
All these years later I sit here on a Monday morning basking in the unprecedented national glow that Cadel’s unexpected victory in “La Grand Boucle” has caused in Australia. And enjoying it!
I like Cadel. He is obviously not your typical, alpha male Australian athlete and I think this has caused him quite a few problems in his relationships inside the cycling world and has meant that he is an outsider and not “one of the boys”. Like another legendary Australian cyclist from down around Geelong, Russell Mockridge.
But now after winning the World Road Championship and last night taking the biggest prize of all he has forced respect from those who couldn’t bear to give it to him before. I guess I can identify with him a bit.
In any case it is a remarkable achievement and if it is at all possible to “deserve” a Tour de France victory then Cadel certainly is one of those people who should have got one some time ago.
I have to say that I thought his chance had gone by a few years ago. I reckoned if he rode to the best of his ability he could definitely run into the top four but with the Schleck brothers and Alberto Contador present and correct this year I thought at the age of 34 he wouldn’t be able to handle them. How wrong can one be!
He is the oldest winner in 88 years and I guess that proves that in modern sport age is only a number.
My abiding memory of the Tour will be of his incredible ride up the Galibier in the Alps. With Andy Schleck four minutes up the road and the Tour disintegrating around him he took the bit between the teeth and led the remnants of the field in chase into a block headwind, never looking around, never asking for help. He rode as only the greatest champions have done and retrieved two minutes on the climb and saved the Tour. It was gutsy stuff.
So now he enters the pantheon of Australian sporting greats and it is quite funny to see the clueless sports reporters from the major television networks scramble to get on the bandwagon, desperately trying to make sense of what is going on and interpreting events all wrong! Maybe now they will take more notice of this beautiful sport.
Well done Cadel. You have done something that most of us thought may not ever be done and deserve every bouquet that’s coming. And never again will anyone in Australian cycling have the gall to disrespect you.
Strange Notations From a Laborious Life 