It was Frank’s recent post that started all this. Mentioning Breukink always makes me think of my friend’s saying, “I have a Breukink in my Van Hooydonk” as his excuse for coming up short on a long training ride. Maybe that’s only funny during a long training ride. That phrase put me back onto Van Hooydonk, a rider I admired because he was so damn tall. The bike is a great equalizer: though there may be an ideal size rider, people like Van Hooydonk prove the exception, unless you are too fat to climb. Edwig rode a steel Colnago and this fact is what put a Colnago at the top of the other recent post. But Edwig’s Colnago was unusual. He was tall and whippy but didn’t want a tall and whippy ride so he used a smaller frame and put a giant spacer above the head tube to get his stem and handlebars up to the correct height. Now a sloping top tube might be the solution but back in days of hairnets, all frames were still the standard double diamond geometry. But his story is relevant to recent doping news so it’s a good time to tie it all together.
Edwig was born near Antwerp, Belgium. The tall lanky red head won the U-23 Ronde van Vlaanderen, something monumental for a young Flemish racer. We saw this race go by in the Keepers Tour 2012 and it might as well have been the real professionals. These guys were so strong and fast. Three years later he crossed the finish line in tears as he soloed to his first of two professional Ronde victories. The pressure of being the next Eddy must be hung on every young Belgian who wins the Ronde and he was no exception. He earned the name Boss of the Bosberg after winning his second Ronde by lighting it up on the final climb of the race. He was an adept Classics rider at the heights of his powers when EPO, then legal, began changing the landscape of professional racing. Drugs and bike racing have been conjoined twins for who knows how long, but the use of EPO to raise red blood cell concentration to sometimes fatal levels in the early 1990s was a quantum change.
Another reason I admire Van Hooydonk was his decision to retire early rather than jump on the EPO train as it was leaving the station. As an American I can’t produce the fitting analogy for what it must have meant for Van Hooydonk to be a top Belgian cyclists with the fame and possible financial rewards, yet he stops and gets off the bike. One either rationalizes doping to keep up; everyone is doing it. Or one says that’s cheating, that’s not racing, I’m not going to participate.
The spectator’s attitude about doping in cycling covers the spectrum. Some think it doesn’t really matter as it produces exciting, stupendous racing. Some are still convinced everyone is doping in 2012 and if everyone is doping maybe it’s a level playing field. Personally, I see it in nearly black and white terms. I’ve always felt it’s cheating and unacceptable. I believe teams like Garmin are totally clean and Ryder just proved a Grand Tour can be won without drugs. For riders, if it’s cheating and you don’t want to participate anymore you retire, like Vaughters and Van Hoodyonk. But these guys are one part of the doping equation we don’t think about. When you retire you are off the radar screen, a has-been, you have moved on. But a few people like Vaughters and Van Hooydonk retired early, not as they ever intended, more because they were not going to race on those terms. I think these guys deserve some respect, certainly more than the riders who so easily stepped on the train. My apologies for once again bringing up the doping subject on Velominati but it’s always there. It is a hard subject to avoid.
A little video of 1989 Ronde, run in good old fashion Belgian spring weather. Think Spring Classics Keepers Tour 2013, this could be you!
I don’t know a word of Flemish but to watch his face enough. Here is a proud man who is still angry and disappointed.
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@RedRanger Yup. Not sure how I missed it, but I did. Unusual as there's umpteen people that normally send me this sort of weirdness!
@Gianni Roll'in JFT style...
@scaler911 There's precedent for the duality of roles. Rider by day and Ride-her by night.
@Duende
I'll tell you one thing, the Flandria team of the 70s (Maertens, Kelly, Pollentier and DeMeyer) wouldn't do that shit. Can't see the Molteni boys doing it either. I believe their response would have been along the lines of HTFU.
@Gianni
I always considered Giles to be a classic EPOer. Maybe I was wrong.
The Boss was just too awesome. Great piece mate!
@Simon
@Gianni
@cognition
HEYELYEAH tall riders love tall riders. Shit, we're such oddities in the world as it is, there are few pleasure greater than watching one of our head-slamming-into-the-house-rafters ilk dominate the world which in most ways has forgotten we exist when it comes to clothing, buildings, and tunneling.
Tall riders are like a mustache with titties.
Something seriously fucked up is happening on the other side of the world from me with Aussie cycling and this Kim Jung Il video. At least, as an American, I can relate to Jungle Commando. His and Frueli's 'tash are the only things keeping me grounded through all this nonsense. I pray for you ChrisO. First the sidewalk and now this.
Great article Gianni. We've ridden those roads and will again. And the only juice we'll be on is the malted variety. I wouldnt trade riding those bergs with my mates for all the EPO laced fame, money, and pussy in the world. (unless I knew id get away with it) It's nice to think of guys like Ryder being the VH's of today.
Wait till Jens releases his cover of Beyonce's Countdown - I can't say too much but it's mind-altering.
Anyway, back to the OP, which is great... and there are a couple of timely articles on CN that are worth looking at along similar lines, especially for anyone who thinks even the Armstrong thing is just raking up ancient history.
One on Jorg Jaschke, winner of Paris Nice who was busted and talked too much and was then dumped on by the UCI and totally frozen out by all the pro teams - this was three years ago. And an interesting interview with Johnny Weltz about Hamilton's allegations around Bjarne Riis.
This is all still going on and I hope Armstrong is just the straw man that brings down the corruption and Omerta culture in the UCI and the pro teams. If not, then there are Van Hooydonks still to come.
@ChrisO
That does it. No Aussie has any credibility left. Done. Spent. Its all over. You guys have to win like 2 and 4/7ths of a Tour de France and at least 8/17ths of a Giro before you're back to Positive Credibility.
This hurts especially because I always thought of the Land Down Under as the Land of Plenty, but it turns out that was always just Las Vegas.
@Gianni
Yeah! I'd like it noted that the Kiwi on their team had zero tolerance for that shit.
@ChrisO
I spent this morning reading these too. Really liked Jorg's quote:
"Ask me who isn't part of the problem. That would be a much shorter list," he says.
And Carlos Satre in the Arvesen article:
Asked if Riis had ever introduced him to Fuentes, Sastre said, "I did not go over the bridge."
@frank fuck you Frank. There arent just Australians in that clip. What about Daniel TWhatshisface? I guess we just all look the same to people like you.
What about your US swimmers? They did the same thing and i watched the whole of it in the vain hope of Natalie Coughlin making an appearance. Your swimmers do that. Australian swimmers tweet photos of themselves like this.