This
For my money, the best slice of cycling video ever is Francesco Moser, appearing out of the dust, in the 1976 Paris-Roubaix. He blasts by the moto camera on the right, on a mission to get up to the front. Something about him appearing, then almost disappearing down the road. What was that? And there it is, the Moser position. His torso is pulled down low. If you want to go that fast you have to get that low. Back in the day, your frame size was directly correlated to your inseam, period. There were no slammed -17 degree stems or long seatposts. If you wanted to get aero you just had to bend at the hips and elbows, a lot.
Getting low is one thing, generating huge power from that position is something else, something Moser excelled at. Lo Sceriffo was not a man to be underestimated. In this excerpted video from A Sunday in Hell, Moser is powering up towards the winning break of four riders: Roger De Vlaeminck, Marc Demeyer, Walter Godefroot, and Hennie Kuiper (all former or future P-R winners). It is an all star break of Belgian-Dutch hardness and Moser bridges quickly. The winner was going to come from this group but it was not Moser’s year nor was the next edition so he made up for it by winning the next three consecutive Paris-Roubaix.
To see Moser powering up the side of the pavé like that, it’s some sort of poetry that captures just about everything I love about cycling.
The Moser scene plays out around 9:10 into the clip, but as always, it is pure pleasure to watch what leads up to it.
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Great lead photo, and it's still a bidon attached to the cage on his bike.
@Haldy
I swear these guys were harder than than Boonen or Cancellara.
@Gianni
They ALL were harder!
The dry, unemotional narrative on the video sure contrasts with the over the top excitement which is the current commentators' style.
And yes, @ebruner they were all harder. Way harder.
Moser may have been Italian, but he knew how to ride all Belgian.
Is it an old school bar style thing? I still feel more comfortable in the Belgian Drops (if Belgian Compact can be a thing, I'm making Belgian Drops a thing too) than in the Actual Drops. Maybe it's my 183 cm frame, it doesn't like to bend down that far for long periods of time. Also my elbows stay in better and I'd hate to look like a spider humping a lightbulb.
@Owen
It is, in my very humble opinion, a mix of different things. On modern bikes the bars are different, the drop from saddle to bars is more pronounced, and the brifters make changing gears in the drop more awkward.
But yeah, when you go into the drops you are generally in the least comfortable position. The drops are here to go fast, not to be comfortable...even then it was the case.
But i am a retrougrouch whose number 1 is a 78 gazelle fitted Eddy Merckx style and i have a strong dislike of most modern bikes, so i am bias....
@LeBelge
I should just point the bike downhill so I run out of gears and the shifting becomes irrelevant. Also, I used to have a Gazelle. Not sure what happened to it...
@Owen
If the gazelle was a champion mondial, its sad since they are worth quite a bit of money right now...and ride like only a good Reynolds steel frame can.
And to not be totally off-topic: Fransesco Moser was a stud. Proof that you don't need tyo be flemish to be a flandrien. Perhaps it is because i come from the flat part of Wallonia, were hills are rare, and cobblestones part of the infrastructure, but for me only that type of guy look really fantastic on a bike, with a few exceptions.