Today is the very final day with the Farewell Event organised by Golazo Sports at the Kuipke, Ghent: "Ciao Fabian", the way they did for Sven Nys earlier this year.
I don't recall such a farewell event organised in Belgium in honour of a foreign athlete. Ryo Hazuki may laugh all he wants but Belgium is certainly among the least chauvinistic countries on earth. Yes at Bavikhove, his last criterium on Belgian soil, Fabian said he was "partly Belgian".
Sep Vanmarcke, Bradley Wiggins, Filippo Pozzato and Fränck Schleck have been announced. The event is sold out: 6,200 tickets.
http://img4.hostingpics.net/pics/673856CANCELLARAHLN20161104.png
They are scheduled to race a 2km pursuit contest.
Recent article in Sport Voetbalmagazine: here, here, here & here
and its translation/adaptation in the French-speaking Sport Foot Magazine: here & here
Translation from French:
Deadly and Charming
Next Saturday Fabian Cancellara says farewell to Belgian cycling fans at the Kuipke in Ghent at age 35. Few foreign riders are as much respected as Spartacus in our country. The Swiss is fearsome & deadly, joyful & charming.
The Competition Beast
7 July 2013. At the end of the final stage of the Tour of Austria Fabian Cancellara and team director Dirk Demol are waiting for their plane in Vienna. In front of their café they are talking about their new project Trek, which they’ll be a part of. It will be Fabian’s last contract. Demol remembered
13 August 2016. Before the Olympic ITT Fabian Cancellara is sitting with a white veil, inward-looking for 10 minutes. He often withdrew in this tunnel during his career, usually before his cobbled classics. Just like during the recon of the Tour of Flanders and of Paris-Roubaix.
The Bear of Bern rode all the climbs and cobbled sections with a surprising slowness in order to memorise each passages. The days before the race, he studied the route hanging in his kitchen. Before the start in Bruges and in Compiègne despite the rushes of photographers, he posed with the arms on his bars, bowed the head and isolated himself from the rest of the world. A ritual.
But Cancellara was much more in doubt before the Olympic ITT. On the hard route in Rio, could he compete with Chris Froome [??] and Tom Dumoulin? The day before he did a long walk through the Olympic village in order to relax. He chatted with Swiss fencers and did a selfie with a US basketball player. Anything in order not to think of the last great objective of his prestigious career.
After his planned abandon at the Tour of France Cancellara doggedly trained for that objective. Never in his career have his legs been so much in pain. His friend and coach Luca Guercilena ruthlessly directed the session. Successfully: The top shape came back after a 5 hour session, his trainer had to slow him down.
The morning of the race, Guercilena woke his rider up: he could start sparkling again.
Cancellara had the 5th time at the first time check but he doesn’t worry for he planned to increase the speed in the second part and in the final climb. There Guercilena shouts: “It’s the last time you are suffering so much”. This thought of the perfect end is puzzling the killer. Cancellara is crushing his pedals like never before. At age 35 he bests his watt record by 4% in an hour.
Cancellara was nicknamed Spartacus by his Fassa Bortolo teammate, Roberto Petito because of his body build.
Pater Familias
February 2001. At age 19 Cancellara discovers the Mapei team. When he goes to the Tour of Rhodes, it’s hard to be far from his girlfriend Stefanie but Roberto Damiani his DS told him he could be forgiven his absence by winning and he won the prologue ahead of Bradley Wiggins and the final GC. That shows how much he’s rooted to his family and his patria. He married Stefanie in 2006 and had two daughters, Giuliana born in 2007 and Elina, born during the 2012 Tour of France. By no means he considered continuing the race “Goodbye #TDF12, I’m not just a rider but also a husband” he tweeted.
Cancellara is not dragging too long in Rio. He wants to bring his daughters to school on Monday. His career kept him far enough from them until then. Cycling has always been a part of his life. This family spirit and leaving cycling aside for 5 to 6 weeks every winter enabled Fabian to succeed in a long and rich career.
The Talkative Parrot
December 2000, Mapei training session. During an intensive session with big names such as Michele Bartoli, Paolo Bettini and Stefano Garzelli, Cancellara caanot stop talking. He’s so excited that he starts whistling. Garzelli and co think that it’s disrespectful and the accelerated in a climb. The young Swiss is all out of breath on top and Garzelli is scolding
The Grateful Leader
18 March 2011. Tirreno Adriatico. Spartacus is celebrating his 30 years of age and offers the team some wine he bought with Brian Nygaard, a connoisseur, in a vineyard near Pisa. On the personnel’s table, a 3 liter €1,000 bottle.
Cancellara has often shown his recognition with other special presents like expensive IWC Swiss watches that he offered last spring to the riders and staff members who helped him win twice the Tour of Flanders and Paris-Roubaix. On the back of the watches he had it engraved: “You’ll never win alone” [in English], and the person’s name. Even Bob Jungels, Tony Gallopin and Jesse Sergent who meanwhile had left the team were offered a watch.
After the 2014 Tour of Flanders, the Swiss also thanked Remi De Moor, the President of his Belgian Fan Club and an old friend. He was stuck in Spain. Some riffraffs had punctured the wheels of his car. Vanderjeugd said that after the ceremony at the Tour of Flanders Fabian asked for his mobile phone in order to call Remi. Despite all the celebrations, he had a thought for his friend.
Dirk Demol claimed that Fabian cared when his daughter had thrombosis and phoned for news two or three times a week. He was willing to meet up with a sick child who was a great fan and instead of the planned 5’, he stayed half an hour with him.
Few people know that Fabian has maintained closed contact with the Wouter Weylandt family, while they had only been teammates for a few months and often goes to his parents’ home in Ghent after the supporters’ party in Oudenarde.
--------------------
I read in an article about Tim Wellens in the Nieuwsblad recently that Cancellara would never drink coffee but cold tea, he would drop tea bags in normal cold water, a trick that he told Jasper Stuyven about, Jasper telling it to his long-time friend Tim who also picked up that habit. Perhaps I should try it myself.
-------------------
However laughable this might sound to you I still consider Fabian Cancellara the greatest rider of the century and this because he was the greatest time trialist in the period, thus far but on top of that he managed to make use of these TT skills to win a fistful of classics, which Tony Martin never wished to do until this year and which Dumoulin does not seem willing to do while his talent should enable him to (something that I fail to understand).
I discovered Cancellara at the 2001 & 2002 GP's Eddy Merckx when he was 2nd to Erik Dekker & Marc Wauters partnering Michael Rogers and then won the race partnering Laslo Bodrogi. At that time it stood clear for everyone that he was the next time trial specialist but nobody could ever have thought that he would be the next classic great and when he was 4th at the 2004 Paris-Roubaix it was a shocker to anyone. Only he had told Rodrigo Beenkens of RTBF that year on the flight back from the Tour of Qatar that he had two main objective that year and that was winning Paris-Roubaix and the prologue of the Tour of France. The second one was a success but Rodrigo couldn't believe it when he talked about Paris-Roubaix. In retrospect he would have been a nice winner, that edition was an anti-climax with a surprise win for Magnus Backstedt while behind Lefevere asked Museeuw not to take any turn with Van Petegem in order to let a third party win rather than Lotto rider PVP.
Than I still remember the wonderful 2008 season. Tirreno Adriatico when he could carry his heavy body up the Montelupone, not far from pocket climber Joaquim Rodriguez. This Milan-Sanremo edition and this wind blow that he gave to Landaluze, to make sure if need be that Milan-Sanremo is NOT a race for sprinter, essentially. Still that year all the battles with Gilbert at the Tour of Switzerland. He kinda resurrected the old kilometer flight attacks, which I really thought was dead until then, the Jelle Nijdam kind of attacks. It really was impressive. So was his attack at the Peking Olympic inline race.
Then his underrated win at the 2009 Tour of Switzerland. Of course it lacked mountains but he had to carry his heavy body up to Ayent/Anzère and Crans-Montana, which is quite something, I know that area very well.
The 2010 double and the Kapelmuur attack sitting casually on the saddle. Well everybody thought he had a motor, including myself but as long as nothing is proved I'll let it go. It still surprises me that the only riders to have done the double are Swiss and Belgian, since before him the only non-Belgian to do it was Swiss Heiri Suter in 1923. I also particularly appreciated the trick at the Ardennes stage at the Tour of France, to make the peloton wait for Andy Schleck who had just punctured. It might be against the law of the sport but it showed how feared and charismatic he is as a classic rider and in the end it enabled Chavanel to win.
2011 is when I really started admiring him (not being a real fan but an admirer). I still remember this E3 edition when he was in a chase group doing all the work by himself never asking for any contribution to group mates and then he went on to win the race. It reminds me of the clips I saw from Merckx, especially on the Sunday in Hell film. The same kind of display of power. He was beaten in both classics but in both cases he showed tremendous power and probably the best rider of the pack, however he probably already was in decline back then. You need to remember the comment by Wilfried Peeters as to why he had Chavanel refuse to take the pulls "He is too strong". Same at Paris-Roubaix, with the weird tactics by Garmin not preventing Van Summeren to win but then capitalizing on the sole error of inattention by Hushovd to escape on the small uphill false flat in Hem.
I would still keep in mind the 2013 edition of Cogoleto-Sanremo (the race that replaced Milan-Sanremo that year because the organisers thought Turchino and Manie were impassable) when he made sure that little punk Sagan didn't win whom he hated for his lame antics. I normally don't like it when riders make sure that another one loses more than try to win themselves but that time it was well deserved. Ciolek won. Besides it shows that Cancellara could race in freezing cold temperature. It's just that when RCS puts the Terminillo in the Tirreno route, it's laughable. We are in March. I sure appreciated all his anti-Tour of France comments about the lack of ITT. He was right.
And then the cherry on the cake is that final season when he once again beat Sagan in the latter's prime at the Strade Bianche on a finale that was way better suited to the Slovak (in order to rate the two riders you simply need to rate their ITT abilities anyway) and of course this Olympic title in Rio when it was as though he told Dumoulin: "You, when you race classics for the win, you'll be a worthy Olympic champion."
I hope you've enjoyed the Cancellara years because I'm trying to find any riders as spectacular as he was in the current pro peloton and I cannot.
I don't recall such a farewell event organised in Belgium in honour of a foreign athlete. Ryo Hazuki may laugh all he wants but Belgium is certainly among the least chauvinistic countries on earth. Yes at Bavikhove, his last criterium on Belgian soil, Fabian said he was "partly Belgian".
Sep Vanmarcke, Bradley Wiggins, Filippo Pozzato and Fränck Schleck have been announced. The event is sold out: 6,200 tickets.
http://img4.hostingpics.net/pics/673856CANCELLARAHLN20161104.png
They are scheduled to race a 2km pursuit contest.
Recent article in Sport Voetbalmagazine: here, here, here & here
and its translation/adaptation in the French-speaking Sport Foot Magazine: here & here
Translation from French:
Deadly and Charming
Next Saturday Fabian Cancellara says farewell to Belgian cycling fans at the Kuipke in Ghent at age 35. Few foreign riders are as much respected as Spartacus in our country. The Swiss is fearsome & deadly, joyful & charming.
The Competition Beast
7 July 2013. At the end of the final stage of the Tour of Austria Fabian Cancellara and team director Dirk Demol are waiting for their plane in Vienna. In front of their café they are talking about their new project Trek, which they’ll be a part of. It will be Fabian’s last contract. Demol remembered
13 August 2016. Before the Olympic ITT Fabian Cancellara is sitting with a white veil, inward-looking for 10 minutes. He often withdrew in this tunnel during his career, usually before his cobbled classics. Just like during the recon of the Tour of Flanders and of Paris-Roubaix.
The Bear of Bern rode all the climbs and cobbled sections with a surprising slowness in order to memorise each passages. The days before the race, he studied the route hanging in his kitchen. Before the start in Bruges and in Compiègne despite the rushes of photographers, he posed with the arms on his bars, bowed the head and isolated himself from the rest of the world. A ritual.
But Cancellara was much more in doubt before the Olympic ITT. On the hard route in Rio, could he compete with Chris Froome [??] and Tom Dumoulin? The day before he did a long walk through the Olympic village in order to relax. He chatted with Swiss fencers and did a selfie with a US basketball player. Anything in order not to think of the last great objective of his prestigious career.
After his planned abandon at the Tour of France Cancellara doggedly trained for that objective. Never in his career have his legs been so much in pain. His friend and coach Luca Guercilena ruthlessly directed the session. Successfully: The top shape came back after a 5 hour session, his trainer had to slow him down.
The morning of the race, Guercilena woke his rider up: he could start sparkling again.
Cancellara had the 5th time at the first time check but he doesn’t worry for he planned to increase the speed in the second part and in the final climb. There Guercilena shouts: “It’s the last time you are suffering so much”. This thought of the perfect end is puzzling the killer. Cancellara is crushing his pedals like never before. At age 35 he bests his watt record by 4% in an hour.
Cancellara was nicknamed Spartacus by his Fassa Bortolo teammate, Roberto Petito because of his body build.
Pater Familias
February 2001. At age 19 Cancellara discovers the Mapei team. When he goes to the Tour of Rhodes, it’s hard to be far from his girlfriend Stefanie but Roberto Damiani his DS told him he could be forgiven his absence by winning and he won the prologue ahead of Bradley Wiggins and the final GC. That shows how much he’s rooted to his family and his patria. He married Stefanie in 2006 and had two daughters, Giuliana born in 2007 and Elina, born during the 2012 Tour of France. By no means he considered continuing the race “Goodbye #TDF12, I’m not just a rider but also a husband” he tweeted.
Cancellara is not dragging too long in Rio. He wants to bring his daughters to school on Monday. His career kept him far enough from them until then. Cycling has always been a part of his life. This family spirit and leaving cycling aside for 5 to 6 weeks every winter enabled Fabian to succeed in a long and rich career.
The Talkative Parrot
December 2000, Mapei training session. During an intensive session with big names such as Michele Bartoli, Paolo Bettini and Stefano Garzelli, Cancellara caanot stop talking. He’s so excited that he starts whistling. Garzelli and co think that it’s disrespectful and the accelerated in a climb. The young Swiss is all out of breath on top and Garzelli is scolding
Cancellara was not ill-intended and apologized
Many journalist interviewing Cancellara noticed he is a chatterbox, mainly when they talked about topics that had nothing to do with cycling such as wine, fashion or travels. He often gave interviews on the train, says Tim Vanderjeugd who’s handled all his media contacts since 2010.
The Grateful Leader
18 March 2011. Tirreno Adriatico. Spartacus is celebrating his 30 years of age and offers the team some wine he bought with Brian Nygaard, a connoisseur, in a vineyard near Pisa. On the personnel’s table, a 3 liter €1,000 bottle.
Cancellara has often shown his recognition with other special presents like expensive IWC Swiss watches that he offered last spring to the riders and staff members who helped him win twice the Tour of Flanders and Paris-Roubaix. On the back of the watches he had it engraved: “You’ll never win alone” [in English], and the person’s name. Even Bob Jungels, Tony Gallopin and Jesse Sergent who meanwhile had left the team were offered a watch.
After the 2014 Tour of Flanders, the Swiss also thanked Remi De Moor, the President of his Belgian Fan Club and an old friend. He was stuck in Spain. Some riffraffs had punctured the wheels of his car. Vanderjeugd said that after the ceremony at the Tour of Flanders Fabian asked for his mobile phone in order to call Remi. Despite all the celebrations, he had a thought for his friend.
Dirk Demol claimed that Fabian cared when his daughter had thrombosis and phoned for news two or three times a week. He was willing to meet up with a sick child who was a great fan and instead of the planned 5’, he stayed half an hour with him.
Few people know that Fabian has maintained closed contact with the Wouter Weylandt family, while they had only been teammates for a few months and often goes to his parents’ home in Ghent after the supporters’ party in Oudenarde.
--------------------
I read in an article about Tim Wellens in the Nieuwsblad recently that Cancellara would never drink coffee but cold tea, he would drop tea bags in normal cold water, a trick that he told Jasper Stuyven about, Jasper telling it to his long-time friend Tim who also picked up that habit. Perhaps I should try it myself.
-------------------
However laughable this might sound to you I still consider Fabian Cancellara the greatest rider of the century and this because he was the greatest time trialist in the period, thus far but on top of that he managed to make use of these TT skills to win a fistful of classics, which Tony Martin never wished to do until this year and which Dumoulin does not seem willing to do while his talent should enable him to (something that I fail to understand).
I discovered Cancellara at the 2001 & 2002 GP's Eddy Merckx when he was 2nd to Erik Dekker & Marc Wauters partnering Michael Rogers and then won the race partnering Laslo Bodrogi. At that time it stood clear for everyone that he was the next time trial specialist but nobody could ever have thought that he would be the next classic great and when he was 4th at the 2004 Paris-Roubaix it was a shocker to anyone. Only he had told Rodrigo Beenkens of RTBF that year on the flight back from the Tour of Qatar that he had two main objective that year and that was winning Paris-Roubaix and the prologue of the Tour of France. The second one was a success but Rodrigo couldn't believe it when he talked about Paris-Roubaix. In retrospect he would have been a nice winner, that edition was an anti-climax with a surprise win for Magnus Backstedt while behind Lefevere asked Museeuw not to take any turn with Van Petegem in order to let a third party win rather than Lotto rider PVP.
Than I still remember the wonderful 2008 season. Tirreno Adriatico when he could carry his heavy body up the Montelupone, not far from pocket climber Joaquim Rodriguez. This Milan-Sanremo edition and this wind blow that he gave to Landaluze, to make sure if need be that Milan-Sanremo is NOT a race for sprinter, essentially. Still that year all the battles with Gilbert at the Tour of Switzerland. He kinda resurrected the old kilometer flight attacks, which I really thought was dead until then, the Jelle Nijdam kind of attacks. It really was impressive. So was his attack at the Peking Olympic inline race.
Then his underrated win at the 2009 Tour of Switzerland. Of course it lacked mountains but he had to carry his heavy body up to Ayent/Anzère and Crans-Montana, which is quite something, I know that area very well.
The 2010 double and the Kapelmuur attack sitting casually on the saddle. Well everybody thought he had a motor, including myself but as long as nothing is proved I'll let it go. It still surprises me that the only riders to have done the double are Swiss and Belgian, since before him the only non-Belgian to do it was Swiss Heiri Suter in 1923. I also particularly appreciated the trick at the Ardennes stage at the Tour of France, to make the peloton wait for Andy Schleck who had just punctured. It might be against the law of the sport but it showed how feared and charismatic he is as a classic rider and in the end it enabled Chavanel to win.
2011 is when I really started admiring him (not being a real fan but an admirer). I still remember this E3 edition when he was in a chase group doing all the work by himself never asking for any contribution to group mates and then he went on to win the race. It reminds me of the clips I saw from Merckx, especially on the Sunday in Hell film. The same kind of display of power. He was beaten in both classics but in both cases he showed tremendous power and probably the best rider of the pack, however he probably already was in decline back then. You need to remember the comment by Wilfried Peeters as to why he had Chavanel refuse to take the pulls "He is too strong". Same at Paris-Roubaix, with the weird tactics by Garmin not preventing Van Summeren to win but then capitalizing on the sole error of inattention by Hushovd to escape on the small uphill false flat in Hem.
I would still keep in mind the 2013 edition of Cogoleto-Sanremo (the race that replaced Milan-Sanremo that year because the organisers thought Turchino and Manie were impassable) when he made sure that little punk Sagan didn't win whom he hated for his lame antics. I normally don't like it when riders make sure that another one loses more than try to win themselves but that time it was well deserved. Ciolek won. Besides it shows that Cancellara could race in freezing cold temperature. It's just that when RCS puts the Terminillo in the Tirreno route, it's laughable. We are in March. I sure appreciated all his anti-Tour of France comments about the lack of ITT. He was right.
And then the cherry on the cake is that final season when he once again beat Sagan in the latter's prime at the Strade Bianche on a finale that was way better suited to the Slovak (in order to rate the two riders you simply need to rate their ITT abilities anyway) and of course this Olympic title in Rio when it was as though he told Dumoulin: "You, when you race classics for the win, you'll be a worthy Olympic champion."
I hope you've enjoyed the Cancellara years because I'm trying to find any riders as spectacular as he was in the current pro peloton and I cannot.
Facebook
Twitter
Instagram