I’m sure if I dug around on these boards I’d find a best races you’ve
ever seen thread, but this is a little more personal than that. I just
went digging through an old box of tapes and found a VHS labeled
Paris-Roubaix 99. I have no idea who won, I’m not even sure I watched
the race, yet bizarrely I’ve watched my WCP tape of the 97
Paris-Roubaix almost to death. Everybody loves an underdog, but with
no disrespect to Frederic Guesdon’s 97 win, I can’t help but imagine
the 99 edition was probably slightly more satisfying in that I expect
whoever won it (Museeuw? Tchmil?) was probably a more fitting victor.
Sorry, this is a long winded way of saying that the best races aren’t
always the ones that you find most affecting. I loved Marco Pantani,
but the 1998 Tour wouldn’t go on my list of Desert Island Cycling
DVDs, but while I have no particular fondness for Bjarne Riis, the
1996 Tour would. On top of that, my intermittent relationship with
satellite TV down the years means that there are some races I only
ever experienced through the pages of a magazine-they may be greats,
but they’ll never be on my desert island list.
Anyway, I thought I’d choose the five races that I’d take with me to a
Desert Island, to follow in half a mo, and wondered what everyone
else’s would be?
ever seen thread, but this is a little more personal than that. I just
went digging through an old box of tapes and found a VHS labeled
Paris-Roubaix 99. I have no idea who won, I’m not even sure I watched
the race, yet bizarrely I’ve watched my WCP tape of the 97
Paris-Roubaix almost to death. Everybody loves an underdog, but with
no disrespect to Frederic Guesdon’s 97 win, I can’t help but imagine
the 99 edition was probably slightly more satisfying in that I expect
whoever won it (Museeuw? Tchmil?) was probably a more fitting victor.
Sorry, this is a long winded way of saying that the best races aren’t
always the ones that you find most affecting. I loved Marco Pantani,
but the 1998 Tour wouldn’t go on my list of Desert Island Cycling
DVDs, but while I have no particular fondness for Bjarne Riis, the
1996 Tour would. On top of that, my intermittent relationship with
satellite TV down the years means that there are some races I only
ever experienced through the pages of a magazine-they may be greats,
but they’ll never be on my desert island list.
Anyway, I thought I’d choose the five races that I’d take with me to a
Desert Island, to follow in half a mo, and wondered what everyone
else’s would be?