The lads
This article could be just about the wearing-o-the cotton cap. That is the Pro look right there folks. It’s too bad this helmet craze has gone and ruined it all. It’s almost reason enough to ride the old timey Eroica Strade Bianche; a natty cap worn backward with no-one having a moan about it. @Wiscot is doing his usual excellent work here. Thanks @Wiscot.
VLVV, Gianni
As we all know, a certain rider from a southern US state famously threw out a “look” at Jan Ullrich on L’Alpe d’Huez during the Tour de France in 2001. It was a look that said “I’m outta here and there’s nothing you can do about it.” Given the Texan’s masterfully measured intake of pharmaceuticals, there was indeed little Ullrich could do.
Let’s turn the clock back to 1978 and the Tour de France. Two young professionals are lined up at the stage start, ready to do the bidding of their team leaders. English-speaking riders were still relatively scarce at the time so these two had something in common besides their status as domestiques.
On the right we have the 22 year old Paul Sherwen from England. He turned professional in 1978 for Fiat-La France, a French team and whose teammates in the 1978 Tour included no-one of any real accomplishment, although the directeur sportif was the legendary Raphael Geminiani. Sherwen would win seven races as a professional, establishing himself as an excellent and tough domestique who fully earned his few opportunities to win.
On the left is the 22 year old Sean Kelly from Carrick-on-Suir in the Irish Republic. He turned professional a year earlier than Sherwen in 1977 and rode the 1978 Tour for Flandria, a Belgian team containing such hard men as Marc DeMayer, Michel Pollentier, Freddy Maertens, Joaquim Agostinho, Rene Bittinger and Marcel Tinazzi. He would win a stage of the Tour that year, outsprinting Gerrie Knetemann on stage six to Poitiers. He would go on to lead teams for 12 years and win Paris-Nice seven times.
However, in 1978, both riders’ palmares were very slim indeed as their job was not to win for themselves, but to assist others in doing so. Their futures were unknown, but surely neither could guess that they would both later land gigs as commentators – and both in English. At the time that would have been regarded as highly unlikely as Kelly’s grasp of the English language was famously difficult to ascertain. He was a rider who, legend has it, nodded in affirmation to a question asked on radio. English-speaking teammates found it easier to communicate with Kelly in French.
But back to the expression on Sherwen’s face. The look Sherwen is giving Kelly is, to me, one of pure disdain. “Who is this barely intelligible tattie-howking peasant from Ireland, and why is he next to me? I rode for the Altringham Road Club, he rode for the Carrick Wheelers.”
Kelly, on the other hand, does a great job of not caring. His crystal ball says “I will become an all-time great. I will win five stages of the Tour, four green jerseys, nine Monuments, podium twice in World Championships and win a Grand Tour. In 1984 alone I will win 33 races, you will become an apologist for one of the greatest cheaters in the history of sport.”
Be careful who you give the evil eye to.
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View Comments
@RobSandy
That`s when they have their race face on and pumping out 185 watts. : )
I put a smiley at the end of last sentence so you`re not allowed to dump on me.
This is the issue:
Pulling rap gangsta, hip hop, and air guitar moves for the camera.
@Chipomarc
Seeing as Quickstep have been taking these style team photos for years at the request of their pillow making sponsor, I don't think it's a gender thing...
@TommyTubolare isn't that against current rules to wear rainbow stripes if you're not a WC? I wonder if this was changed after this photo?
One other thing, didn't Jan Ulrich take his fair share of pharmaceuticals? Who is to say that Lance took anymore than Jan? We may never know, right?
@Mikael Liddy
Ok, ok, I`ll give you that - you have a valid point.
But that`s one reason I haven`t been riding for a pro team.
@Gianni
I doubt the UCI rules were applied much back then. For starters, these guys are wearing two versions of the jersey. Starting from Freddy on the left, he and #2 are wearing the same jersey, riders #2-7 a different version. I think this is from 1976 when they were sponsored by Flandria Velda Westvlaams Vleesbedrijf.
How good was Freddy in 76? 54 wins including the World Championship RR, 1st Belgian RR, 1st Championship of Flanders, Ghent-Wevelgem, Henniger Turm, Amstel Gold, Championship of Zurich, 8 styages of the Tour and the Green jersey, the Grand Prix des Nations, 4 Days of Dunkirk, and the Prestige Pernod and Super Prestige Pernod awards. That's Merckx-like domination!
@DavyMuur
Hats just good common sense, n'est pas?
@wiscot
It wasn't even a UCI rule then!
In the 60s, 70s and 80s the bands were on non-World Champion's shoes, socks, mitts, tights, bikes, bidons, caps, jerseys, you name it, and up until the mid 90s the rainbow bands were everywhere, it was just when the UCI decided to monetise "their" intellectual "property" that it changed - first they said you had to have been a World Champion in any discipline and you could wear the bands in ALL disciplines, then in the late 90s ('99, I think?) they harshed our mellow and set the rules as they are today.
Trying to apply today's rules to the past is just silly, we should admire (or not) the past as it was, not as we think it should be today.
In my humble opinion, of course ...
@Oli
This is why you had guys like Roger de Vlaeminck, Stuart O'Grady or Chris Boardman (shown below in Fleche-Wallone, 2000) wearing the bands in road racing even though they never won a road World Championship.
@Oli
Did you know you can get a World Champion's Rainbow Jersey for 'Artistic Cycing'?