Eddy Merckx: The Cannibal (44 page)

‘Cycling’s Napoleon’, directeur sportif Lomme Driessens, muscles in on the lap of honour around the Cipale velodrome at the end of the ’69 Tour, riding the special yellow street bike he’d had prepared for the occasion.

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Merckx lies unconscious in the middle of the Pierre Tessier velodrome in Blois after the crash that killed his derny rider Fernand Wambst in September 1969.

A packed circuit in Leicester, England played host to the 1970 World Championship road race. For once, Merckx was overshadowed and beaten by another precocious Belgian, Jean-Pierre ‘Jempi’ Monseré.

Merckx often revelled in the very worst weather conditions, as was the case here in Paris–Roubaix in 1970. Though Roger de Vlaeminck claimed that only his puncture allowed Merckx to drop him and win.

The drama of Luis Ocaña’s crash on the Col de Menté in the 1971 Tour de France. Race director Jacques Goddet, far left, is a beleaguered spectator.

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Merckx winning his first Tour of Lombardy in the Sinigaglia velodrome in Como in 1971. The race was the first major cycling event outside the Olympics to be broadcast live in the United States.

Merckx marauds to the Hour record on the Agustín Melgar velodrome in Mexico City in October 1972.

Joseph Bruyère, followed here by Merckx and Raymond Poulidor, became Molteni and Merckx’s irreplaceable mountain enforcer.

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With Théo Mathy. Merckx had a difficult relationship with the press throughout his career, who became increasingly frustrated with their failure to get under his skin.

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‘I’m only truly happy when I’m on my bike,’ Merckx once said. Or, it seemed, when making endless, infinitesimal adjustments to the three dozen or so machines he kept in his garage.

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Balancing daughter Sabrina on his handlebars as he arrives home in Kraainem after a training ride in 1973.

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Merckx shares a joke with Jos Huysmans, one of his longest-serving domestiques, over dinner at the 1973 Giro d’Italia.

From the left, Messers Parecchini, Mintjens, Merckx, Swerts, Spruyt, Huysmans, Van Schil, Bruyère, De Schoenmaecker, Janssens – Molteni’s formidable team at the 1973 Giro.