THE QUIET ACHIEVER
Forty years ago, the 1980 Tour de France was the classic race of two halves. It was won by Joop Zoetemelk, but is now primarily seen in the context of one rider: Bernard Hinault. 1980 is the Tour of the Badger’s Wounded Knee. It’s the one where Hinault came down with tendinitis so severe that he had no option but to pull out of the race. It thus divides into first half with the Badger dominating the race and an anticlimactic second after he retreated to lick his wounds in his burrow in Brittany.
Looking back, the prescient editor of Miroir du Cyclisme, Henri Quiquéré, could see this coming a mile off. Dusting off the crystal ball when he reviewed the race, Quiquéré hypothesised that in July 2013, as the 100th Tour approached, a cycling fan might take a dusty magazine from his grandfather’s collection and conclude that “an unknown” won in 1980. “Library rats in the 21st century could well get the impression that this 1980 Tour was won by ‘some guy’ to general surprise!” he wrote. This is unfair to Zoetemelk, a courteous, quiet man, who won the Vuelta a España and the Worlds, finished second in the Tour de France six times and wore the yellow jersey three years running, in 1978, 1979 and 1980; also in 1971 and 1973.
Once Hinault had headed for Brittany, Quiquéré wrote, it was as if the French media wanted to erase what happened next. There’s nothing intrinsically wrong with, I am personally as guilty as anyone - maybe more guilty than most - in depicting it that way. But let’s recast that oftentold story from another point of view. The 1980 Tour was one of unmatched domination by one team, TI-Raleigh, and a richly deserved win for one of the most consistent, yet consistently under-rated, cyclists of the 20th century.
