VeloNews, 19 mai 2003
Maynard Hershon
Thirty years ago Eddy Merckx dominated pro cycling as no one has before or since. Tireless, insatiable, he raced hard all season long. He won important races, minor races, classics, grand tours and six-days. You name it, he won it.
Merckx felt his job was to win every race, and not by a wheel or so many seconds. He beat you as severely as he could, and as often as he could. He was called the "Cannibal."
If you raced in Merckx's era, even if you were a superman yourself, you rode in his long shadow season after season, nearly invisible all your racing life.
We wonder what it was like to be Merckx and what it was like to be the other guys, watching helplessly as he rode away. We wonder if they cursed their bad luck or their bad timing. Crying shame, not being Merckx in the Merckx Era.
Today we are witnessing another long shadow - that of French-Canadian phenomenon Geneviève Jeanson. During the early part of the season here in North America, if Jeanson pins on a number and appears at the start, the rest of the field races for second place. It's news if she loses.
Unless the race is dead flat, great women riders, stars really, ride in her shadow. Certainly individual women are helpless. If the climbs are long and steep, teams are helpless, teamwork ineffective. Jeanson rides away alone.
From the technical assistance motorcycle, I've watched her drop famous riders on major teams, riders whose résumés list victory after victory. What must it be like to be Kimberly Bruckner or Lyne Bessette watching Jeanson pedal away ?
Jeanson can time-trial, climb and sprint. She climbs so well she'd finish high in the standings in mens races. At Redlands this year she'd have finished 52nd (of 154 men) in the uphill time-trial prologue. Imagine this tiny woman beating all those pros up a power hill.
It's hard to see where the strength comes from : Jeanson is slender, medium height, skinny legs. You'd never notice her in a crowd. You can't take your eyes off her on her bike.
Often she breaks away in the first few miles. I've followed her for miles and miles as she rides alone off the front. She rides like a man : biggish gear, low over the bike, looking back under her arm, but not looking back often.
Nothing back there to see. No one is chasing.
She's not cruising either. She's time-trialing, doing a race long solo effort faster than the pack, which is way, way behind her.
I've given Jeanson time splits and heard my mechanic/passenger giving her splits. I have walked past her at her team car before and after races. I used to say hi or wave, but I quit. It felt inappropriate. She's preoccupied.
During the three years I've been aware of Jeanson, I've met and chatted with lots of other women racers. They're a friendly bunch. In contrast, I have never heard Jeanson's voice live, only from television speakers.
I never see Jeansson chatting with anyone, not even her teammates. I see her with her coach, who's also the team manager. You hear that he runs the team by yelling and dictating tactics. No one defends him.
Is it her manager who drives her? Or is she truly another Cannibal ? No one seems to know.
Like Merckx, Jeanson is not satisfied beating you by a minute or several minutes. She wants to win by miles, solo. Why sit in a group or work with another rider if your legs don't hurt ?
No one knows what voices she hears. Is her coach screaming over the radio that a six-minute lead won't cut it? Are her personal demons demanding ever more dominance? Or is she trying to break the spirits of her opponents?
In a stage race, Jeanson will probably win all the hilly stages. In flat stages or crits, she often contests the intermediate and final sprints, banging elbows with the sprint specialists.
Doing so, she stands to gain a few seconds. Why take the risks? She'll win tomorrow's road race by four minutes, all alone, safe as a seat in church.
She may win a stage race by 10 minutes, racing hard even in the final miles on the last day, so that (God forbid) she won't win by only nine.
At Redlands, Jeanson doubled her overall lead in the last road stage, winning on GC by neady 13 minutes instead of "merely" half that. She told an interviewer that her opponents are so strong she felt she must keep hammering, must increase the gap to ensure her victory.
Why not sit up, finish the race at some laser pace? It's a mystery why she doesn't, especially given her susceptibility to injury. She gets hurt sometimes, not from crashing but from overuse injuries.
Merckx was tough enough to absorb the beating that training and racing gave his body. Jeanson, still just 21, hurts herself. By June, she is often injured. You hear she's injured, anyway. She's gone, done racing for the season.
Remarkably, the next spring she's at it again, riding every event as if her salvation depended on it - until she hurts herself again and has to quit.
If it is her manager who drives Jeanson to such excess, we can be sure her apponents wish him good health and lots of job security. As long as she continues to beat herself up in the early season, there'll be those Jeanson-free months, months when mere superstars can win races - even if there's a hill.
Worst case would be Jeanson finding a new director-coach who would soften her need to dominate and break spirits, who would teach her moderation. Instead of winning by miles in the springtime, she might coast and win all season long.
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