Cyclopedia (18 page)

The most celebrated and controversial trainer in modern-day cycling; a miracle-worker to his disciples who included the seven times TOUR DE FRANCE winner LANCE ARMSTRONG, but tainted with doping allegations according to his adversaries.

Ferrari comes from Emilia-Romagna in Italy and came to prominence as one of the coaches who guided FRANCESCO MOSER to his HOUR RECORD successes in 1984. He was Moser's team doctor in the 1984 season when the Italian won MILAN–SAN REMO and the GIRO D'ITALIA; in the early 1990s he worked with the Swiss star Tony Rominger, a triple winner of the Tour of Spain, and by 1994 he was doctor at the Gewiss team, which was, briefly, spectacularly successful, winning that year's Giro with Evgeni Berzin and several CLASSICS—including a clean sweep of the first three placings at the 1994 Flèche Wallonne. He was thrown off Gewiss after he told reporters that the banned blood booster EPO was no more dangerous than orange juice unless it was abused. In 1995, he was introduced to Armstrong by the American's friend EDDY MERCKX.

Armstrong's biographer Dan Coyle (see BOOKS) described him as “dark-haired and darty-eyed,” adding that he was nicknamed Dr. Evil because of his notoriety. Coyle related an episode in which Ferrari jokingly said that Parmesan cheese should be banned because it was good for those who ate it, thus giving them an unfair advantage. Ferrari said that
he and Armstrong had been in close contact since the early stages of his comeback from cancer in 1998, even though their relationship did not become public until 2000.

The Italian estimated that he spent one week a month in the cycling season with Armstrong. The Italian tested Armstrong to assess his power-to-weight ratio and lactate tolerance and worked to make him climb mountains using a higher, more efficient cadence. During some stages of the Tour, and most famously in the 2000 race, Ferrari would be in touch with Armstrong via a mobile phone to his team car to advise him on tactics at key moments. The partnership drew fierce criticism from Armstrong's fellow American, triple Tour winner GREG LEMOND.

Armstrong officially ended their collaboration in October 2004 when Ferrari was found guilty of unlawful distribution of medicines and sporting fraud, after a trial that had lasted several years. Subsequently the sentence would be rescinded on appeal. The main witness was Italian professional Filippo Simeoni, who alleged that Ferrari had advised him to use drugs: other witnesses disputed this, as did the trainer himself. There were no allegations concerning Ferrari's work with the Texan.

FIGNON, Laurent
(b. France, 1960 , d. 2010)

After retirement, the bespectacled, blond-haired double TOUR DE FRANCE winner ran motivational courses for industrialists. At his first meeting, he was greeted with the words “Aren't you the guy who lost the Tour de France by eight seconds?” Fignon replied solemnly that he preferred to be remembered as a man who won the race twice and also took back-to-back wins in the MILAN–SAN REMO classic (1988 and 1989).

Part of the legendary Renault
squad (see TEAMS), Fignon was one of the few cyclists to win the Tour at their first attempt (EDDY MERCKX and FAUSTO COPPI are two others). He followed up that 1983 win with an epic victory in the 1984 Tour, when he won five stages along the way and completely dominated four-time winner BERNARD HINAULT. He was also unlucky to lose the 1984 GIRO D'ITALIA to FRANCESCO MOSER.

His dramatic defeat by GREG LEMOND after a ding-dong battle throughout the 1989 race is what has stuck in most minds, however: it concluded what many saw as the finest Tour ever. Fignon began the 25 km final time trial stage from Versailles to the Champs-Elysées wearing the yellow jersey, with a 50 second lead on LeMond and victory seemingly in the bag.

Unfortunately he had a sore on his backside that made pedaling a penance, and, in addition, LeMond, a better time triallist at the time, was using radical new triathlon handlebars that gave him an advantage estimated at 1 second per kilometer (see AERODYNAMICS for other tricks). Fignon was at another disadvantage: he started three minutes after LeMond, and the crowd along the route could see he was behind the American. Their shouts of “25 seconds” and “you are behind” played on his mind.

Fignon was never the same after that defeat, although he won a stage in the 1992 Tour. He retired and ran the Paris–Nice race for a while and worked for French television. His memoir,
Nous Étions Jeunes et Insouciants
(
We Were Young and Carefree
), was published in 2009 and included a confession that he had used the drugs cortisone and amphetamine; the book was sympathetically received as before publication it was revealed that Fignon was suffering advanced cancer of the intestine and pancreas. He finally succumbed in August 2010. (See also DEFEATS.)

FILMS
The best cycling films of all time: a subjective list.

 

Breaking Away
(1979, dir. Peter Yates)

A growing-up movie, wistful and hilarious by turns, written by Steve Tesich and starring Dennis Christopher as an Italian-cycling obsessed lad in middle America. Dennis Quaid and Daniel Stern costar. Dave Stoller's cycling passion is a framework for exploring his and his friends' fraught relations with the local college boys and the exhilaration and disillusion of their entering the adult world. The best scene, for me, is where Dave attempts to talk Italian to a group of professionals who visit for a local race; they respond by putting a pump in his front wheel. The film is based on a real-life race, the Little 500 race in Indianapolis; Dave Stoller is named after a legendary rider Dave Blasé (like the film Dave an Italian enthusiast) and his manager Bob Stoller.

 

American Flyers
(1985, dir. Steve Badham)

Stars David Grant as Marcus, a young cyclist who dreams of winning a prestigious bike race in Colorado, with a young Kevin Costner (sporting a cheesy 1980s moustache) supporting as his elder brother, a failed international. Also written by Tesich, this one uses cycling to explore the tensions within Marcus's family following the death of his father. Great '80s soundtrack, the most fearsome beard in cycling (see HAIR for other tonsorial nasties), and fine location footage from the Coors Classic (see UNITED STATES OF AMERICA for more on this race). Badham was also responsible for the iconic disco film
Saturday Night Fever
.

 

Bicycle Thieves (Ladri di Biciclette)
(1948, dir. Vittorio De Sica)

Iconic black-and-white Italian film about the economic deprivation that followed the Second World War. The central character is a man dependent on his bike to earn a living: it is stolen, and he and his son desperately try to recover it. Finally he faces a dilemma: should he become a thief as well?

 

Sunday in Hell
(1977, dir. JØRGEN LETH)

Probably the greatest cycling documentary ever, based on the 1976 PARIS–ROUBAIX race, seen from different viewpoints—riders, spectators, mechanics, protesters who stop the race—and including stars of the time such as EDDY MERCKX and Freddy Maertens. The slow-motion footage of cyclists bouncing over the cobbles is spinechilling. (See Leth's entry for his other documentaries.)

La Course en Tête
(1974, dir. Joel Santoni)

Follows Merckx in the 1973 Vuelta and Giro, shot in the style of French
cinema-vérité
, including the iconic scene in which the Cannibal rides the rollers in his garage with the sound constantly increasing. Combines live and archive footage to a bizarre baroque soundtrack.

 

Le Vélo de Ghislain Lambert
(2001, dir. Philippe Harel)

Belgian comedy narrated by Antoine de Caunes, starring Benoît Poelvoorde as a cyclist who wants to be a great but can't quite make it. Includes a defining scene in which two cyclists try to inject amphetamines in each others' buttocks in a very small toilet cubicle.

(2003, dir. Sylvain Chomet)

Hilarious, poignant, and beautifully drawn cartoon parable. It stars a cyclist with a distinct resemblance to FAUSTO COPPI, his unfeasibly supportive grandmother, and their loyal if depressed-looking dog Bruno, set against a backdrop that can only be the Tour in the 1950s. The cyclist is kidnapped by villains who make him race continually on a stationary bike to recreate the Tour for gambling. Granny and dog set out to rescue him.