A New Breed of Cycling Champ?

The significance of Cadel Evans's world championship victory has many aspects, but one that has been overlooked by most commentators is arguably the most significant: the people who are changing the culture and traditions of the old European cycling model.

There are two parts to this: the geography; and the cycling history. Looking at the geographical part, Evans' win is evidence that the sport is slowly becoming more global. By this I mean that the tight clique of nations in western Continental Europe are slowly loosening their grip. This might seem to some like a voluntary action, but I don't think so. It is no secret that for several decades, many continental Europeans have held onto the opinion that the anglo nations (Australia, Canada, Ireland, New Zealand, South Africa, United Kingdom, United States, etc.) don't really understand the essence of bicycle road racing.

There is some historical justification for this view. Looking at the world championship results back to 1927, we see that the first time an anglo rider to win a world championship was the Briton, Tom Simpson, in 1965. This was, in fact, only the second time a rider from outside the clique (France, Italy, Switzerland, Belgium, Netherlands) had won a road world's. So even though the prejudice seems mistaken now, you can see how it might have been formed.

Germans, Muller and Altig won in 1952 and '66, but the next time a non-clique nation won it was Greg Lemond in 1983 and again in '89. Lemond was really the start of the revolution, because he won several Tours de France as well, and showed the world that angl0 nations can understand cycling well enough to win its greatest prizes (some in the clique still wouldn't admit this - and at the time pointed to the fact that Lemond had a French-sounding name!). In 1987 Stephen Roche of Ireland claimed the rainbow jersey (in the same year he won the Tour de France and Giro d'Italia), and his compatriot Sean Kelly deserves credit too, because he was the most successful one-day racer of this era and it was paradoxical that he never won a road world's title. He was that good, and even the die-hards in Europe grudgingly admitted that Kelly was unbeatable in one-day competition.

During the 1980s we began to see a lot of English speakers on the top step of the podium. Fast forward again four years to 1993, when a young Lance Armstrong took the title, and it really was starting to look as though a new order was being established in road cycling.

Next we saw the emergence of Spain as a major force in international cycling, as Abraham Olano took the first rainbow jersey for his nation in 1994, beginning a decade when Spain would win five of the ten world's titles.

Romans Vaintsteins won it for Latvia in 2000, which further rocked the tradition, but toward the end of the first decade in the new millenium the old guard reasserted itself with Boonen winning for Belgium in 2005, followed by three Italian wins.

So bringing the conversation back to Evans: he brought to three the number of Anglo nations who have won a world championship; he was the first Australian to win the title. Evans' brilliantly tactical victory at Mendrisio in September 2009 made the statement that not only in the past 30 years have the clique nations had to share the rainbow jersey, but they've shared it with English speakers from several different nations.

The next part is briefer, but it is no less significant .... and again it's to do with exploding snobbish myths and traditions.

This is about the type of bicycles a champion has ridden in his career. Tradition has it that the world champion only ever rides a road bike in his life, with the occasional exceptions of traditional disciplines such as cyclo-cross or maybe track.

Not so for Evans. Cadel evans tooled about on a BMX bike as a child before taking up mountain biking as his sport of choice. Needless to say he excelled in the fat tire sport before deciding to seek fame and fortune on the road - where he became one of the top cyclists of his generation excelling in the Tour de France and now winning a world championship.

This resoundingly makes the point that it doesn't matter where a cyclist learns the sport. If the talent, dedication/desire, psyche, etc. are there, the rider can switch to a given discipline (road, track, mountain bike, bmx, etc.) at a relatively late age and still excel.

Some traditions are worth preserving, but cycling has a few that aren't. Lance Armstrong noticed this, and wears black socks in protest. Cadel Evans, while hardly an outspoken rebel, in quietly doing his own thing has become the latest in a line of Anglo riders who are irrevocably broadening the scope of this great and storied sport.