fiamme red
06-17-2010, 12:32 PM
2004 Cycle Sport interview:
http://www.cyclingweekly.co.uk/news/latest/473676/eddy-merckx-interview.html
Interviewing a legend is always interesting, for the interviewer at least. Eddy Merckx hadn't displayed any lack of patience, and answered everything without seeming to hold back. I was happy, but I have to say that his best answer was given that night during a post-dinner interview in front of all the Dave Rayner Fund guests. It was to a question put to him by the evening's master of ceremonies, the former world pursuit champion Hugh Porter.
Hugh had gone over bits of Eddy's career and got to the defining moment of the 1969 Tour de France. It was where, at the top of the Tourmalet climb with 130 kilometres to go, Merckx, already in the yellow jersey, attacked and cleared off alone to win the stage by eight minutes.
"Why did you do that?" asks Porter. Merckx, the spotlight shining on his face, is lost for a moment. He searches his mind for some kind of logic that we will understand, something that we will be able to relate to. Different ideas flicker, but there isn't any logic to what he did that day.
Suddenly he realises it and his face collapses into childlike innocence, he shrugs his shoulders, smiles and says, "Because I'm crazy." It brings the house down.
http://www.cyclingweekly.co.uk/news/latest/473676/eddy-merckx-interview.html
Interviewing a legend is always interesting, for the interviewer at least. Eddy Merckx hadn't displayed any lack of patience, and answered everything without seeming to hold back. I was happy, but I have to say that his best answer was given that night during a post-dinner interview in front of all the Dave Rayner Fund guests. It was to a question put to him by the evening's master of ceremonies, the former world pursuit champion Hugh Porter.
Hugh had gone over bits of Eddy's career and got to the defining moment of the 1969 Tour de France. It was where, at the top of the Tourmalet climb with 130 kilometres to go, Merckx, already in the yellow jersey, attacked and cleared off alone to win the stage by eight minutes.
"Why did you do that?" asks Porter. Merckx, the spotlight shining on his face, is lost for a moment. He searches his mind for some kind of logic that we will understand, something that we will be able to relate to. Different ideas flicker, but there isn't any logic to what he did that day.
Suddenly he realises it and his face collapses into childlike innocence, he shrugs his shoulders, smiles and says, "Because I'm crazy." It brings the house down.