Lucien Van Impe

Lucien Van Impe (born 20 October 1946 in Mere, Belgium) was a Flemish cyclist from 1969 to 1987. He excelled mainly in multiple-day races such as the Tour de France: he started 15 times and reached the finish in Paris every time, and won in 1976. He was above all a famed climber, the best of his generation and one of the best in history.

Van Impe credits the start of his career to Spaniard Federico Bahamontes, himself a famed climber nicknamed the eagle of Toledo and former Tour de France winner; Bahamontes used his influence to get Van Impe a contract as a professional. Van Impe won the polka dot jersey as "King of the Mountains" six times in the Tour, a record shared with Federico Bahamontes; Richard Virenque broke the record with a seventh victory in 2004. Van Impe has criticized Virenque for being an opportunistic rider rather than the best climber; he also said to have refrained from breaking Bahamontes' record himself out of reverence to Bahamontes.

As a rider, Van Impe joined Cyrille Guimard's team in 1976. In that year he duelled several times with Joop Zoetemelk in the mountains. Guimard claims that it was his order to attack the defending champion Zoetemelk that gave Van Impe his victory in the Tour de France, shouting at van Impe that he'd run him off the road with the car if he didn't attack [1]. Van Impe has denied this in various interviews. On Alpe d'Huez the latter won, but in the Pyrenees Van Impe secured his victory. In 1977 he started as one of the favorites in the Tour, but failed to take a lead in the mountain stages. He waited until the very last mountain stage, to Alpe d'Huez, but forgot to eat timely, causing him to lose his lead. In that tour, he was also caught by one of the accompanying cars and fell, another cause for his defeat to French champion, Bernard Thévenet.

After three lesser years, seemingly over his height, Van Impe made a strong comeback in 1981 with a second place in the final classification and a first place in the mountain classification. Afterwards he still won the mountain classification in the Giro d'Italia twice.

Single-day races were not his specialty, therefore it was a surprise that he won the Belgian road cycling championship in 1983.

Most important successes as professional cyclist

1971

• Mountain classification Tour de France

1972

• Stage in Tour de France

• Mountain classification Tour de France

1973

• Stage in Tour de France

1975

• 2 stages in Tour de France

• Mountain classification Tour de France

1976

• Tour de France

• Stage in Tour de France

1977

• Stage in Tour de France

• Mountain classification Tour de France

1979

• Stage in Tour de France

1981

• Stage in Tour de France

• Mountain classification Tour de France

1982

• Mountain classification Giro d'Italia

1983

• Stage in Giro d'Italia

• Mountain classification Giro d'Italia

• Belgian championship on the road

• Stage in Tour de France

• Mountain classification Tour de France