Read We Were Young and Carefree Online
Authors: Laurent Fignon
We Were Young and Carefree (22 page)
As I will show later on, I am perfectly willing to take responsibility when I do something wrong, but unfortunately the truth about this positive test was different. I say ‘unfortunately’ because I believe I was the victim of a conflict between two competing laboratories who were fighting over the market for anti-drugs testing for the whole of Belgium. The samples were taken in Namur and the flasks then took three days to arrive in Liège. Why? Where were they?
I was innocent but I will never be able to prove I was, because at that time, incredible as it may seem, it was still against the rules to request a second analysis in a laboratory other than the one in which the first, positive test had been carried out. That was ridiculous – why would a laboratory contradict its first finding?
The story behind this race also needs to be told so that you get the picture. Usually there were no drug tests at the event. Everyone knew it; this was part of the ‘tradition’ at certain races on the calendar. A lot of riders must have assumed that this year’s edition would be run in the usual way, except that the organisers came to warn us the day before: this year, there were to be drug tests. At least then it was clear. A lot of the peloton were glad they had been warned but it didn’t make any difference to me for one simple reason: I would never have dreamed of taking a drug that might be detected on the day of a race. And what’s more, that year, I went flat-out for the win knowing that there would be a control, which proves – if you need extra evidence – that I had a clear conscience. And a few days after – positive. It was a lie.
I have to admit that this business really upset me. We knew through the grapevine that there were sometimes dodgy dealings and we got wind of things that were really underhand. According to the stories that we heard, there were even occasions when
directeurs sportifs
might betray their own riders. As far as I was concerned, when I was given anything for medical reasons, whether it was vitamins, supplements or even antibiotics, I was adamant that I had to be shown the boxes or the tablets in their original packaging. I only believed my own eyes.
directeurs sportifs
might betray their own riders. As far as I was concerned, when I was given anything for medical reasons, whether it was vitamins, supplements or even antibiotics, I was adamant that I had to be shown the boxes or the tablets in their original packaging. I only believed my own eyes.
After all this, I had no great desire to compete. I was depressed by the rumours that inevitably began circulating after this mishap. No one believed I was telling the truth, obviously. Since my operation, which had followed Hinault’s, and above all since the succession of injuries to Marc Madiot, Pascal Poisson and Martial Gayant, there were people out there who dreamed up stuff about ‘Guimard’s way of doing things’. There was one journalist who had no qualms about suggesting that we all limped with our right legs because that was the leg in which we received injections. The craziest thing is that there were people who believed this nonsense.
At the Tour of Switzerland, everyone understood that I was not in my usual state. My moral was at a low ebb. I felt an insane desire to send everyone packing. All anyone wanted to discuss was my ‘positive’ test and I was undermined by the notion that anyone could believe I was a cheat. In addition, my wife was pregnant and I simply wanted to think about things other than bike racing. I felt a bit as if I didn’t want to be there and the way I behaved may have seemed strange to onlookers. I was irritated, and got worked up over nothing. I became provocative at the slightest opening. We were by now only a few days away from the start of the Tour de France and I was having grave doubts about my ability to return to the top of my sport.
In Switzerland a ‘great’ journalist arranged an interview. I say ‘great’ because he was a national celebrity in his field and that is how he introduced himself to me. He had clearly never spent any time in a cycling team’s hotel and he had no notion of the routine that we stick to in the evening after a stage. My massage ran late and I was fifteen minutes behind schedule for the interview in one of the meeting rooms. He made it clear that he was not happy, even showed a certain amount of irritation. My attempts to explain what had happened were not good enough. Then he began the interview. It was surreal. ‘What are you called?’ he began. I was dumbstruck. Then he continued: ‘What is your date of birth?’ And then: ‘What big races have you won?’
I had no option but to bring this session to an end, rather abruptly. I said, ‘Stop. We can’t go on with this. If you don’t even know the basic minimum about the person you are interviewing you have no business with me.’
He yelled ‘I’m one of the most important journalists in Switzerland, and just wait till you see what I write about you.’
He thought I might be intimidated. I leant towards him, pointed my finger at him, and said: ‘I don’t give a monkey’s, you can write what you like.’ And I turned on my heel.
The guy was beside himself, and who knows what he yelled at me as I walked out. It was an incredible spectacle.
I’ve totally forgotten the name of this journalist and I never actually read his article. No doubt he took great pleasure in taking my character apart, and he probably demonstrated immense writing skill.
CHAPTER 23
THE END OF A LITTLE WORLD
At the height of my glory in 1984, with the dumb confidence of a man who knows just how good he is, I had declared: ‘I’ll race until I’m thirty and then I’ll live off my winnings.’ It was said in total sincerity and was typical of the way I could behave. But the passing of time takes no account of our expectations. I had not the slightest inkling that I might be injured, nor that I might have a year out of cycling, nor what the physical consequences might be. I was now aware that it had been stupid to name a date in this way because saying this kind of thing can look like a commitment. Whenever I was asked about it I would display a genuine lack of certainty about how much time I now had in me. I could barely even see as far ahead as the 1987 Tour, even though it was now imminent, so a possible end of my adventures in the peloton was further than my imagination could stretch.
I knew better than anyone that
La Grande Boucle
is an unforgiving arena. It even seemed to me that the whole of human life was written in the twists and turns of a single Tour de France. Great joy would give way to misery, and the wheel kept turning, turning. I had believed that I was hugely strong – not invincible – but fate had brought me brutally back to reality. I have to confess that in that summer of 1987 my situation was a dire one. I had been riding like a shadow of myself for two years now. It’s hard to put my feelings into words but I could feel what was coming, like a wild animal senses an approaching storm. Do people actually understand just how difficult bike racing is? Have they ever wondered why it is that the greatest minds of the twentieth century have always compared cycling to boxing, putting these two sports above all others for their sheer toughness?
La Grande Boucle
is an unforgiving arena. It even seemed to me that the whole of human life was written in the twists and turns of a single Tour de France. Great joy would give way to misery, and the wheel kept turning, turning. I had believed that I was hugely strong – not invincible – but fate had brought me brutally back to reality. I have to confess that in that summer of 1987 my situation was a dire one. I had been riding like a shadow of myself for two years now. It’s hard to put my feelings into words but I could feel what was coming, like a wild animal senses an approaching storm. Do people actually understand just how difficult bike racing is? Have they ever wondered why it is that the greatest minds of the twentieth century have always compared cycling to boxing, putting these two sports above all others for their sheer toughness?
When the Tour came, once again I would learn where I stood, even if I was afraid of what the answer might be. I arrived at the start in a lousy mental state. From what I could see my form was uncertain and I was still desperately seeking the psychological turning point that would enable me to bury my doubts and get rid of everyone else’s worries at the same time. And what’s more, the problems within the team were becoming more and more poisonous. The atmosphere was difficult, tense. Our system was disintegrating. In theory, Guimard was in charge, but Guimard wasn’t a natural boss. Insidiously, perhaps without even formulating the thought in our minds, we were each beginning to have our doubts about the other. He wasn’t sure I could return to the top, I wasn’t convinced of his ability as an administrator. That didn’t help at all.
I began with a catastrophic ride in the prologue time trial in Berlin: seventy-second was shameful. I can no longer remember how I reacted, or how other people looked at me. And in the first few stages, it was as if I wasn’t there, and part of me was indeed somewhere else. My body was pedalling but my mind was wandering. Nothing was going right. My wife Nathalie was about to give birth; I thought a good deal about becoming a father, and taking part in the Tour at this important time seemed almost incongruous. That did not explain why I was performing so badly, however, but every time I met the slightest obstacle, I felt an almost tangible urge to run for home. It was like being in a dark tunnel. As soon as I found myself in a slightly tricky situation I would always tend to go into my shell, whereas before I had always managed to pull out a little bit extra.
Guimard, who was always at the forefront of technical development, had made us wear some of the very first pulse monitors to hit the market. According to him, they would revolutionise the way we analysed the physical effects when we pushed our bodies hard. After tests the doctors had advised me that ‘165 beats per minute is your absolute limit. Above that you will blow up very soon.’ To begin with I didn’t take it that seriously but soon, the second I noticed my heart-rate monitor above 165, I would rein myself in. It became impossible to force myself to go that little bit harder.
I worked out later that mentally I was not willing to go past a certain level of pain, but still, as a matter of course, and with as much enthusiasm as you could wish, I set to work for Charly Mottet, who was well placed overall. That made me a star turned team rider, but I had no trouble with my ego in this respect. On the contrary.
On the other hand, I was beginning to know by heart just how painful defeat always feels. That ache had been ravaging me for so long, and so unfairly. The way people behaved towards me had changed radically. Since 1986 I had noticed that journalists were keeping away and there were fewer letters in the post. That all seemed reasonable to me, but none of us is ever ready for this kind of change. What did shock me on the other hand was the speed with which people forget what you have achieved. A rider who has won the Tour de France two years in a row should always be worth two Tours in other people’s eyes. But I ended up being completely undervalued. I couldn’t work out why. Even my appearance money was slipping downwards. I understood completely that there would be more interest in the riders who were making headlines, but I didn’t understand why race organisers didn’t want me at the same price as before. To be honest, that only happened in cycling. I remember falling out with the organisers of the Paris six-day race, who refused to meet what they termed my ‘financial pretensions’. They were having a laugh. They simply wanted to get me at a discount. I didn’t mind haggling if that was necessary, but going below the limit that I had set for myself would have been degrading. At a certain point I would believe wholeheartedly that I was worth so much and they could take it or leave it, and it didn’t matter if I started or not. I would rather not race than feel anything akin to humiliation.
On that Tour de France, I felt I was suffocating, right up until the celebrated time trial stage up Mont Ventoux. It’s a legendary mountain, backdrop for all kinds of cycling feats. It’s a majestic theatre, a symbolic frontier between northern and southern France and a sanctuary to Tom Simpson’s memory. That is where Jean-François Bernard achieved the feat that everyone knows about, collapsing in tears on the finish line in the arms of his guru Bernard Tapie. The boss, father and master, perhaps already totting up the rise in his share prize and drawing all the cameras towards him. The rider, seemingly the son but probably more a slave, reaching here, on the sacrificial altar, the climax of a career that already bore the genes of its own very premature downfall.
On this mountain top, in front of a hysterical crowd, I had decided to give it my all, absolutely everything I had: motivation, concentration, will to win. Unfortunately nothing happened, nothing at all. All I had was the
coup de pédale
of a cycle tourist. There was emptiness, nothingness. Everything simply subsided at once: I’d had too much emotional turmoil, too many troubles to deal with. What else can I say, other than that it was all very real. My placing was sixty-fourth, more than ten minutes behind Jean-François Bernard. I was appalled by my performance.
coup de pédale
of a cycle tourist. There was emptiness, nothingness. Everything simply subsided at once: I’d had too much emotional turmoil, too many troubles to deal with. What else can I say, other than that it was all very real. My placing was sixty-fourth, more than ten minutes behind Jean-François Bernard. I was appalled by my performance.
My son had been born the day before. I almost went home. On the climb there were spectators who had found out who shouted, ‘Come on, dad!’ It was savage. I simply couldn’t move. It hurt all over. Such was Mont Ventoux.
Climbing into the team minibus on the finish line I cracked. ‘I’m never going to make it,’ I thought. When I was well away from prying eyes, I wept for a long time.
That evening, a journalist happened to meet me at the hotel and asked me: ‘Is Bernard your successor?’
I answered: ‘Does that mean you’ve got me dead and buried already?’
He said: ‘Maybe.’
I replied: ‘Well, that’s yet another way of getting me to show you you are wrong.’
I was raging mad. I had the very distinct impression that this was the end. This was no longer where I wanted to be. I noticed later that I definitely have to hit rock bottom before I can pick myself up. I have to go deep down into distress before climbing back out again.
After the Ventoux, after these agonising episodes, there was now no question of quitting. I wanted to demonstrate to everyone that I could still spring the odd surprise. The very next day we had a look at the route map and we decided to ‘skip the
ravito
’ – race hard through the feeding station while the other guys slowed up to collect their rations. That put us back in the thick of the action. This was the day that Bernard lost the race, for good. His teammates wanted to get him up to the front at once but he was not concerned, and refused, saying they had plenty of time to get back on terms. It was a basic error because, up front, an imposing alliance of rival riders was coming together.
ravito
’ – race hard through the feeding station while the other guys slowed up to collect their rations. That put us back in the thick of the action. This was the day that Bernard lost the race, for good. His teammates wanted to get him up to the front at once but he was not concerned, and refused, saying they had plenty of time to get back on terms. It was a basic error because, up front, an imposing alliance of rival riders was coming together.
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