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the eddy merckx story - the greatest cycling champion. double dvd set bromley video £33.99

eddy merckx story

in 1978, eddy merckx finished his career at the age of 33, and i finished college the very same year. it was 1983 before i owned a (cheap steel) road bike and became enthused about road racing due to the exploits of scots grimpeur, robert millar (where have we heard that name before?). i had certainly heard of merckx, as i think almost everybody has/had, but really had very little knowledge of why it was that i should have known more.

so my cycle heroes started with robert millar, took on a kind of diluted appeal with a deviation into mountain biking, though gert jan theunisse did sort of get a look in, and came out the other side with marco pantani. poor old eddy never really stood a chance. so when the opportunity came along to review this double dvd, i grasped the opportunity with both wheels.

the wonderful part about this is that i watched the whole two dvds as for the first time, and it was great. it really takes a presentation like this to put into perspective just how much merckx achieved over the course of his career. just to help me out, i wrote down as much as i could and it looks just as implausible in pixels as it does in any other medium. as a sample offering (and i apologise to those who followed every inch of eddy's career and need no reminding), eddy won five tours de france, including 34 stages, five giros d'italia, including 24 stages, one vuelta espana, including six stages, five liege bastogne liege, three paris roubaix, seven milan sanremo etc, etc.

eat your heart out lance armstrong

much of the interview footage was filmed in and around merckx's bike factory in belgium, but the archive footage was a revelation. i had no idea this much film of sixties and seventies cycling existed - including ernesto colnago shouldering merckx's spare hour record bike while eddy buried himself round the mexico velodrome. granted some of it leaves a bit to be desired in the quality stakes, but only in comparison to our current age of digital and broadband 'perfection'. the atmosphere and excitement engendered from some of these races, would make your kneecaps crinkle.

while dvd one presents merckx's career from beginning to end with some really insightful modern interview footage and commentary by phil liggett, dvd two deals with the friendly 'rivalry' between merckx and felice gimondi as well as an episode of a half hour tv programme 'champions'. oddly enough, one of the more pointed observations was just how frighteningly good is the memory of almost all the cyclists featured, including merckx. as someone who can barely remember what he had for tea last monday, merckx's recollection of who was in the sprint with him, and at what point he passed them in his fourth milan sanremo victory was particularly impressive.

bromley video are to be roundly congratulated for piecing all this together and issuing it in such an accessible format. if you, like me, are only vaguely aware of much of our cycling heritage, you owe it to yourself to at least acquaint yourself with the legend that is eddy merckx, and this is definitely the place to start.

since i take it as a badge of honour, as a reviewer of no particular note, to spot any particular negative aspects of the items under review, this dvd will be no exception. a subtitle at the very start names ugo derosa (he of derosa bike fame - who built eddy's latter career frames) as 'hugo'. the rest is pure dead brilliant.

available to order from bromleyvideo.com. grateful thanks to david bromley for his assistance with this review.

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this website is named after graeme obree's championship winning 'old faithful' built using bits from a defunct washing machine

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as always, if you have any comments on this nonsense, please feel free to e-mail and thanks for reading.

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