Merckx’s tribute to Rik Van Looy: “A huge champion, an absolute icon”

Eddy Merckx greeted his “ami“, mentioning in a press release “a super champion who was almost unbeatable in the classics“. Like the Cannibal, the entire Cycling world is mourning this Wednesday the death, two days before his 91st birthday, of a true legend.

“Rik was a huge champion, an absolute icon with an incredible track record“, says Merckx, 79 years old, who was Van Looy’s teammate for one season (1965). “I’m happy to have been able to race against him, adds Le Cannibale. Recently, even though he was sick, he took the trouble to call me when I was in the hospital after my fall“, ten days ago. “Only in the last month has his condition deteriorated rapidly. A few days ago, I myself gave him words of encouragement“, says Merckx, the only Belgian cyclist to have more victories than Van Looy (525 against 371).

His imposing size never allowed him to win a Grand Tour (despite 37 stage victories in France, Italy and Spain) but thanks to his efficiency in sprinting, he was the first, before Merckx and Roger De Vlaeminck, to win the five Cycling Monuments (eight successes in total): Milan-San Remo (1958), the Tour of Flanders (1959, 1962), Paris-Roubaix (1961, 1962, 1965), Liège-Bastogne-Liège (1961) and the Tour of Lombardy (1959).

Above all, the Antwerp native (real first name Hendrik), also a double world and Belgian champion, is the only one to have won all the classics of his time (sixteen victories in all, including the Monuments), which n Merckx, never a winner of Paris-Tours, did not succeed. A newspaper deliverer (by bicycle) from the age of 12, Van Looy achieved the feat in 1962 of winning the three Flandrian classics in one week (Flanders, Roubaix and Ghent-Wevelgem).

He has the immense merit of having built up an extraordinary track record against opponents of an exceptional level, from Rik Van Steenbergen to Eddy Merckx, including Fausto Coppi, Ferdi Kubler, Hugo Koblet, Louison Bobet, Jacques Anquetil, Raymond Poulidor or Charly Gaul. His compatriot Roger De Vlaeminck (77 years old), one of the three winners of the five Monuments, expressed his “pain to see go” son “idol“. “We competed against each other for about four years. I still have a photo of Van Looy, Eddy Merckx and myself before the start of a race“, remembers De Vlaeminck.

At his peak, Van Looy received up to a thousand letters from admirers per week. “Younger people may not realize it but he was extraordinarily popular“, underlined Lucien Van Impe, last Belgian winner of the Tour de France (1976). The Frenchman David Lappartient, president of the International Cycling Union, said for his part onsaddened“by the announcement of the death of Rik Van Looy, who was”a monumental figure in cycling history, whose legacy will live on forever“.