This is the Eddy Merckx Hour Record, the last set in the way most had before, by great road racers tacking an attempt onto the end of a long hard road season.
Merckx insists he did some specific training, including rudimentary altitude simulation, but it’s hard to see where because in the days running up to the attempt, he won the Giro del Piemonte, Il Lombardia and 2 criteriums, then was 2nd in the Trofeo Baracchi.
The record venue was Mexico City’s Olympic Velodrome, an outdoor track at altitude. The idea was to fly in, do the record then leave, but a torrential storm meant it was 48 hours before he could even train on the track.
There were discussions about the start time. Should it be in the evening or in the morning? A morning start would harmonise with Merckx’s body clock, so the bid was scheduled for 9am on October 25.
Merckx had planned to attack the 10 and 20-kilometre world records first, then make a separate bid for The Hour. The storm delay scuppered that plan; he had to go for all 3 records in one ride.
Some experts warned against that, but when 10 kilometres flashed by in 11 minutes 53.20 seconds, 5 seconds faster than the Dane Ole Ritter’s record, Merckx gained confidence. He continued to gain on Ritter too, passing 20 kilometres in 24:06.80, beating the old record by 11 seconds. Then reality began to bite. Locked in one position on his bike his back injuries, caused by a near fatal crash, it was fatal for his pacer Fernand Wambst, in a 1969 motor-paced race flared up.
Merckx was in agony but pressed on. He’s always said the Hour Record took years off his life, but he rode 49.431 kilometres in the hour. It was 778 metres further than Ritter in 1968 and lasted until 1984, when Francesco Moser beat it riding a low-profile bike with disc wheels.
Merckx did his record on a bike with standard geometry and spoked wheels. To put his ride into context, when the UCI changed the rules for The Hour in 1997 and would only ratify records set on standard geometry bikes with spoked wheels, Chris Boardman broke Merckx’s 1972 record, but only by 10 metres.
Read more about Merckx in Cycling Legends 04: Flandriens - https://cyclinglegends.co.uk/products/cycling-legends-04-flandriens-by-chris-sidwells
Photo Credit: L'Equipe
