In a report on cyclingweekly, journalist Chris Marshall-Bell debated what is simultaneously cycling’s greatest compliment and greatest curse.
Edwig Van Hooydonck was the first. After winning the Tour of Flanders at just 22 in 1989, the Belgian begged the press. “Please don’t call me Merckx again,” he shouted.
Twenty-nine years later, it was Remco Evenepoel’s turn. After becoming junior world time trial champion and jumping from the junior category, directly to the World Tour, the Belgian was definitive.
“Being described as the new Merckx is not something I want to hear,” he said. “Please stop this,” he later wrote on social media. “No one can be a new version of something incomparable. Stop comparing, please.”
Eddy Merckx incomparable
Since Eddy Merckx retired in 1978, coming to the end of an unparalleled career of 525 victories, including victories in every Grand Tour, Monument and almost every track and road race in which he competed. However, since his retirement the cycling world (especially Belgium) has been eager to find the “Cannibal’s” successor.
Alfons De Wolf
One of the men initially identified as “the next Eddy Merckx” was Belgian Alfons De Wolf, aged 20. Ultimately, it was a pressure he couldn’t live with. “The press started as soon as Eddy retired,” De Wolf told Cycling Weekly. “All the journalists were talking about finding a new Eddy, but the pressure was very high.”
“They’re still looking for the next Eddy, but they’ll never find one,” continues De Wolf sadly. “Just as you will never find the next Pelé in football.”
“The press tried to pressure me, but I was smart enough to know I wasn’t as good as Eddy. I could do a few good races, two or three months a season at a high level, but not a whole year. I knew what I could and couldn’t do”, he concludes.
“It was weird. I would walk into a store and everyone knew me. There were many requests from sponsors and even from some people asking me to enter politics, but none of that interested me.”
Frank Vandenbroucke
In the mid-1990s, Frank Vandenbroucke arrived on the scene. “With his talent, Frank is the Cruyff of cycling,” said Merckx, cleverly comparing VDB, as he was known, to footballer Johan Cruyff rather than himself. “He could win anything,” Merckx added.
Vandenbroucke never reached the heights expected of him, but he imitated Merckx with his extravagance. “We need heroes, examples,” wrote Belgian journalist Matthias Declercq about Vandenbroucke. “People who don’t break, people who free us from daily mediocrity. People who can fly, who do things we can’t.”
Now it’s Tadej Pogacar’s turn
The most recent, alongside Evenepoel, is the Slovenian Tadej Pogacar, who at just 25 years old, has already won 63 races, two Tours de France and three Monuments
“I have heard many times ‘this is the new Merckx’ without the condition being met, but with Tadej I think this time we have really got there,” said Merckx himself in 2021, adding that Pogačar “has no weaknesses and can do better than than me in some races”, concluded the true and, to this day, only Canibal.
