The Monuments : The Grit and the Glory of Cycling's Greatest One-Day Races

An awe-inspiring history of the five most legendary “classic” races in world cycling. The Tour de France may provide the most obvious fame and glory, but it is cycling's one-day tests that the professional riders really prize. Toughest, longest and dirtiest of all are the so-called 'Monuments', the five legendary races that are the sport's equivalent of golf's majors or the grand slams in tennis. Milan–Sanremo, the Tour of Flanders, Paris­–Roubaix, Liège–Bastogne–Liège and the Tour of Lombardy date back more than a century, and each of them is an anomaly in modern-day sport, the cycling equivalent of the Monaco Grand Prix. Time has changed them to a degree, but they remain as brutally testing as they ever have been. They provide the sport's outstanding one-day performers with a chance to measure themselves against each other and their predecessors in the most challenging tests in world cycling. From the bone-shattering bowler-hat cobbles of the Paris–Roubaix to the insanely steep hellingen in the Tour of Flanders, each race is as unique as the riders who push themselves through extreme exhaustion to win them and enter their epic history. Over the course of a century, only Rik Van Looy, Eddy Merckx and Roger De Vlaeminck have won all five races. Yet victory in a single edition of a Monument guarantees a rider lasting fame. For some, that one victory has even more cachet than success in a grand tour. Each of the Monuments has a fascinating history, featuring tales of the finest and largest characters in the sport. In this updated edition of The Monuments Peter Cossins tells the tumultuous history of these extraordinary races and the riders they have immortalised. Cover 1 Contents 6 Introduction: The making of the Monuments 8 Part I: Liège–Bastogne–Liège – ‘La Doyenne’ 12 1 A stuttering start 14 2 The emergence of La Doyenne 29 3 The greatest Classic ever? 47 4 Tougher than the rest 63 Part II: Paris–Roubaix – The Hell of the North 88 5 Babies’ heads, bowler hats and barnums 90 6 The birth of a legend 109 7 Under attack from tarmac 126 8 The north falls in love with ‘Hell’ 143 Part III: The Tour of Lombardy – The Race of the Falling Leaves 170 9 The birth of ‘the autumn criterium’ 172 10 Italian cycling’s golden age 188 11 ‘The most demanding race on the calendar’ 204 12 The forgotten Monument 220 Part IV: Milan–Sanremo – ‘La Classicissima’ 244 13 Putting Sanremo on the map 246 14 ‘A crazy, passion-filled race’ 262 15 Feast and famine for Italy 277 16 ‘It builds up like a thriller’ 295 Part V: The Tour of Flanders – Vlaanderens Mooiste 320 17 Emancipation for Flanders 322 18 The legend of the ‘Flandriens’ 339 19 The remaking of the Ronde 352 20 Bring on the bergs 368 Endpiece: Truly Monumental 396 Appendix 400 Bibliography 433 Acknowledgements 435 Index 437