The cycling mourns the loss of Walter Godefroot. The Belgian, in the 1990s and 2000s sporting director of the Radrennstall Team Telekom and the former Tour-de France winner Jan Ullrich, died at the age of 82.
The Belgian news agency Belga reported on Monday. Godefroot had recently lived in his homeland after he had Parkinson’s.
“Father” of the tour success of the Team Telekom
Godefroot played a large part in Team Telekom. After his arrival in 1992, he laid the foundation for the tour victory by the Danes Bjarne Riis 1996 and Ullrich in 1997. The cycling boom in Germany, which followed Ullrich’s Triumph, was also earned.
In 2005 Godefroot withdrew, and the doping machinations in the Telekom team, who had become public two years later, said he passed him.
Success as an active driver – Merckx “deeply touched”
As an active cyclist, Godefroot won ten stages on the tour of France, plus the prestigious classics Flanders tour and Liège-Bastogne-Liège in his homeland and Paris-Roubaix.
In 1965 and 1972, Godefroot won the Belgian championships ahead of Eddy Merckx. In 1964 he won bronze at the Olympic Games in Tokyo. Merckx reacted “deeply touched” to the news of Godefroot’s death. Godefroot was “underestimated” during his active career, said the Belgian icon of the French news agency AFP.