Alejandro Valverde, 42, says goodbye on this Tour of Spain. The affection for him is enormous despite the dark spots in his vita.
Banners can be seen all over the roadside of this Vuelta proclaiming the “Legend Valverde“ celebrate the “eternal Valverde“ greet or just say “Thanks Valverde“. Alejandro Valverde is on his farewell tour of Spain.
It’s the 16th Vuelta a Espana for the now 42-year-old professional cyclist. He played his first exactly 20 years ago. The following year he finished third overall – the promising start to an amazing career. Back then won Roberto Heras, Erik Zabel won two stages and the points jersey. It was a completely different generation that this young Spaniard was ushering in.
Against the generation after next
Currently the very old Spaniard is still driving, meanwhile against the generation after next. Remco Evenepoel22 years young, is getting ready for that vuelta to win. Juan Ayuso19, and Carlos Rodriguez, 21, fighting for a podium place. in between Enric Mas27, in second place.
Mas is teammate of Valverde – and thus the man on whom Valverde be careful on this tour. “Enric is well placed and I’m here to calm him down”, Valverde explains his duties. He says it as calmly as he is. Calmness in all racing situations was always his trademark.
He learned to be calm in a special way. He won many races when he was very young. For three years, between the ages of eleven and thirteen, won Valverde in his home region Murcia even all the races to which he did. That’s how he earned his name “el Imbatible”the unbeatable.
“At the time, however, I was much more nervous than today. I felt tremendous pressure, because not winning seemed bad to me. It was only over the years that I learned to lose better. Because in cycling you lose more often than you win.”said Valverde the sports show already at his penultimate Grand tourat the Giro d’Italia in May.
Quiet hope stage victory
In his farewell season, however, he is anything but unbeatable. Merely two wins, based on small races Majorca and in Galicia, he added to his otherwise very impressive record. Also at the vuelta he’s far from winning. He would like to round off his career with a stage win.
“If the team management told me to join a breakaway group today and fight for the day’s win, then I would do that too. But so far that hasn’t happened because we’re looking forward to the classification Enric Mas focus”says Valverdewhile a small shadow flies across his face.
Going against the team management or making extra requests is not his thing. Despite all the successes such as the 2018 World Championship title, the 2009 Vuelta victory, he has a total of five triumphs in the classic Fleche Wallonne and four of them near the Liège-Bastogne-Liège monument, remained modest.
“If I hadn’t become a professional cyclist, I would have become a truck driver like my father”, he likes to say. And operates with the long-suffering of a man who sits hundreds of kilometers a day on the box Valverde also his sport. That makes him popular peloton. Nobody likes to say a bad word about him because he doesn’t polarize people like some other stars of the scene.
The black moment
The media, and also the international fans, polarized Valverde certainly enormous. After all, he is one of the few convicted and convicted dopers as part of the doping investigation Operation Puerto. Valverde hurt the punishment. However, he continued to train obsessively during the suspension – and came back as strong as ever in the 2010 season. The 2018 World Cup title was his greatest hour, as he says himself.
He doesn’t describe his doping affair as the blackest hour – about which he tends to remain silent – but the heavy fall during the opening prologue of the Tour de France in Dusseldorf 2017. “At the time I thought my career was over”he said now. Valverde but recovered, returned, and continued to win. He won 133 professional races between 2003 and 2022, the first in the Basque Country and the last in Galicia.
For all this he is celebrated in Spain. his team Movistar had a huge portrait of the oldie spray-painted on the bus. The Vuelta organizers put the start of the 11th stage near Valverdes hometown Murcia. Whole legions of fans came to this occasion. Fernando Lopez MirasPresident of the region Murciapraised Valverde as the “best ambassador we can have”. The thick doping stain on the vest? Forgive, forget, considered irrelevant.
Better than before – and still not great
In terms of sport, of course, not much is going on anymore Valverde. Not because age is getting to him. At the beginning of the season he had better values than in previous years, he told the sports newspaper mark. “I was surprised myself”, he confessed. In his opinion, the fact that there is hardly enough to win is due to the increased performance of the competition. “We’re going faster now than we used to. That’s mainly because the average level has risen sharply.”he observed.
Even with personal bests, Alejandro Valverde can only get behind. That’s amazing. And for him probably the right moment to resign. He wants the next two years team Movistar support in a role that has not yet been defined. Now he wants to conclude his career with the fact that he Enric Mas with its calm and experience to vuelta-Victory guides. And if him Movistar leaves, then at the end he also hangs on to the World Cup in Australia.