Eddy Merckx

“I really worked hard and overcame mental barriers to achieve those records.”

“I think I was three or four when I first rode and four when I first crashed.”

“I sleep very well, thank you.”

“I'd have no problem with Cavendish winning 34 or 35 Tour stages.”

“I always had a strong lieutenant to help me, but Hinault doesn't need one.”

“If you win once, you want more. You are not satisfied.”

“The closest I have come to death was when I had my crash at the Blois outdoor velodrome in central France in September 1969.”

“I hated losing. Being defeated made me sick, I couldn't stand it.”

“I can tell you I preferred my era. Yes, they make much more money now but I preferred my cycling. The passion for racing. I like more racing. Now riders they train all the time. Not so much racing.”

“The most important thing is that you're the best of your generation and I can say that I was.”

“The day when I start a race without intending to win it, I won't be able to look at myself in the mirror.”

“When the terrible accident occurred, at least I escaped with my life. I was the lucky one, that was my reaction.”

“I don't know if Armstrong will find it hard to get into normal life. You can't really compare our cases. He is a racer, too, but he has had cancer and has found other things in life which are important.”

“Fear never left me during the tour - the fear of a spill, fear for accidents, for mishaps, for the unexpected which might ruin everything at the end.”

“I do not want to continue cycling until I am 35. I want to make something else out of my life, too. There are other things besides a bike and racing.”

“I'm not saying that every time I race I go to the very limit of my strength. But when the opportunity appears I consider it immoral not to take them.”

“Riders are not criminals.”

“I have decided to give up competition. I cannot train properly for the Tour de France which I had hoped to ride for the last time as apotheosis to my career. Doctors are forbidding me to ride anymore in high level competition and I bow to them.”

“I agree it is the most important, but cycling is not only about Tour. If everybody thinks like Armstrong, there will be only one race.”

“Even when I was a kid I wanted to win everything: a game of Monopoly, a game of cards, dominoes.”