The 42-year-old from Murcia is a month away from ending a two-decade career of success and always one of the best bibs in the world
When Alejandro Valverde first dressed up as a professional cyclist in the summer of 2002, the Kelme veterans nicknamed him ‘Torrente’ for his quick Murcian accent. But no one was kidding that boy. His nickname was actually something else, ‘the unbeaten one’. I deserved it. As a child and teenager he had won almost everything. On the road and on the track.
This Sunday, already 42 years old and after two decades in the peloton, he said goodbye to the Vuelta with an ovation from the Madrid crowd. “I have enjoyed the affection of the people at every stage,” he thanked. In a month, after the Giro de Lombardia, the professional rider’s jersey will be removed forever. Farewell to the incombustible myth. To a unique cyclist. With 133 wins. Winner of the Vuelta, the World Cup and resident of the podium in the three Grand Tours, he is the rider with the most victories in Vlies Wallonia (5) and the first Spaniard to win Liège-Bastogne-Liège, where he has won four times .
No one has more medals (7) at the World Cup. And another thing: since his debut, he has been able to win in almost all types of races. He has been more complete than Miguel Indurain. And much loved. Realizing his dreams of winning the Innsbruck World Cup in 2018, Spanish national team player Javier Mínguez said: “I think the whole cycling world is happy that Alejandro won.” He deserved more than anyone else that gold that made him scream at the finish line. “It’s my favorite win,” says Valverde.
For the Murcian runner, the son of a bike-mad truck driver, cycling always seemed easy. Is there anything funny. Even before he was 30, his training partners admired him. “It was December. Alejandro had been ordered to retire, spend a month without training to rest and prepare well for the attack on the Tour. But the order was skipped. He didn’t feel comfortable without his bike. And one morning he went for a ride with us, who were already in shape for the Tour Down Under. We went to climb the Cresta del Gallo and he let We all left behind, then he kept calm and went back to his vacations,” said José Joaquín Rojas, one of his inseparables in Movistar.
Valverde is a chosen one. He was the Spanish Youth Champion on the road and track, winning the Spanish Cup sub’23. Unstoppable. In the 2005 Tour, he defeated Armstrong at the top of Courchevel. That flash made him strive even more to win one of the few races that wasn’t within his reach, the Tour.
The other was the World Cup. Until 2018. “I have already done everything in cycling”, he stated when he stepped down from the World Cup podium in Innsbruck. «Now I can retire in peace… Actually, after the fall in the Tour 2017, everything was already a gift. I began to think that my career had ended there.
That happened on July 1, 2017. It was raining over Düsseldorf, where the Tour started with a dangerous city time trial. Valverde came in with a knife at a treacherous turn. The tube slipped. The iron of a gate opened his knee and broke his ankle. Blood and bones in sight. “As soon as I fell, I looked at my knee. I’m not a doctor, but I thought I should have a prosthesis put in. That was the worst moment; those fifteen minutes on the ground until they put me in the ambulance,” he recalls. For the first time in his life he felt like a former cyclist. Just four months after sustaining an injury that could have knocked him off the bike, Valverde appeared intact. “When I could cycle again, I had to make do with an ankle splint. I couldn’t even put on my cycling shoe. That’s how I started. Then I could put on the shoe. To get off the bike, I had to take my foot out of the shoe with my hand,” he said. “Let’s see if I can win the fifth ‘Liège’. That’s how I match Merckx ».
That fight with the ‘cannibal’ measures him. Valverde is one of the great numbers in history. He was unable to overtake the Belgian myth in Liège, but in 2019 he still finished second in the Vuelta a España. Then the pandemic pushed the public out of the gutter. Valverde decided to stay active until the fans returned. During this Vuelta he has received a tribute at every stage. At the exit of Las Rozas, he discovered a statue in his honor. With open arms. Triumphant gesture: “I enjoy what I do”.
Leaving at the age of 42, after overcoming injuries and a doping suspension of almost two seasons, he knows no life other than cycling. He made his debut in 2002, when Armstrong ruled Beloki and Rumsas in the Tour, and in the Vuelta, Aitor González defeated Heras in the Bernabéu time trial. “I enjoy what I do. I have been very well advised by my team and then there is the family. It is also very important to always be able to train with my group of cyclists from Murcia. And, heh, heh, they can attack every day of course,” he says. It has been his engine. Cycling seen as a game rather than a job. “It was a privilege to have Alejandro,” said Movistar manager Eusebio Unzúe. “With him, there are options in every race. He was unique in that.” The director says it about Miguel Induráin and Pedro Delgado, among others. She has not lost him yet and she already misses him.
Source: La Verdad
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