Miguel Indurain: “Enric Mas is good, among the best”

As he finishes his preparations for the Titan Desert 2023, Miguel Indurain (July 16, 1964 Villava, Navarra) found a moment in his busy schedule to attend the MD and perform a quick scan of the current cyclist.

How would you assess the Movistar team’s signing of Fernando Gaviria this season?

They are teams that an auctioneer must have. Ultimately you aim for good tours, but it can be good or bad and you have to win stages throughout the year. get Now what matters to the teams is winning. Before, if you got the top ten it was a good place, but now you either win or it’s not worth it. Teams need to be strengthened by winners.

We are three months into the season without Alejandro Valverde.

In the end, everything will come. It has been fun for many years and has given us much joy.

Does it remind you in any way of the day you left him? Is it hard to understand that you need to step aside?

Yes, it costs, but you see that every year it costs. Age weighs on you, the kilometers you covered during your sports career and stress weigh you down, and you need to be convinced. The hard part is not competing, the hard part is training every day, taking care of yourself, overcoming injuries, all the things that can get you through the race. Then the race is what you want and you take more or less, but training throughout the year is the most complicated. And the year you are not motivated for it, it is better to leave it.

How do you see current cycling compared to your era?

Much has changed, although the method of running is the same. The stages are reduced because nowadays you don’t organize a young person in an eight-hour stage of 260 or 300 kilometers that we did and everything has to be faster. Faster and more intense phase. It has changed a lot in the sense that now they will race in Argentina, Australia or the United Arab Emirates. The teams were also from all over the world, before there were more teams from Europe.

Do you think if you were competing now you would be able to do your running as well?

I had to adapt to a different type of cycling. In my time there were longer time trials, now there are several hour trials. I have to adapt to other types of training and courses and give it my all. The percentages are now harder on the climbs but there are also more developments. One thing is paid for by another.

Do you still enjoy cycling when you see it from the outside?

Yes. It’s not like being in a race, but I’m enjoying it. I don’t follow every race, but I follow the good and interesting ones, and I like to see the tactics used, how they come out in the race.

Beyond the Tour, is there another race you wouldn’t miss for worlds?

I have never been very classic, yes great tours. I haven’t caught the bug yet, they work differently in stage races. I prefer week-long races, like the Volta Ciclista a Catalunya, or the grand tours.

If it were up to you, would you remove the earpieces?

I don’t want to, because the runners, I talk to, they tell me that they love them, for safety. They have pros and cons. The advantages of security, of knowing that they are connected to the equipment, of knowing what is going on; and then there are directors who go a little too far. If a runner likes them, it’s for a reason. I will remove more information that the directors have on the cars, now they have television and everything. They connect with the people they have in the hotels who do big data and things like that. You can restrict all this information a little, so that it does not reach the director. Technology is evolving and you can’t deny it.

Do you sometimes think that there is another rider who could surpass the record of five Tour victories that you share with Anquetil, Merckx and Hinault?

I did my best with my time, with my ups and downs and my injuries and I got what I got. I won the Tours, Giros, La Vuelta I can’t, the World Cups too. Anyone who wants to match us can do so for free. There is a lot of competition and it is very difficult to win the Tour. It looks easy when you watch it on TV but balancing a whole year and having a career in it is complicated.

Which riders interest you the most from the current peloton?

I’m looking for them. Dumoulin, who was one of my favorites, left him. I prefer big runners, which are good time trials.

Philip Ganna?

Yes, but he doesn’t want to go on grand tours. It will have an engine, but it must have a mind. He had found his little things and still had them, so I continued to look for my broker.

Late last year, Spanish cycling took off. How do you see it?

It’s okay, even if the Pro Tour teams are missing. We have one Movistar, which is the reference, but then there are many continental ones. Something similar is happening in Italian cycling. Spain has adapted to the new situation in cycling, and companies, because cycling is very international, must be a multinational that bet on cycling, and the children are coming out, which is what is needed. What could be better, yes; but it’s okay.

And among them all, Enric Mas is the benchmark. Do you see him as a solid candidate for success in a great cycling tour?

Enric Mas is fine, what happens is that the fight is difficult because there are good riders, but he is at his level. He has his style and way of running. He is among the best and does great things. You always want to win and win, but you have to know that the opponent is difficult, the races are difficult to execute and Enric Mas has power, his explosiveness, but what he lacks is confidence. Last year he already achieved achievements, the day he gains more confidence things will be better for him.