David Walsh on the Tour de France with Sean Kelly

It was the seventh day of the Tour de France. Sean Kelly's massage went on until about eight-thirty; it was going to be one of those long days. He said he would finish his meal in a half an hour but in France you don't eat quickly and it was ninethirty when Kelly returned.

The Novotel Hotel in Nantes is a fairly typical resting place for the Tour de France rider. Big, conventional but nevertheless comfortable. As good a place as any to lay down a weary head. Considering that the day's work had been a particularly searching episode of the Tour, Kelly was noticeably fresh.

A quiet corner is found in the bar.

Two glamorous ladies, who have come in search of Tour "strays", sip their drinks expectantly and ensure that we're not entirely alone. When speaking to this particular athlete you don't even offer to buy him a drink. Kelly waits for the questions.

Five hours earlier he had been pedalling furiously at the end of an exhausting 59 kilometre time trial, a ride that had taken him into third place on the Tour. It had been a fine performance, superior to that produced by any rider in the top fifteen but Kelly is not the type who wants to be patted on the back. If he has an ego, he manages to conceal it.

Sean Kelly is something of a character. At the end of that time trial into Nantes he had to ride through the city's Parc des Expositions to get to the finishing line. As man and machine negotiated the second last bend in marvellous harmony, an Irish voice could be heard: "get up Sean, get up."

While all around were absorbed in the struggle, Kelly's head turned and sought to pick out the Irish face. It was a hopeless quest but as his eyes ran over countless unknown faces one could not help smiling at the extent of his curiousity. Here is a man pushing body and mind beyond the boundaries of normal pain in one of the world's most punishing sporting escapades and he wants to know whose is the Irish voice in the crowd. A bit like Eamonn Coghlan furiously glancing through the Moscow crowd in the middle of the Olympics 5000m final. It simply is not done.

SEAN KELLY IS THE MOST successful cyclist this country has ever produced and is now regarded, along with Eamonn Coghlan, as one of Ireland's two most successful international sports persons.

Last month he spent twenty-four days attempting to win cycling's greatest prize, the Tour de France. His quest, brave, determined and all that, failed in the stifling heat of the south of France. Even by the standards of that part of Europe, the temperatures were unusually high and when Kelly began to ascend the challenging peaks of the Pyrenees and the Alps he suffered.

He found that featherweight Colombians, Spaniards and even Frenchmen could propel their machines upwards far faster than he could. On two days he let them go on the early climbs in the hope that he would pick them off in the later climbs. While he did not catch all of them, he did cut his losses. On the third day he gambled by going with them at their frightening pace on the first climb but then had nothing left for the later climbs. That day he lost badly.

So the man who was the devastating sprinter and superb time trial exponent in this year's Tour failed to master the third aspect of the sport, Le climbing, and had to satisfy himself with seventh place overall in a race which had one hundred and forty starters. Easily the best performance by an Irish rider in the Tour but for Kelly it was disappointing.

Tour de France prize money is notoriously small but Kelly would still have earned his team around £18,000 over the duration of the event. That amount must be divided ten ways and when it eventually reaches each rider the pay-off will be relatively small.

For Kelly the financial rewards come in the two to three weeks immediately after the Tour.

Then his much used limbs will be dragged to the smaller towns and villages of France: to where there are criteriums and appearance money. These are races on a tight circuit in the centre of the hosting town or village where the spectators pay for the privilege of seeing the professional heroes close up. Kelly, with his big name and green Tour de France jersey, will receive something around £1,200 each time he participates in one of these races. Over the three weeks he could earn anything up to £20,000.

About his earnings, Kelly is politely reticent. Discussions with other riders induce one to believe that as bike riders go, Kelly is very highly paid. At the start of each season he receives a signing-on fee, last season it was thought to be £80,000 to £90,000. With a reasonable amount of success, earnings could be increased by another £50,000 to £60,000.

This season Kelly has done very well - he has won Paris/Nice (nineday), Criterium International (twoday), the Tour of Switzerland (eleven day) and claimed the green jersey in the Tour de France - it is likely that his earnings will not be less than £150,000 for the season. There would hardly be ten cyclists in the world earning that kind of money.

THE BAR IN THE NOVOTEL remains quiet and as Kelly begins to feel more relaxed, the talk becomes a little less formal. He discharges his duties to the media with a studied courtesy but he prefers to live his life as informally as possible. Kelly has never been a man for a neck-tie.

Possibly the most interesting chapter in the ensuing conversation concerns a young rival of Kelly, Eric Vanderaerden. A first year professional, Vanderaerden has made quite a name for himself on the circuit. He is the young (22), trigger-happy gunslinger who came into town looking for the man who was reckoned to be the fastest, Kelly.

And sure, the Belgian is fast. Good enough to beat Kelly in a few sprints, although the Irish rider won more than he lost. But Vanderaerden was also more than a little reckless. When sprinting he often did things which were, even to men who possess the instinct of the frenzied animal, unacceptable. In the Paris to Nice race earlier this season Vanderaerden was race-leader early on and in a moment of extreme carelessness he caused Kelly to crash.

Consequently Kelly dropped from second to ninety~sixth place on general classification and Vanderaerden survived with his leader's jersey still intact. After that stage Kelly made a point of facing up to Vanderaerden. In the plainest of Flemish, he told his Belgian friend that if he (Vanderaerden) had the race lead on the last day that there would be another crash. This time it would be on a descent and it would be Vanderaerden who would suffer.

But Kelly never needed to carry out that threat. By the end of Paris/Nice he had climbed from the pits to the race leader's position and Vanderaerden had slipped into the oblivion of defeat. But the message was delivered in a way that the Belgian fully understood and since that incident he has treated Kelly and his Sem team with a degree of respect which in bike racing is almost unseemly.

With others, young Vanderaerden continues to play the hard man. On the third stage of this year's Tour de France into the town of Roubaix, he caused a quite appalling crash which resulted in the French champion, Mark Gomez, swopping the hotel bed of the Tour for a hospital bed. Kelly does not criticise much - but with Vanderaerden he makes an exception:

"This guy does not show any respect for his fellow riders and so far is getting away with it. But he will only survive doing what he is doing for so long, he will get an answer soon. Something or somebody which makes him respect others. I was very fortunate in Roubaix for I was just one place ahead of him when he caused that crash. If I had been one place behind him it might have been me and not Gomez in hospital. Others came down in that crash but fortunately escaped injury."

What if Vanderaerden had brought down Kelly again? “I know what I would have done. I would have got up and gone over to him and I would have broken something, probably his nose. I would not have hesitated for one second, he has got away with too much already and after Paris/Nice I would have had no option.

"Of course I would have been up before the race officials for fighting but as it would have been a first offence I would have got away with a fine and a caution. Somebody must show this rider that there are certain things he can not do and somebody will. It may not be one of the riders he brings down but somebody else who has decided that his messing can go on no longer." There are some laws in the jungle and with the Sean Kellys you just don't fool around.

YOU CALL A WAITER, ORDER another beer and Kelly shakes his head in refusal before you offer. The ordinary pleasures of life and professional cycling don't mix. It is worth recording that when in conversation, Kelly responds to everything in the most matter of fact manner. Was he enjoying this Tour de France, the responsibility of being Sem's team leader, the burden of having to chase both the yellow and green jersies?

"With Sem, I'm the one in the privileged position, the protected rider. I'm paid more and more is expected of me. It is simply a question of whether I can produce the goods or not. If I do there is not a problem, if I don't there will be consequences. It is not really a question of enjoying it."

Kelly's pragmatism probably stretches back to the farmhouse a few miles from Carrick-on-Suir where, on the twenty-fourth day of May, 1956, he was born. Going to school every morning, Kelly had to pass the Carrick-on-Suir Golf Club and if he and his brother, Joe, climbed a fence into the club, it was merely boyish yearning for the collection of lost balls. For this son of a modest County Waterford farmer, golf was never a sporting possibility.

Young Sean was not much sportingly inclined in any case. Before forming his first competitive alliance with the bike, Kelly remembers having played just one hurling match and having no great love for it. His talents were certainly not in that direction. Fortunately for the teenage Kelly, bike racing was a part of Carrick's sporting life at that time and it is sobering to reflect that had he been born in any one of an infinite number of small Irish towns his cycling tendencies would never have surfaced.

A local by the name of Tony Ryan, who was himself a rider with a fair amount of ability at the time, was one of Kelly's earliest influences. Ryan had the perception to recognise Kelly's talent and the enthusiasm to nurture it. He brought his protege to many unlikely corners: he did the talking and Sean did the winning. It was a fruitful relationship.

In those early years Sean Kelly was a very shy lad. His way of communicating was on the bike and his verbal responses frequently courted the monosyllabic. Twelve or so years later and he still treats the questioner cautiously, if very respectfully. Now his answers tend to be more elaborate but he remains essentially a non-talker.

When it became evident that Kelly had been granted more than ordinary cycling talent, an inquisitive man from continental Europe made a trip to Ireland. He was a gent by the name of Maurice de Gribaldy from the town of Besancon in France. A private jet got him to Dublin Airport and then a taxi was used to get him to Carrick-on-Suir.

A young French amateur, who had raced against Sean in France, was brought to Ireland by de Gribaldy for the purpose of identifying this quiet but talented Irish rider. When they arrived into the lonely-looking farm yard the only sign of life was a man aboard a tractor. The young French rider, eager to find Kelly and so justify his trip, addressed the farmer on the tractor:

“IS SEAN KELLY HERE," HE asked tentatively. "I'm Kelly", said the figure on the tractor and then Monsieur de Gribaldy spoke up. He said he was acting for the Flandria professional team and that he could offer Kelly £3,000 to sign professional forms. Kelly was but twenty years of age and was shrewd enough to play hard to get.

Negotiations followed and a couple of weeks later, Kelly became a professional bike rider for the highly respectable inducement of £6,000. That was seven years ago and since then the youngster from Carrick has enjoyed a most successful innings. His career is still a long way from complete for as a twenty-seven year old he can have at least five more good years.

People wander in and then out of the bar in the Novotel and admire the two ladies on their way. The indifference of the ladies is more apparent than real and they order again. Kelly and his interviewer have long since stopped ordering and the cycling talk has taken them up to ten-thirty. Normally Kelly would be fast asleep at this time.

You relate that his kid brother, Vincent, finished second in a stage of the Dairy Ras Tailteann and he wants to hear the full story. He doesn't comment one way or another on his brother's performance, rather he just takes it in. But it is getting late and, before departing, a final question is posed. Why does Kelly always play down his own chances of winning when speaking to the French newspaper people:

"I have found that if I say I can win a certain race the French paper will run a headline proclaiming 'Kelly Can See Nobody to Beat Him'. That makes a difficult life more difficult so I have just made a habit of never making too much of my own chances." The man's pragmatism runs deep.

COUPLE OF NIGHTS LATER it is the ninth day of the Tour and it is another hotel, this time the Sofitel in Bordeaux. Stephen Roche, as ever, is exuberant and enthusiastic. He is Ireland's only other professional cyclist and is regarded as one of the most (if not the most) promising riders on the continent.

Although they ride for different teams, Roche for Peugeot and Kelly for Sem, they are good friends. Stephen abounds in admiration for Kelly and says that one day he would love to ride in the same team as Sean. For his part, Kelly clinically describes Roche as an outstanding prospect and while he is not one to discuss his likes and dislikes it is obvious that he has much time for Roche.

On the subject of Sean Kelly, Roche could speak uninterrupted for as long as you are prepared to listen. That evening his bedroom was the location and he tied up Kelly and the 1983 Tour de France quite superbly:

"For me Sean is a rider who has invisible buttons on his handlebars. There is one which says 'fast' and another which says 'slow'. When he is going well all he has to do is touch those buttons and the response is immediate.

"I have ridden alongside him in this Tour quite a lot so far. We are the two Irishmen over here and we have plenty to talk about. But on this Tour I reckon that Sean is not going as well as he can. Sure he is still one of the best, definitely a top ten man and sure to win the green jersey. But if he had his very best form then nobody would live with him. Whatever he achieves remember that it was achieved on form that was not his best."

Murderous days in the Pyrenees and the Alps proved that Roche had read the signs well; Kelly's Tour form was good but not super. Still his seventh place overall, his green jersey and the fact that he wore the yellow jersey on one day, ensured that his Tour had been highly successful.

It was on the twelfth day of the Tour that Kelly was encountered at length again. This time it was in the one-horse town of Fleurence in the south of France. Kelly's Hotel Capelli was indeed a most unpretensious resting place. Now Kelly was visibly tired: two days earlier he had sweated and suffered in the mountains and his body still carried the traces.

But his hunger for overall victory drove away those dark thoughts which sought to discourage. Kelly reminds you that on this day the race leader, Pascal Simon, had crashed, another big contender, Joop Zoetemelk, had been penalised a crucial ten minutes as a result of a positive dope test and the Tour was only at the half way point.

Kelly then smiled to himself. The question came easily: "So with Simon and Zoetemelk in trouble, Kelly could benefit?" He just smiled again and you were left, not the first time, with the notion that here is one who delivers the important answers in the heaving turmoil of cycling action.

Kelly, if he were a talker, might say - it is all about producing the goods, not words .•