Sean Kelly's grand tour

Currently the World No.1 cyclist, Sean Kelly, is riding the three biggest races in the world. The Tours of Spain, Italy and France. No rider has attempted this for ten years. Eddy Merckx was the last. Sensible cycling enthusiasts describe the attempt as madness. Patrick Roue explores Kelly's mentality and motives.
Sean Kelly was sure he had found a way. The prospect of riding the three biggest and longest tours in the world had worried him. Sixty-eight races in a ninety-one-day period, even Kelly was intimidated. Seven thousand miles to pedal before he could sleep. The fact of his being the first rider for ten years to attempt the three tours: Spain, Italy and France, did not lessen the burden. But Kelly thought he had found a way to get by a little easier.

On Monday, April 22, he flew from Brussels to Madrid. It was on that jourrney he would have worked it out. The following evening he would begin the nineteen-day Tour of Spain or Vuelta, as the Spaniards call it. The first of the big three. If he encountered even the slightest difficulties in the mountains in the first week then he would quietly make an exit from the race. Suffer a little criticism, a good bit of controversy but get away and preserve his body for Italian and French roads. That was the plan.

The day the Tour of Spain started Kelly must have felt close to throwing up. As the prologue time trial to the race did not start until late in the day, he had a chance to read the Spanish morning papers. There it was, headdlined of course, "Kelly not Expected to Finish". He had not uttered a word to anyone. Spanish journalists had reasoned for themselves and got it right.

Sean Kelly is a wealthy man. His riches have been provided by commmercial firms who clamour to hang their product onto his success story. This year Kelly is the leader of a team whose bills are paid by three giant companies. Skil, an American power tools firm. Kas, a Spanish soft drinks firm. Miko, a French ice-cream commpany. It was Kas who insisted that Kelly ride the Tour of Spain. They had paid the Irishman millions of pesetas and he would have to ride the Spanish race.

Hands tied by monies received, Kelly said yes. Of course. Still he knew that to ride all would be dangerous. Possible lunacy. Consequently he deciided on a premature departure from the Vuelta. Then those newspaper stories. Kas' president, Louis Knorr, read those reports in his office in Vitoria, Northern Spain, with a cerrtain amount of consternation. So Kelly was taking the company for a ride. Unfortunately, a short ride. Knorr caught up with Kelly on the fourth day of the race.

He walked into his hotel and deemanded to know whether it was true that Kelly would be leaving the Vuelta at halfway. Kelly said no, of course it wasn't true. Journalistic rubbish. Only fools would believe what they read. There could be no quiet exit after all. Knorr was reassured. Although Kelly was still determined not to punish himself in Spain he did take the Blue Jersey of Points Classification Leader early in the race and held it all the way to the finish in Salamanca. That meant he was on the podium almost every day of the race. Television focuses on the podium, the "Kas" on Kelly's jersey was beamed into millions of Spanish homes. That is what the game is about. Louis Knorr was happy.

To understand why Kelly should have undertaken to ride all three tours, there is a need to explore the notion of this rustic's instinct. They have said that he doesn't talk much. One journalist wrote of his being as taciturn as Stephen Roche is loquacious. Another said Kelly was the only man who nodded when asked a question on radio. The underlying impression of a man not blessed with brightness. Stories don't need to be true to be stories. Kelly's instinct is as sharp as that of a hungry fox.

The stereotype about the nonntalker is also wide of the mark. By miles. In the right circumstances and mood, Sean Kelly could keep you rivetted for hours at a time. Might even tell you what it was like on the farm at Curraghduff, near CarrickSuir, when he was making his way into adolescence. Howat the age of twelve he packed school because his father was hospitalised and how somebody had to look after the farm. Twelve year-olds grow up quickly on 35-acre farms. There is a story he tells of boyyhood tragedy. It is worth re-telling. The story brings us back to the notion of his sharp instinct.

It was the day Sean almost ruined everything. The real culprit was a horse, a horse with piggish tendencies. Young Sean - he would have beennabout nine at the time - was told to go out into the field and put the winkers on the horse. The three young Kelly boys and father, Jack, had bales of hay to draw. The horse was of mean temperament and difficult to work with. Sean put the winkers on wrong, failing to put one side behind the horse's ear. No body noticed.

The horse was led up to the yard, the tackle was put on and the cart fixed up. Jack would hold the reinsswhile Joe, Sean, Vincent and "Larry", the terrier, sat in the back. They were halfway towards the hayfield, when the horse wriggled itself free of the winkers. Seeing the great expanse of County Waterford countryside, the horse bolted. Jack reacted immediately, got out in front of the runaway animal and tried to stop this equine madness. The horse just knocked him over and carried on.

As the frenzied animal careered onto greater speeds, the three young turks in the cart had every reason to consider an imminent rendezvous with their maker. They could see the ditch that lay directly in the animal's path. The horse was intending to clear it. Something which might have been okay if it weren't for the cart. The young Kellys didn't need to have a committee meeting. They all jumped out together. Larry, the now terrified terrier, stayed on board and, through no fault of his own, lived to amuse his canine friends with the story.

The point relates to that instinctive exit by the three lads. Two decades have passed since that escapade down on the farm. Sean Kelly has become the world's no. 1 cyclist and instinct is still his guiding light. Nine seasons as a professional bike racer and he has earned enough money to sustain affluent idleness for the rest of his life. Instinct has not let him down.

The story of Kelly and his three tours does not lack for interest. During the months of December and January last, Kelly had time to contemmplate his season's programme. In '84 he had conquered the cycling world, he knew that he had to extract the price for his fame in 1985. People would pay appearance money to have Kelly at their races, Kelly had merely to seek out the best offers. From Kelly's viewpoint the Giro d 'Italia was the race to get serious about. It is written in his contract that he rides the Tour de France, he would always have felt that with Kas' sponsorship he was likely to have to ride the Vuelta. If there was an appearance contract it would only come from Italy.

So Kelly decided that the tour he really wanted to ride was the Giro. This suited Giro organiser, Signor Thoriani, who appreciated the value of having Kelly in his race. Kelly's team didn't particularly want him going to Italy although one of his sponsors, Ski!, insisted that a group of riders from the team be sent. When team director, Jean de Gribaldy, selected the Ski!-Miko-Kas team for the Giro he did not include Kelly. Two tours was enough for his warrior. De Gribaldy received a reply from Thoriani which simply said "team, not acceptable".

Thoriani did not want a team which did not include Kelly. De Gribaldy was prepared to forget Italy but Skil said it had spent 85,000 dollars in publicity material for the Giro and a team had to be sent. Kelly could afford to remain quiet. He said that riding the three tours was not a healthy idea but that if he had to, he would. It might have seemed like he was being a model professional.

The more machiavellian and plaussible evaluation is that Kelly did a deal with Thoriani as soon as Kelly realised that his team in tended to go to Italy. Sharp instinct. Thoriani played along by saying that the team without Kelly would not get a place in his race. Who would want to entertain Naples soccer team without Diego Maradona? Kelly has a way of denying things, highly convincing. He swears he gets no conntract for riding the Giro. This doubting Thomas argued with him that there had to be something. Around £40,000 Sean? Kelly said no way. An agreement to differ.

There has always bee~ a certain number of cowboys operating in the cycling circus. Men who are clever enough to exploit vulnerable athletes but not clever enough to do it in a professional way, beneficial to all. Kelly was a victim during the early years. He was happy with what he was getting, didn't realise that others were receiving much more, were actually using his name to make money - "I can get Kelly to your race, for a price."

The payment never ended in Kelly's bank account.

Eventually Kelly worked it out.

It took him time but he is at last looking after the commercial side of his life. Now he has a manager, Dublin based Frank QUinn. Contracts are drawn up by Quinn and his legal advisors, Kelly makes his additions and they are presented to potential sponsors. Quinn likes Kelly, his primary motivation is to help him avoid losses in the rip-off game. They have worked well together. Now the company which makes Reydel saddles, the type which Kelly uses, coughs up something around £ 1 0,000 each year for the privilege of having Kelly's arse on one of their prooducts. A few years ago the money wasn't paid, or if it was, Kelly wasn t the beneficiary. There are other, simiilar, con tracts.

Anyway, that's the business side of things. Kelly is organised. He will never be forced to see a bank manager before buying cattle. The three tours are, however, a cycling monstrosity. Some young men ride the Tour de France and are never the same again. To ride all three in one season is like running a horse in three Aintree Grand Nationals over the same weekend.

One accepts that Kelly is a specimen unlike any other. An old dog with the toughest of fibres. But even he has traces of humanity. The perceptive notice that he often straps little ban- . dages around his cycling shoes when racing. The tendons in the heel of his feet have had more punishment than they can accept. During the Vuelta, Kelly had to take tablets for the innflammation. Rest is what the tendons need. They would not have agreed to three tours.

On the Sunday night the Vuelta ended, Kelly flew to Brussels. The following morning he saw his perrsonal doctor at his home in the Brussels suburb of Vilvoorde. He had pain killers injected into the heel. That would suffice to get him to Italy. Later in life Kelly will have to pick up the tabs for the ill-treatment of tenndons. Sportsmen tend not to contemmplate their life in old age.

Yet he remains remarkably resilient.

On the night before the Vuelta ended, he lay down his suitcase in a hotel in Segovia, not far from Madrid. He said he felt great, the race had taken noothing out of him and he was preparing himself for a serious challenge in Italy. From the seventh day of the Vuelta Kelly had been riding for training purrposes only. On the sixth day he had lost minutes in the mountains and decided to cruise thereafter.

Cruising for the World No. 1 is, of course, relative. Kelly still won three stages, won the points jersey and finished ninth overall. Next to the yellow jersey of race leadership, the points jersey is most important. For Kelly it was nothing more than a trifle. Enough to keep Louis Knorr satisfied. The Kas' president likes Kelly, they both liking shooting in the winter. Knorr wants Kelly to join him in northern Spain next winter for two weeks of sport with the wildlife in that part of the world.

Knorr has even gone further. He has said he wants a cycling team of his own next season. He is talking about a lot of money. The condition is that the farmer's son from Ireland must lead the team. They were saying during the Vuelta that Knorr was offering Kelly the earth to sign for 1986. For one season of Sean Kelly's services, the Louis Knorrs of this world would need a minimum of £250,000 to turn Kelly's head. Whattever Knorr has already offered, Kelly's head has been turned.

The American group, Ski!, also say they want their own team next year. They, too, -say Kelly must be the leader. Cees Vail Beek is Skil's front man in the bargaining stakes. He has got an assurance from Kelly that before the Irishman signs into any team for 1986 he will give Skil the opportunity to better any existing offer. All very interesting for the boy who left school as a twelve year-old in CarrickSuir.

Kelly will commit himself when the Giro d'Italia is over. The timing is not without significance. Kelly, it appears, is going to shit or bust in the Giro. It is an attainable prize for Kelly. If he wins then the contract for 1986 will be closer to £500,000 than £250,000. Kelly has always fascinated the Italians, currently the Malvor and Bianchi teams are pestering him to try a season of sun and spaghetti. As a winner of the Grio, Kelly could name his price and the Italian suitors would nod without hesitation.

Kelly's strategy has always been to collect the offers and then bounce one off another, never revealing the team that he would like to join. If by winnning the Giro, Kelly was offered half a million pounds by Bianchi then Kas and Skil and every other team would be told that the price had escalated because of the enthusiasm of the Italians. Kelly speaks fluent French, fluent Flemish, a little Italian and a little Spanish. His flair for languages has nothing to do with broadening his intellectual horizons. Easier to do business when you speak the lingo.

And so the man's instinct has told him that a good ride in the Giro could make him a lot richer. Expect Kelly to try very hard in Italy. In the Vuelta he was out of contention after a week. That should not happen in the Giro. That Kelly appears to have made the Giro his number one target suggests that he doesn't believe he can win the hardest race of all, the Tour de France. The suggestion is one that Kelly would not refute. He has tried in the tour, tried and tried but got nowhere.

Though all of the high powered wheeling and dealing, Kelly has remained the same character that left Carrick-on-Suir almost nine years ago. He relates best to those without affectation, without wealth and with a sense of humour. His best friend on the continent, Ronny Orighena , is a joker. A joker in the hotel, a bit of a joke on the bike. Ronny would have been left unemployed by cycling's team managers a few years ago but he comes with Kelly. Part of the deal.

When you invite Kelly to ride your race, you invite Ronny as well. Even though Ronny is not exactly a houseehold name, not in Belgium and not in his own home in Saint Niklaas. Kelly calls Ronny, "Alex". Nobody else calls Ronny, "Alex". They room togeether. Kelly is the monk-like discipliinarian. Ronny is the kind of guy that will be eating chocolate in bed late at night.

In three or four years Kelly will get out. He was never made for the life of high finance and high profile. Without his instinct he would have been murrdered. He says that he could have got out of the Vuelta after nine or ten days were it not for the journalists. All of the journalists are the same, always wanting to know about money and always wondering what a guy like Kelly will do next.

Kelly says that if he had been able to get out of the Vuelta at halfway, given his heel a couple of weeks rest, then he could really have had a go in the Giro. He still says he will, but the journalists have made it hard for him:

"You know what I'd do with the jourrnalists," he says, "I'd hang them. Hang them by the balls." •