Boonen masters the Infer du Nord

When Tom Boonen won his record equaling fourth Paris Roubaix last week, it was a fait accompli. For who else realistically would challenge the Belgian when he had the strongest team and the most experienced crew? With the biggest fly in his ointment, Fabian Cancellara, out with a broken collarbone he got last week in the Tour of Flanders, Boonen’s win was like the sun rising in the east.

His fourth Paris-Roubaix (’05, ’08, ’09 and ’12) win equals the palmares of the original Monsieur Paris-Roubaix, Roger de Vlaeminck, aka, “The Gypsy”,who won the Hell of the North in ’72, ’74, ’75, and ’77. Not on that, Boonen is the only person to win the Tour of Flanders/Pris-Roubaix double, twice!

There are people who believed that the outcome of both races would have been different if Cancellara was around. But we have to get it on our noggin that Fabian wasn’t at the end when it mattered because he crashed. Its not that Boonen held a gun pointed at the Swiss‘s head and told him to stop.

The opposition this year was not as rated since most of the better one-day riders were out with an injury. Philippe Gilbert, Thor Hushovd, Matt Goss, Nick Nuyens and Johann Van Summeren didn’t have top form. But the rest of the peloton were not just fillers. They are the top 200 cyclists in the world!

What I like about Boonen is that the guy never gives up. There’s no ‘quit’ in his mind. In the 2010 Tour of Flanders, in spite being dropped by Cancellara, he led the chasing group in a futile chase, never doing more turns at the front then the others. It seemed to me that he has enormous respect for the race and the fans, because if he hadn’t, he would have simply stepped off the pedals and wait for the sprint. A week later, in Paris-Roubaix, he chased a visibly stronger Cancellara until the very end, in spite of the fact that he was losing time at every time check.

At 31yo, Boonen has a chance to surpass de Vlaeminck and I have a feeling that he has at least 2 more Paris-Roubaix win in him. Boonen was already a darling in Belgium with tennis star Kim Clijsters. His current win will enhance his stature. Winning and surpassing the Gypsy will undoubtedly make him a legend.

Finally, three local cyclists, JaybopPagnanawon, 23yo, Elmer “Asay” Navarro, 22yo and Marvin “Baby” Tapic, 22yo, were included in the under-23 developmental team of LBC. The rest of the team includes Pangasinan’s Julius Bonzo, 23, Ilocos Sur’s JemicoBrioso, 23, and Kelvin Mendoza, 20, and Cebu’s Marvin Tapic, 22, Jay Pagnanawon, 23, and Elmer Navarro, 22. Except for Navarro and Tapic, who are still getting the proper travel documentation, the rest of the team are already in Holland and will proceed later to Belgium for training. They will then proceed for more training to Malaysia in May and in Australia from June to September. I hope that LBC will see this program through, unlike what happened a few years ago when a similar set-up was created and nothing ever happened.