Farewells To Great Cyclists

[Aurora Australis]

Acknowledge your great champion cyclist ending their career with a dedication here.

[xabi]

I start this topic with my first cyclist retired with 33yo.

Reinaldo does not have any impressive result, but his regular points for the last 14 seasons helped me promoting to 1st division and maintaining the category since then. He was one of the first young cyclists I promoted the first season:

Reinaldo Clemente   Edad : 33   Sueldo : 7218
Resistencia : 88   Sprint : 69   Montaña : 23
LLano : 85   Pavés : 95   Tecnica : 80
Descenso : 49   Colinas : 89   Agresividad : 50
Crono : 23   TraEqui : 16   Experiencia : 100

Best achievements:
9 times top10 in Strade Bianche, including two silver medals
5 times top10 in E3 Harelbeke
2 times top10 in Omloop Het Nieuwsblad
1 time top10 in Gent-Wevelgem
6 times top10 in GV (Giro-Tour)

Bye bye Reinaldo, have a great retirement!!

[xabi]

Today I say goodbye to other 1 Club Cyclist. If I remember well, my first valid young rider, who made me choose cobblestone as first training:

Emanuel Ribeiro   Edad : 33   Sueldo : 6667
Resistencia : 84   Sprint : 77   Montaña : 24
LLano : 91   Pavés : 98   Tecnica : 79
Descenso : 5   Colinas : 3   Agresividad : 31
Crono : 15   TraEqui : 37   Experiencia : 100

No victories in 1st division, but he has other great achievements:

8 times top10 on Paris-Roubaix
30 times top10 in 1st división
Bronze medal in international race

Thanks and happy retirement Emanuel!!

[Sjiz]

Arno 'The Barbecue' Verbeek

After being scouted by Pro Team Yvo Meppelink at the age of 19 he quickly received a prof contract from team Claes. However this didnt work out and after only a week he switched to Team RHB. It was quickly apparent that Verbeek would become an absolute superstar. He was dripping of talent. Every pedal stroke looked strong and smooth and he quickly surpassed all other riders in the team.

At 21 years old he got his breakthrough. The won the first stage of the Tour Down Under by beating the best of the best and going on to finish 10th in the GC. After two short periods in the second division with the team we promoted back to the first and the successes never stopped for Verbeek. At 23 years old he got his first podium in a classic by finishing second in Amstel. After returning in season 8 he got his first classics win, also Amstel. From there the rest is history.

He grew up to have some excellent stats. At the age of 30 this was it:
Arno Verbeek      Age :    30   Wage : 852   
Stamina :    90   Sprint :    78   Climbing :    29
Flat :    83   Cobblestone :    8   Technique :    78
Downhill :    91   Hills :    100   Aggressiveness :    82
Time Trial :    20   Teamwork :    49   Experience :    100

As an exceptional rider he was able to compete not only in the hill stages but also in the tougher sprint hills. He finished 6 times in the top 10 in Milano - San Remo and 2 times top 10 in Eschborn. In the smaller tours he also enjoyed some success by finishing 7 times top 10 in the TDU, one top 10 in both Paris - Nice and the Dauphine.

In his prime he was able to pull off some exceptional races. Winning Giro stages as a free role, winning a sprint hill stage against the best sprinters, but, without a doubt, his biggest stunt was winning the world championship without a training camp.

At the age of 32 he retired as one of the 4 world stars in the peloton and 31 wins in 1a _{and he never finished 9th}.

Palmares
1x World Champion
2x Amstel Gold Race (5 podiums in total)
3x Fleche Wallone (6 podiums in total)
4x Liege - Bastogne - Liege (6 podiums in total)
2x National stage winner (4 podiums in total)
2x Silver bike
3x Bronze bike
7x Dutch champion
6x Giro stage win
2x Vuelta stage win
34x top 10 in a classic
13x other stage wins
20x other podiums

At the moment of his retirement he holds the stage record of 10 stages including the Salzburg WC, Lieja and Flecha. He is also the rider with the most wins at each of the hill classics.

[Vos]

Hail to / all honor to ; the master of the hills Arno Verbeek
For sure he deserves a spot in this topic with his impressive and legendary palmares. 
 
Even now Verbeek is retired, he is still winning ;
because the book that he and his manager Sjiz wrote about the career of Verbeek, is now on number 1 in the best sellers list.

[EpoGlucK]

One of the superstars!

[Quinto & Tapa]

Arno 'The Barbecue' Verbeek

[B.E-L]

Nooooooo he is to young to retire this game    still the best Dutch hill rider at this moment...

[Aurora Australis]

Not as great as Arno Verbeek, however today we say happy retirement to the first of our champion team TTers, Ben Mitchum & Owen Acree (both flat to flat-hill TTers), part of the greatest TT squad from a single nation CFF will ever see.

Aged 22, Owen missed out on making history to be the first Aussie cyclist to win an NT race by a single second, because it was won by Mitchum.  It was that season where Owen would finish 6th in NT rakings with 305 NT points, and Mitchum finished 2nd with 450 points, losing to a cobble-hiller (cobble-hillers winning the NT title being a NT trend).  Owen would get his final top 10 NT result in the next season, aged just 23, and despite 29 top 10 results in Div1, would only win one race, Stage 4 Paris Nice Season 7, aged just 25.  He would however regularly score Div1 top 10s well into Season 15, his final result being 9th in Stage 9 Vuelta España.

Ben Mitchum however would be a regular top 10 finisher in NT races, gaining 7 in all, including the victory in Season 4.  He should have won the Season 10 WC TT race, only the team had gone on holiday with intentions not to race, and he was a late minute inclusion because the team was close to relegation.  Despite being in low health, with little support, Mitchum finished 3rd.  It was the start of a string of WC TT top 10s, five in all, his lowest result being 6th (season 12, AA cyclists finishing 1st 2nd 4th 5th & 6th).
Mitchum's other wins were the Div 1 Stage 1 Dauphiné Season 6 & Stage 1 Paris Nice Season 11, Mitchum taking 38 Div1 top 10s in all, his final result being 2nd in Stage 9 Tour France Season 15.

Even aged 34, both declare themselves still capable of Div1 top 10s, but are happy to retire & see the next generation in action.

Ben Mitchum 
Division : 1a
Team : Aurora_Australis
https://www.cyclingforfun.org/cff/historifame.php?ciclistaid=6537

Owen Acree
Division : 1a
Team : Aurora_Australis
https://www.cyclingforfun.org/cff/historifame.php?ciclistaid=9894

Ben Mitchum & Owen Acree.  Born in Aurora Australis aged 19, retire in Aurora Australis aged 34.

[xabi]

Today galegospolabici says goodbye to Danilo Bernardino, the flat-hills specialist in the team for the last 15 seasons. He was concentrated for trying to get some good results in the TDU, but the risky tactics did not work.

3-times stage winner in 1st Division and still with 2 CFF-Records (66,7% of Records/Victories, not bad). Thank you Danilo for being another great One Club Cyclist for galegos:

Danilo Bernardino   Edad : 34   Sueldo : 3237
Resistencia : 79   Sprint : 26   Montaña : 4
LLano : 86   Pavés : 10   Tecnica : 78
Descenso : 68   Colinas : 98   Agresividad : 75
Crono : 37   TraEqui : 75   Experiencia : 81

[JGonmar6]

Hoy me despido de Carrere.

Con un gran palmarés a sus espaldas (triplete en Ardenas, mundial, 5 veces campeón francés), yo solo he podido disfrutar de él como pieza importante en la bici de oro de Abilio Andújar.

Gascogne Carrere   Edad : 34   Sueldo : 17093
Resistencia : 84   Sprint : 50   Montaña : 3
LLano : 78   Pavés : 51   Tecnica : 76
Descenso : 82   Colinas : 99   Agresividad : 76
Crono : 3   TraEqui : 32   Experiencia : 100

[Aurora Australis]

Today we have the surprise retirement of Isaac Trump.  One half of the leading duo of Australia's dominant TT team for over a dozen seasons, Trump was expected to strive to continue winning races  But it was not to be:

"I came into this season with the intention to win races and maybe even help the national team.  We'd, Levin and myself, had been in discussions with our team manager on our futures, part of us wanted to retire together, another part wants to see one of us attempt to continue until thirty-seven -- providing we'd be able to get division 1 results, it seems to be a good challenge.  With the second prospect, with me having won the International TT race four last season, discussions were leaning towards me attempting to continue on.  But then I came into the first TT race of the season, and my fitness was around 87%, and I realised that I'm fully satisfied with my great career, that it was time for me to retire, and what I wanted most was to see the next generation racing.
I could have continued, get a few results, but that would mean taking the place of a young cyclist with his career ahead of him, and you must be honourable enough to know when your continued presence becomes a liability.  And thus I retire, proud to know that my TT career is unmatched except for by my partner in crime, Richard Levin."

Isaac Trump   
Division : 1a
Team : Aurora_Australis
https://www.cyclingforfun.org/cff/historifame.php?ciclistaid=8932

4 times NT TT race winner (seasons 7 - 11 - 12 - 15)
WC TT winner (season 8.)
Australian Best Cyclist jersey winner

10 NT race podiums: 14 top 10s
4 top 10 NT end of season results (including 500 points - 2nd overall - season 7)

WC Results
1st season 8
2nd seasons 9 & 12
3rd season 11
8th season 13

6 other Div1 victories : 21 other Div1 podiums : 31 other Div1 top 10s (6* 4ths) (holding several race records at retirement)

[xabi]

Today we say goodbye to the first (and for longtime only) signing of galegos, 2 years and 1 week ago.

Ned Williams used to be the rider with more points at the end of each season and he gave me also my unique victory in a classic in 1st Division: Gent-Wevelgem.

11th consecutive times top 5 in Gent-Wevelgem (including 1 victory and 6 podiums) and 11th consecutive times top 10 in Binck Bank Tour (including 3 podiums) are his top achievements:

Ned Williams   Edad : 34   Sueldo : 11738
Resistencia : 83   Sprint : 79   Montaña : 14
LLano : 81   Pavés : 87   Tecnica : 79
Descenso : 59   Colinas : 94   Agresividad : 57
Crono : 5   TraEqui : 46   Experiencia : 100

Thank you Ned, enjoy your retirement in the UK!!

[ophiuko]

Great Ned Williams!

For the future, it would be nice to post the cyclists at their peak (29-31 yo), as Sjiz did for Verbeek. It would be great to have them as references.

[Vos]

For the future, it would be nice to post the cyclists at their peak (29-31 yo), as Sjiz did for Verbeek. It would be great to have them as references.

This does not count for thé CFF climb legend Nicola Miorlin, who never reached the 10 stars, and never was in the top100.
His stats are not a good reference at all, and his doubtfull stats caused that he was riding many times in free- and helpers-roles in his career.

But Miorlin is the only cyclist in the SPORTLIFE hall of fame, and for sure he deserves a place in this topic too.
When he was the number 330 or so, he even achieved 2 stage victories in Romandie (s14), just before he dropped to silver.
With his greatest race victory even to come ; because as silver climber in a free role (!), he won stage 2 Giro (s14).

This was his final victory in CFF. 1A Palmares = 25 stage victories and even 1 Romandie GC victory with just 9stars climb and 1star cobble.
Miorlin was sold before the Tour de France of s14 to a 2nd division team.
Right after that TdF I bought him again ( for 1M less, so he even made a transfer profit at the end of his career ) and placed him in my hall of fame.
Today or in one of the next days I will post him here.