Grand Prix Eddy Merckx
The Grand Prix Eddy Merckx (short: GP Eddy Merckx ) was named after the cycling legend Eddy Merckx cycling time trial pair in Brussels, Belgium.
History
Since the introduction of the UCI ProTour and the associated therewith Continental Circuit, the UCI Europe Tour at the start of the 2005 season, the race will not take place.
It was ranked last in the UCI 1.2 category and place at the end of August. Due to the failure of the race, they tried to maintain at least the prestigious names in the racing calendar, but an agreement with the organizers of the semi- classic Paris -Brussels, this rename in Grand Prix Eddy Merckx, was rejected again.
The race took place from its first edition in 1980 as an individual time trial. This mode was maintained until 1997, before it was converted to the 19th edition in 1998 in a pair of time trials. The last individual time trial had a total length of 57 kilometers. The length of the pair of time trials tended between a length of 40 and 67.5 miles.
Record winner of the event are Knut Knudsen, Eric Vanderaerden and Chris Boardman with two victories in the individual time trial. Abraham Olano won one each issue of the individual time trial and a pair of time trial, Erik Dekker and Marc Wauters were able to secure the victory twice in the pair time trial.
Curiosities
At a curiosity, it came at the 24th edition in 2003. Having already half of the starting teams were on the route through downtown Brussels against 15 clock, had to retire due to a fire in a hardware store in Merchtem district to be stopped, the not to interfere with work of the fire department. After a 30 - minute break, the organizers had cordoned off an alternative course management and the race was completely restarted.
Palmarčs
ITT (1980 - 1997)
Couple Time Trial (1998 - 2004)
- 2000 United States Lance Armstrong
- 2001 Belgium Marc Wauters
- 2002, Hungary László Bodrogi
- 2003 Germany Michael Rich
- 2004 The Netherlands Thomas Dekker