In a new run of features, Cyclingnews sits down with some of the sport's well-known personalities as they pick their cycling dream teams. This week it's the turn of Etixx-QuickStep team manager Patrick Lefevere to pick his nine-man line-up for the Classics. During his 36 years as a directeur sportif and team manager, Lefevere has worked with some of the greatest Classics riders and has won an astonishing 21 editions of the Tour of Flanders and Paris-Roubaix in that time.
The rules:
- Dream teams must feature nine riders, one of which can be the rider selecting the team. In which case they pick eight riders to join them.
- The riders picked must have all ridden with the person picking the team. That means you can’t just pick the eight or nine best riders of a generation.
To be a Classics rider is a mental thing. We are born into this; we grow up on the Tour of Flanders. For weeks before the Tour of Flanders, everybody, including my family, would be talking about the race. The crowd is so fanatic, but they also understand cycling.
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It is very difficult to explain how to build a team for the Classics, but you really have to think: ‘We are the best, and we are the team that they have to beat – if they want to win, they have to beat us.' We always went to the start with that mentality. The guys that I have picked are all able to win a Classic, and several did. Most importantly for me, they were also ready to die for the team, to die on the bike. I think this is very close to the perfect team.
The leader: Tom Boonen (Etixx-QuickStep)
Tom Boonen is a very complete rider for the Classics; he can climb the small hills in Belgium, he can do the cobblestones, he’s got the perfect body to ride on those roads. Purely physically, I think that Johan Museeuw was stronger, but Tom is faster in a sprint and also he reads the race very well.
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