Cyrille Guimard
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Cyrille Guimard (born January 20, 1947 in Bouguenais, Pays de la Loire) is a French former professional road racing cyclist who became famous as the directeur sportif for two famous French cyclists and Tour de France winners: Bernard Hinault and Laurent Fignon, and Belgian Lucien Van Impe, who won the Tour in 1976 under his guidance. Guimard also brought American Greg LeMond to Europe after signing him to his first professional contract. As a professional rider he was the French national champion in 3 separate occasions in 3 different disciplines: road in 1967 for the amateur category, vitesse in 1970 and cyclo-cross in 1976. he won several stages of the Tour de France and the points classification of the Vuelta a España. He was a team leader on the Gitane-Campagnolo team - in which a young Bernard Hinault was often a roommate - when he took over the team's management in 1977. He convinced Hinault to stay on his team.
Although he was a good rider, it was as a directeur sportif that he forged his legendary reputation. He ran Gitane-Campagnolo, Renault-Elf-Gitane, Système U-Gitane, Super U, Castorama, and Cofidis; the teams which riders under his direction include Lucien Van Impe, Bernard Hinault, Laurent Fignon, Greg LeMond, Charly Mottet, Marc Madiot, and even Lance Armstrong. As a directeur sportif, his riders have won a total of 7 editions of the Tour de France.
Guimard is known as a master tactician in a race, and innovator in training techniques. In the Alpe d'Huez stage of the 1976 Tour de France he shouted at Van Impe that he'd run him off the road with the car if he didn't attack the defending champion Joop Zoetemelk. Thanks to this aggressive riding Van Impe was able to put time against Zoetemelk and win the Tour. Guimard is credited as one of the first cycling coaches to use the periodization method in the early 1980s. He is also known to have told his riders to hold back from entering certain races and competitions if he feels that they were not ready for the challenge yet. A famous example of this was Hinault's decision not to enter the 1977 edition of the Tour de France despite his impressive list of early season wins as a first-year professional (neo-pro), only to win strongly the following year. In his autobiography, Hinault credited Guimard with his uncanny tactical sense for many of his greatest wins, including the snowy Liège-Bastogne-Liège of 1980.
However, Guimard's strong personality also led to disagreements with his riders, most notably with Hinault in the mid-1980s. Hinault had to abandon the 1983 Tour de France due to his knee injury, and his lieutenant Fignon won the race. The following season he decided to switch to the newly-formed La Vie Claire cycling team. "With Guimard, you do not argue, you can only listen," Hinault was known to say. Fignon was a young cyclist and was already closely associated with Guimard since his youth. "With Hinault, Guimard already had a champion. With me, he made a champion. That is perhaps why we have a special bond," Fignon admitted in an interview.
Guimard was also involved in the early development of the French UCI ProTour team Cofidis, although he no longer has a formal association.
