The Best Australian Cyclist?: Cadel Evans

Cadel Evans became the first Australian and the first rider from the Southern Hemisphere to win the Tour de France, after he beat Andy Schleck by over a minute.

Evans was born 14 February 1977 in Armidale, New South Wales, Australia to Paul Evans and Helen Cocks. His surname comes from his paternal grandfather, who was Welsh, and was given the name Cadel, after three Welsh kings. He lived with both of his parents, until his teenage years when his parents divorced, when he moved with his mum to Melbourne.

Baby Biking

It wasn’t long before Evans had found his passion for cycling, after riding his 16” BMX bike at the age of two. He tried his hands at a few other sports, but he couldn’t stay away from the pull towards cycling. He attributed his early years in Armidale to giving him an advantage in the mountains, over his competitors. The hills around the city, which is sat between Brisbane and Sydney, make it hard work for any cyclist.

At 14 Evans began to compete in BMX and mountain biking events, but only took to the road in 1994. However, his move to road cycling was only to improve his mountain biking skills on the recommendation of his coach. Success came almost immediately and year later he won bronze in both the junior world road time-trial and mountain bike championships. In 1997 and 1998, under the coaching of Heiko Salzwedel and Damien Grundy, he won the silver medals in the Under-23 MTB World Championships.

Switching to the Road

Evans has competed in two Olympic Games, as part of the Mountain Biking team; he took 9^th in Atlanta and moved up to 7^th in the 2000 Sydney Games. Evans decided to concentrate solely on road cycling, in the same year, after coach Michelle Ferrari persuaded him to switch allegiance. In his first full year, as a road cyclist, he won the Tour of Austria, while dipping briefly back in to MTB to take silver in the World team relay.

With success on the road flooding in, his personal life also started on the upward track. At the end of 2002 he met his soon to be wife, pianist and music teacher, Chiara Passerini, through a friend of her father’s. Evans took part in his first Grand Tour, earlier the same year, when he finished 14 in the Giro D’Italia. He didn’t have another attempt, until the 2004 Vuelta a Espana, where he finished 60^th. The Australian finally had his first shot at the Tour de France in 2005 and made it in to the top ten, with an 8^th position. He progressively moved up the rankings, before a drop in form and a broken elbow caused him to move out of the top-ten, in 2009 and 2010.

Despite his bad luck in the Tour de France, he became the first Australian to win the World Championships. From the off-set it seemed like 2011 would be Cuddles’ year, with victories in the Tirreno-Adriatico and the Tour de Romandie. His Tour de France victory makes him seals his position, as probably the most successful Australian cyclist in history.