UCI Road World Championships 1966

Rudi Altig became world champion at the Nürburgring

The 1966 UCI Road World Championships took place from August 25th to 28th on the Nürburgring in the Eifel and near Cologne-Müngersdorf (team time trial on August 25th).

Racing action

Professional driver

More than 100,000 spectators crowded the Nürburgring to watch the individual races of the professionals "on the super difficult course and [..] over the grueling distance of 273.72 kilometers" . There were numerous favorites for the world title, including the British Tom Simpson , the Belgian Eddy Merckx and the French Jacques Anquetil , but also the German vice world champion from 1965 Rudi Altig , who had suffered a thigh fracture the year before. Towards the end of the race a top group of seven had pulled away, including Raymond Poulidor , Anquetil and the Italian Felice Gimondi , but Altig was not there. However, the German managed to fight his way up to the top group and win the race after a long final sprint. He had reached an average speed of 36.4 km / h. Of the German participants, next to Rudi Altig, only Winfried Bölke came in 16th. Of 74 starters, only 22 crossed the finish line.

After the race there was trouble: First, Anquetil, who was actually a private friend of Altig, did not come to the award ceremony out of hurt vanity and was subsequently fined. Altig, in turn, returned to his hotel without having submitted the urine sample required for the doping test. None of the first six of this race properly gave a sample, so the Union Cycliste Internationale (UCI) banned the drivers. However, the UCI later lifted these bans for fear of being obliged to pay damages by race organizers.

Amateurs

The 100 km team time trial was held on a route through the Rhein-Erft district from the Müngersdorfer stadium in Cologne and back to the stadium. The outsider team from Denmark surprisingly became world champions with an hourly average of 46.4 km / h. The two German teams disappointed. The German street four under national coach Otto Ziege started the race with many praise. However, numerous defects in the pouring rain ensured that the team ended up in eleventh place. The GDR four with Lothar Appler , Günter Hoffmann , Axel Peschel and Dieter Vogelsang finished four places better . He was still in the lead halfway through the distance, but then lost a lot due to Vogelsang's weakness.

For the women, 40 drivers from twelve countries competed, including three athletes from the GDR. The 64.5 kilometer race led six times over the 7.7 kilometer south loop of the Nürburgring. During the first lap, the inclines ensured that a small group of four riders was able to pull away, to which the Belgian Yvonne Reynders joined on the second lap . After a long sprint, she was finally able to win the race, ahead of the only 16-year-old Dutchwoman Keetie van Oosten-Hage , who won six world titles in the following years. The GDR drivers couldn't set any accents and ended up in the bottom third of the list of results. As the best GDR driver, GDR champion Hannelore Mattig was only able to place 22nd.

The end of the amateur competitions was the single road race. It was held in sunny weather on the 22.8-kilometer Nordschleife of the Nürburgring over 273.7 kilometers. 146 drivers from 32 countries started, including the GDR drivers Bernhard Eckstein , Jürgen Exner , Siegfried Huster , Karl-Heinz Kazmierzak , Günter Liebold and Dieter Mickein . Already in the second round a quartet with Evert Dolman (Netherlands), Leslie West (England), Attilio Benfatto (Italy) and Claude Guyot (France) pulled away from the field. After Benfatto and Guyot later fell back, Dolman and West reached the finish line together, 21-year-old Dolman turned out to be the better sprinter. He won with an average speed of 36.5 km / h and left all highly traded favorites behind. As in the team time trial, the GDR drivers could not meet expectations, Huster and Liebold gave up prematurely, while Exner with ninth place ensured the best result from the GDR perspective. None of the German drivers were able to place themselves in the top ranks.

Results

August 25, 4 p.m .:
Amateurs - team time trial (100 km)

space	country	Athletes	Time (h)
1	Denmark	Verner Blaudzun / Per Norup Hansen / Ole Højlund / Fleming Wisborg	2:09:03
2	Netherlands	Eddy Beugels / Harry Steevens / Tiemen Groen / Rinus Wagtmans	2:09:27
3	Italy	Attilio Benfatto / Luciano Dalla Bona / Mino Denti / Pietro Guerra	2:10:07
4th	France	Bernard Guyot / Robert Hiltenbrand / Gerard Swertvaeger / Jean-Pierre Danguillaume	2:10:12
5	Soviet Union	Viktor Tereschko / Alexander Dochljakow / Pepp Yffert / Wladimir Urbanowitsch	2:11:07
6th	Sweden	Erik Pettersson / Sture Pettersson / Gösta Pettersson / Tomas Pettersson	2:11:43
7th	GDR	Lothar Appler / Günter Hoffmann / Axel Peschel / Dieter Vogelsang	2:12:25
8th	Czechoslovakia	Daniel Grac / Jans Smolik / Miloš Hrazdíra / Jan Wenczel	2:12:49
9	Spain	Salvador Canet / G. Erenozaga / J. Linares / J. Ochotorena	2:13:06
10	Poland	Zenon Cechowski / Marian Kegel / Jan Magiera / Raimond Zielinski	2:13:48
11	Germany	Siegfried Adler / Martin Gombert / Dieter Leitner / Horst Ruster	2:14:14
12	Austria	Christian Frisch / Hans Furian / Hans Königshofer / Kurt Schattelbauer	2:14:43
0 ...

August 27, 10 a.m .:
women - individual race (46.5 km)

space	Athlete	country	time
1	Yvonne Reynders	BEL	1:27:21 h
2	Cornelia Hage	NED	same time
3	Aina Puronen	URS	same time
4th	Elsy Jacobs	LUX	same time
5	Beryl Burton	GBR	same time
6th	Nina Trofimova	URS	+ 0:14 min
7th	Lidia Kallik	URS	+ 2:18 min
8th	Marie-Rose Gaillard	BEL	+ 2:18 min
9	Galina Yudina	URS	+ 2:31 min
10	Ann Horswell	GBR	+ 2:33 min
11	Emilija Sonk	URS	+ 2:41 min
12	Jacky Barbedette	FRA	+ 3:06 min
13	Christiane Goeminne	BEL	+ 3:06 min
14th	Christiane Geerts	BEL	+ 3:16 min
15th	Isabelle Hage	NED	+ 3:34 min
16	Elisabetta Maffeis	ITA	+ 4:52 min
17th	Ludmilla Filina	URS	+ 4:52 min
18th	Muriel Good	GBR	+ 5:00 min
19th	Barbara Inez Goody	GBR	+ 5:00 min
20th	Simone Ellegeerts	BEL	+ 6:42 min
21st	Florinda Parenti	ITA	same time
22nd	Hannelore Mattig	GDR	same time
27	Ilka List	GDR	same time
34	Monika Israel	GDR	+ 9:44 min
0 ...

August 27, 12.30 p.m .:
Amateurs - individual race (182.5 km)

space	athlete	country	time
1	Evert Dolman	NED	4:59:43 h
2	Les West	GBR	same time
3	Willy Skibby	THE	+ 0:40 min
4th	Marian Kegel	POLE	+ 0:45 min
5	Gosta Pettersson	SWE	+ 1:18 min
6th	Willy Van Neste	BEL	+ 1:24 min
7th	Gabriele Pisauri	ITA	+ 1:26 min
8th	Ole Knight	THE	+ 1:30 min
9	Jürgen Exner	GDR	+ 1:33 min
0 ...
24	Karl-Heinz Kazmierzak	GDR	+ 1:43 min
27	Dieter Mickein	GDR	+ 1:43 min
59	Bernhard Eckstein	GDR	+ 14:35 min
0 ...

August 28, 9.30 a.m.
Pros - individual race (273.7 km)

space	athlete	country	time
1	Rudi Altig	GER	7:21:10 h
2	Jacques Anquetil	FRA	same time
3	Raymond Poulidor	FRA	same time
4th	Gianni Motta	ITA	+ 0:08 min
5	Jean Stablinski	FRA	+ 0:10 min
6th	Italo Zilioli	ITA	+ 0:13 min
7th	Guido Reybrouck	BEL	+ 0:35 min
8th	Jo de Roo	NED	all the same time
9	Lucien Aimar	FRA
10	Martin Van Den Bossche	BEL
11	Felice Gimondi	ITA
12	Eddy Merckx	BEL
13	Flaviano Vicentini	ITA	+ 1:12 min
14th	Michele Dancelli	ITA	all the same time
15th	Seamus Elliott	IRL
16	Winfried Boelke	GER
17th	Jean-Claude Theillère	FRA
18th	Joseph Huysmans	BEL	+ 4:23 min
19th	Georges Groussard	FRA	+ 7:11 min
20th	André Foucher	FRA	same time
21st	Cees Haast	NED	+ 10:00 min
22nd	Mario Pereira da Silva	POR	same time

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Ruttkus / Schoppe: Im Glanz und Schatten , p. 172
2. ↑ Boelsen: Cycling World Championship , p. 98

literature

• Helmer Boelsen : The history of the cycling world championship , Bielefeld 2007, p. 98, ISBN 978-3-936973-33-4
• Werner Ruttkus / Wolfgang Schoppe : In the shine and shadow of the rainbow. Self-published, 2005, ISBN 3-00-005315-8
• German sports echo , August 1966

Web links

• Professional results at www.radsport-seite.de
• Women results at www.the-sports.org

See also

• 1966 UCI Track World Championships