Putting a Happy Face On Cycling Team's Woes
https://www.nytimes.com/1995/04/20/sports/IHT-putting-a-happy-face-on-cycling-teams-woes.html By SAMUEL ABT His bicycle team is off to a mournful start, his sponsor has threatened to withdraw, his star rider is sick, his shoes are nearly submerged in a pool of rain. What, me worry? Everything is on schedule, says Patrick Valcke , smiling a somewhat beady smile. Valcke is the directeur sportif of Le Groupement , a new and troubled French team . He is French too but not troubled. No. Valcke has been here before, quite often actually for a person in his mid-30s, and one thing he has learned is that he is a survivor. He has survived other sinking teams, tumult and insurrection , even a heart attack that later was diagnosed as possibly indigestion. So the smile never left his face as he stood in a cold drizzle before the Liège-Bastogne-Liège race and explained why there was nothing to explain. "We said this winter that Le Groupement didn't have a rider who...