World Championships in Ronse (in French Renaix), Belgium, August 11, 1963, professionals. Rain, cold, pavé. A three-man breakaway: a Frenchman (Henry Anglade), an Irishman (Seamus Elliott), and an Italian (Italo Zilioli). Maximum advantage 1'24". The Belgians - with captain Rik Van Looy pulling at the front - chase and regroup. Then sun and wind, 28 at the front and final sprint. Van Looy goes long. But thirty meters from the finish line, he is overtaken on his left by another Belgian, his domestique, who should be his domestique, Benoni Beheyt. Van Looy, by instinct, or by trade, or in desperation, slightly shifts to the left. Beheyt takes his right hand off the handlebar and places it between Van Looy's side and back. Perhaps he pushes him. Away, behind, in front?
The fact is he passes him and, as the photofinish will establish, by about ten centimeters, he overtakes him. Van Looy files a complaint. The complaint is rejected. Beheyt is the new world champion. On the podium, Beheyt and Van Looy do not shake hands. Van Looy, from Herentals, 29 years old, has already won everything he could win: northern classics, Italian classics, stages in Giro, Vuelta and Tour, even stage races, national championships and, above all, two World Championships. Beheyt (Benoni in homage to an Italian grandfather), from Zwijnaarde, 22 years old, has won Gand-Wevelgem and four minor races. Twenty-eight days before the Ronse World Championship, in the last stage of the Tour, the Paris stage, Van Looy won in a group sprint right over Beheyt. Already rivals, but this time in different teams: Van Looy for Gbc-Libertas, Beheyt for Wirls-Groene Leeuw.
The agreements are not clear, in Ronse: Van Looy will claim that the pact was all for one, him, Van Looy; Beheyt will specify that the pact was all for him, Van Looy, until the last kilometer, then everyone for himself. A strange pact, in Beheyt's version. But rarely has the Belgian national team revealed itself as a team. Often it has been divided, fractured, dissolved among alliances, complicity, factions, due to friendships, kinships, interests. From Herentals to Ronse, the kilometers are 120. From Zwijnaarde to Herentals, about thirty. In between, a thousand bell towers. I thought of Beheyt immediately, a week ago, when Van Looy died.
Because Van Looy, the tyrannical and despotic Emperor of Herentals, had never forgiven Beheyt. Affront, outrage, betrayal. Beheyt's betrayal. Beheyt the Traitor. Already arrested, already judged, already condemned and punished three seconds after crossing the finish line. In the black and white footage of the Ronse sprint, a man approaches Beheyt, gives him a shoulder bump, then turns and walks towards Van Looy. Probably one of the national team's masseurs. From that day, Beheyt, boycotted, sabotaged, chased by Van Looy's domestiques every time he attempts a breakaway, wins little or nothing, until at 26 he participates in one race, at 27 in two, at 28 he stops. Perhaps due to lack of training motivation, perhaps to follow his bicycle shop. But he finds no peace: while cleaning a weapon, a shot goes off, he kills his little son. He will also attempt suicide.
I met Beheyt in 2007, at the Northern Classics, sent by "La Gazzetta dello Sport". Tall, slim, distinguished, elegant, with white hair, Beheyt followed races on a motorcycle, a dark Yamaha: he would report to the jury the behavior of riders, any infractions, fouls, irregularities. And on that same Yamaha he would go back and forth from his seaside house in Wenduine, not far from Bruges, east of Ostend. I asked him how he fell in love with cycling. "I went to school by bike. It was always a race among us friends. When I was 15, my friends encouraged me: come on, no one can beat you, you're the strongest, you must race". The problem of getting a racing bike remained. "My grandmother took care of it. She gifted me a real, new one". Ready, go.
"The first one I won was Poeke-Nevele. I was 16. I got a taste for it. I was good". He would continue to win. From junior to professional. "Of all the victories, the one I love to remember, despite everything, is the World Championship". A cursed World Championship. It is said that on the eve of the race, a pact was made among Belgian riders to sabotage Van Looy. It is said that Beheyt knew nothing of that pact: he was not even considered capable of achieving such a feat. It is said that Van Looy's main rival was Gilbert Desmet, not by chance attacking four kilometers from the finish, not by chance Beheyt's cousin.
Finally, I asked Beheyt about Van Looy. "He swore revenge. But I was in good faith. I didn't want to beat him, I didn't want to win. I was there to help him. For years he didn't speak to me. Now things are better. We meet two or three times a year, we say good morning and good evening". Two years ago, Beheyt dared to show up at the Gran Prix Rik Van Looy in Herentals. Van Looy was there too. It seems that the Emperor and the Traitor greeted each other and then had a beer together. Peace, truce, armistice, statute of limitations, pardon, grace... Who knows.