Quotes from Eddy Merckx

Cyclists live with pain, if you can't handle it you will win nothing.

If you think back to the days of Phil Anderson, when there were very few Australians to now when you have a Tour de France winner in Cadel Evans, a professional team in GreenEDGE, and classics winners in Stuart O'Grady and Matt Goss - the sport is bigger and bigger in Australia.

I sleep very well, thank you.

The most important thing is that you're the best of your generation and I can say that I was.

If a rider is concerned about questionable practices, it's his duty to speak up for the good of others.

We ate at 6:30 or 7:00 in the morning, before the race. First a small breakfast with the cheese and the ham and then steaks. It was horrible, but you know, you had to eat steaks to be strong. It was absolutely crazy.

The sport will benefit when star riders start races.

I stopped because I was tired of always racing.

I can tell you I preferred my era. Yes, they make much more money now but I preferred my cycling. The passion for racing. I like more racing. Now riders they train all the time. Not so much racing.

I do not want to continue cycling until I am 35. I want to make something else out of my life, too. There are other things besides a bike and racing.

In my time it was different. When I knew the wind was strong, I attacked myself to make the race as hard as possible.

It's not like at university where you graduate. Every cyclist must start again. At the end of the season you know if you are good or not.

I won 34 in my career and I never thought that the record would last, that I'd be the person with the most stage wins.

I didn't win any bunch sprints. But I won in solo breakaways, I won time-trials, I won in the mountains.

I think I was three or four when I first rode and four when I first crashed.

Cycling is a good school for life. It makes you hard and gives you ambition, but you can never say you've arrived.

When you are number one, the pressure is on you. It's not only physical but mental. You become tired.

I have no regrets at all. With all the races I won, what regrets could I possibly have?

Doping has to be fought, cheats must be unmasked, abuse should be punished but all this should remain human.

I'm not saying that every time I race I go to the very limit of my strength. But when the opportunity appears I consider it immoral not to take them.

I agree it is the most important, but cycling is not only about Tour. If everybody thinks like Armstrong, there will be only one race.

The only event that counts is the Tour, it's the only race that all the media go to. It's far more important than it was in my time, but as I see it cycling is more than the Tour de France.

My wife is a much better tourist than me.

Absolutely, in stage races, Froome is better than Eddy Merckx. Maybe he can win five, six Tours de France, but my focus wasn't only on the Tour de France. I was riding all year.