Phil Anderson (cyclist)

Philip Grant Anderson OAM (born 20 March 1958) is an Australian former professional racing cyclist who was the first non-European to wear the yellow jersey of the Tour de France.[2]

Phil Anderson

Anderson in 2008
Personal information
Full name	Philip Grant Anderson
Nickname	Skippy, Dr Teeth
Born	20 March 1958[1] London, England
Team information
Current team	Retired
Discipline	Road
Role	Rider
Amateur teams
<1979	Hawthorn Cycling Club
1979	Athletic Club de Boulogne-Billancourt
Professional teams
1980–1983	Peugeot-Esso-Michelin
1984–1987	Panasonic
1988–1990	TVM
1991–1994	Motorola
Major wins
Grand Tours Tour de France Young rider classification (1982) 2 individual stages (1982, 1991) Giro d'Italia 2 individual stages (1989, 1990) Stage races Critérium du Dauphiné Libéré (1985) Tour de Suisse (1985) Tour de Romandie (1989) One-day races and Classics Amstel Gold Race (1983) Züri–Metzgete (1984) Frankfurt Grand Prix (1984, 1985) Paris–Tours (1986) Milano–Torino (1987)
Medal record Men's road bicycle racing Representing  Australia Commonwealth Games 1978 Edmonton Road Race 1994 Victoria Team Time Trial

Origins

Phil Anderson was born in London but moved to Melbourne, Australia, when he was young. He grew up in the suburb of Kew and graduated from Trinity Grammar School in 1975. He first raced with Hawthorn Cycling Club, where Allan Peiper, another future professional, was also a member.[3] Peiper said: "Phil went to a private school and joined the club with his mate, Peter Darbyshire. My best friend was Tom Sawyer, later a six-day racer in Europe, and we were the two rough nuts, while Phil and Darbs were the two upper-class boys".[3]

Amateur career

Anderson won the 1977 Dulux Tour of the North Island in New Zealand[4] and the Australian team time-trial championship at Brisbane in 1978.[5][6] In that year he also won the Commonwealth Games road race in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada.[3][7] He was 19.

He moved to France in 1979 to join the ACBB,[3] a club at Boulogne-Billancourt in the suburbs of Paris with a reputation of placing riders in professional teams, particularly Peugeot. Whilst he was with the ACBB he lived and raced alongside Robert Millar and Mark Bell. That season he won the Tour de l'Essonne, the Tour de l'Hérault and the amateur version of the unofficial world time-trial championship, the Grand Prix des Nations, in Cannes.[3][5][7]

Professional career

Anderson at the 1993 Tour de France

Anderson turned professional in 1980, for Peugeot, one of the oldest French teams. He won two races in his first season - the Prix de Wetteren and a stage in the Étoile des Espoirs, and came second in two others. He moved to Lokeren, Belgium, to ride criteriums.

It was a big change; I'd never lived out of home before, so that was a big difference, and then there's the length of the races; you know all of a sudden you're riding 200 km a day instead of back here you'd be racing 80 or 100 km a day; huge fields, you turn up at a race and you'd have 200 riders, 250 riders. It's difficult because I was on a French team, and I felt that the French riders got priority, and I had to go a bit deeper or had to be a little better than some of my colleagues on the team. But that hardened me, and put pressure on me, and I think became part of my make-up in the end.[8]

He came fifth in the 1982 Tour de France, in which he held the white jersey of best young rider, and again fifth in 1985, the year he won the Tour de Suisse. That same season he finished second in the Super Prestige Pernod International, forerunner of the UCI points championship. His highlights were wearing the yellow jersey of the 1981 Tour de France and then again for nine days of 1982. He was the first rider from outside Europe to lead the race. Anderson described what it meant in 1981:

It happened in the Pyrenees. This was my first Tour de France. I didn't have aspirations of becoming the wearer of the yellow jersey or anything like that. I was given my instructions and I was supposed to look after a rider on my team, the team leader, a Frenchman, and I forgot my instructions and just sort of went into survival mode over a number of mountain passes, just staying up with some of the top riders, and before I knew it, my team director came up beside me in his car and told me, 'Listen, what happened to your leader, the guy that you've been instructed to watch today?' you know. And to help if he has any troubles, or just pace him back if he's having some troubles. And I said, 'Oh gee, that's right. Where is he?' And he said, 'he's five or ten minutes back, in the next group.' I said, 'No worries I'll wait up for him.' He said, 'No, no, stay up here, you're doing OK, just stay out of trouble and try and hang on as long as possible.'

So hang on I did, and whistled down the next mountain and got to the last climb and I stayed up with Bernard Hinault; there was one rider, a Belgian rider, Lucien Van Impe rode away, an excellent climber, he rode away and so we came in a couple of minutes later, but I had enough time from some good days previously, that I climbed into the yellow jersey, and I had no idea of what the sort of yellow jersey represented, because I mean there's so much history to it, and for me it was just like, 'Oh yes, great, I don't have to wash my old jersey tonight, you know, get a new one'. But really, you're sort of at the highest level of the sport.[9]

His best year was 1985, when he won the Tour Méditerranéen, Critérium du Dauphiné Libéré and the Tour de Suisse, as well as finishing second in the Tour of Flanders and Gent–Wevelgem. He continued to ride the Tour until 1989, when he came 38th, but by then he had arthritis. In 1990 he joined the American team, 7-Eleven - "Speculation has it that he took a big pay cut; maybe that is what turned into motivation which resulted in his comeback to the big league," said Peiper[3] - and he won the Tour Méditerranéen and the Tour of Sicily and stages of the Tour de Suisse and Tour de France.[3] He also won the Tour of Britain in 1991 and 1993.[10]

Retirement and honours

Anderson retired to a farm he bought in Jamieson and has what he calls the life of a gentleman farmer. He was given the Medal of the Order of Australia in 1987 for service to cycling.[11] In 2000, he received the Australian Sports Medal[12] and in 2001 he received a Centenary Medal for service to society through cycling.[13] He was inducted into the Sport Australia Hall of Fame in 2010.[14] In 2015, he was an inaugural Cycling Australia Hall of Fame inductee.[15]

Private life

Anderson has married twice, first to Anne, whom he married just after turning professional, and then Christi Valentine, who in 1999 wrote Anderson's biography, Phil Anderson: Cycling Legend.[16] Anderson and Valentine married on 29 April 1994 and separated in 2005.[17] Anderson has been in a relationship with Anne Newell since 2006.

Career achievements

Major results

1978

1st Road race, Commonwealth Games

1980

3rd Overall Paris–Bourges

1981

1st Stage 6 Paris–Nice

10th Overall Tour de France

Held after Stage 6

1982

5th Overall Tour de France

1st Young rider classification

1st Stage 2

Held after Stages 2–11

7th Overall Critérium du Dauphiné Libéré

1983

1st Amstel Gold Race

2nd Overall Tour de Romandie

1st Stage 5a

3rd Overall Paris–Bourges

3rd Liège–Bastogne–Liège

6th Overall Critérium du Dauphiné Libéré

1st Prologue & Stage 3

7th Super Prestige Pernod International

9th Overall Tour de France

1984

1st Overall Setmana Catalana de Ciclisme

1st Stage 4b

1st Züri–Metzgete

1st Rund um den Henninger Turm Frankfurt

2nd Liège–Bastogne–Liège

3rd Super Prestige Pernod International

7th Overall Critérium du Dauphiné Libéré

1st Stage 6

9th La Flèche Wallonne

10th Overall Tour de France

1985

1st Overall Tour de Suisse

1st Points classification

1st Mountains classification

1st Stages 3, 5b & 8

1st Overall Critérium du Dauphiné Libéré

1st Stage 1b

1st Overall Tour Mediterranean

1st Stage 4b

1st Rund um den Henninger Turm Frankfurt

1st E3 Prijs Vlaanderen

2nd Overall Tour of Belgium

1st Stages 2 & 3b

2nd Overall Setmana Catalana de Ciclisme

1st Stages 2 & 3

2nd Tour of Flanders

2nd Gent–Wevelgem

2nd Super Prestige Pernod International

4th Overall Paris–Nice

1st Stage 4b (TTT)

5th Overall Tour de France

5th Amstel Gold Race

7th Liège–Bastogne–Liège

1986

1st Paris–Tours

1st Stage 3b Nissan Classic

3rd Overall Coors Classic

1st Stage 3

3rd Giro di Lombardia

1987

1st Milano–Torino

6th Amstel Gold Race

7th Overall Giro d'Italia

9th Rund um den Henninger Turm Frankfurt

10th Gent–Wevelgem

1988

1st Overall Danmark Rundt

1st Stage 3

Nissan Classic

1st Stage 2 & 4

1st Stage 3 Tirreno–Adriatico

2nd Tour of Flanders

2nd Milano–Torino

1989

1st Overall Tour de Romandie

1st Stage 1

1st Stage 17 Giro d'Italia

1st Stage 2 Kellogg's Tour

1st Stage 5b Nissan Classic

3rd Liège–Bastogne–Liège

1990

Giro d'Italia

1st Intergiro classification

1st Stage 4b

1st Stage 5 Tour de Luxembourg

2nd Paris–Tours

4th Overall Three Days of De Panne

10th Amstel Gold Race

1991

1st Overall Kellogg's Tour

1st Mountains classification

1st Stages 1 & 3

1st Overall Tour Mediterranean

1st Stages 5 & 6

1st Overall Settimana Internazionale di Coppi e Bartali

1st Stage 6

1st Stage 10 Tour de France

1st Stage 8 Tour de Suisse

1st Stage 4 Tour DuPont

2nd E3 Prijs Vlaanderen

7th Milan–San Remo

7th Züri–Metzgete

10th UCI Road World Cup

1992

1st Overall Nissan Classic

1st Stage 4

Tour DuPont

1st Stages 5, 8 & 9

1st Grand Prix d'Isbergues

3rd Overall Settimana Internazionale di Coppi e Bartali

3rd Paris–Brussels

6th Paris–Tours

1993

1st Overall Kellogg's Tour

1st Stage 1

1st Overall Tour of Sweden

1st Stage 4

1st GP Impanis

1994

1st Team time trial, Commonwealth Games

General classification results timeline

Grand Tour general classification results
Race	1981	1982	1983	1984	1985	1986	1987	1988	1989	1990	1991	1992	1993	1994
Vuelta a España	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—
Giro d'Italia	—	—	—	—	—	—	7	—	13	33	—	—	—	—
Tour de France	10	5	9	10	5	39	27	—	38	71	45	81	84	69
Major stage race general classification results
Race	1981	1982	1983	1984	1985	1986	1987	1988	1989	1990	1991	1992	1993	1994
Paris–Nice	—	16	—	5	4	—	—	—	—	—	11	19	—	—
Tirreno–Adriatico	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	7	—	—	—	—	—	—
Tour of the Basque Country	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	45	60	54
Tour de Romandie	—	—	2	—	—	—	—	—	1	13	—	—	—	—
Critérium du Dauphiné	20	7	6	7	1	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—
Tour de Suisse	—	—	—	5	1	26	—	27	—	—	31	20	—	30
Volta a Catalunya	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—	—

See also

• List of Australians who have led the Tour de France general classification

References

1. "Phil Anderson". cycling.org.au. Cycling Australia. Archived from the original on 1 January 2020. Retrieved 1 January 2020.
2. Phil Anderson at Cycling Archives
3. Cycling Weekly, UK, 21 November 1992
4. Phil Anderson to visit New Zealand Archived 9 November 2014 at the Wayback Machine cyclingnz.com
5. "Palmarès de Phil Anderson". memoire-du-cyclisme.eu. Archived from the original on 9 November 2014. Retrieved 9 November 2014.
6. Riding with R. Sansonetti, S. Sansonetti and A. Goodrope
7. "Index - Velo-club.net - le RDV des fans de cyclisme, vélo, velo, cycling, cyclo, piste, VTT (dead link)". Velo-club.net. Archived from the original on 5 December 2008. Retrieved 15 January 2014.
8. The Sports Factor, ABC 1999
9. Sport Sponsorship & The Tour de France Archived 21 March 2005 at the Wayback Machine The Sports Factor, ABC radio National transcript. 23 July 1999. Retrieved 23 May 2007
10. Lee, Aaron S. (18 August 2014). "The Spin with Phil Anderson". Eurosport. Archived from the original on 4 April 2015. Retrieved 5 March 2015.
11. "Phil Anderson". Australian Honours Database. Archived from the original on 26 September 2007. Retrieved 30 April 2007.
12. "Phil Anderson". Australian Honours Database. Archived from the original on 26 September 2007. Retrieved 30 April 2007.
13. "Phil Anderson". Australian Honours Database. Archived from the original on 26 September 2007. Retrieved 30 April 2007.
14. "Phil Anderson". Sport Australia Hall of Fame. Archived from the original on 24 September 2020. Retrieved 24 September 2020.
15. "Inaugural Cycling Australia Hall of Fame inductees". Cycling Australia. Archived from the original on 4 March 2016. Retrieved 12 November 2015.
16. Lothian Books, UK, ISBN 0-85091-933-9
17. Feud over $3.5m estate Archived 24 September 2020 at the Wayback Machine Herald Sun 13 December 2006.

External links

• Anderson's website at the Wayback Machine (archived 2016-03-24)
• Phil Anderson at Cycling Archives
• Phil Anderson at the Sport Australia Hall of Fame
• Sports Factor 1999 Interview at the Wayback Machine (archived 2005-03-21)