Óscar Freire
Freire at the 2012 Tour Down Under | |
| Personal information | |
|---|---|
| Full name | Óscar Freire Gómez |
| Nickname | The Cat, Oscarito |
| Born | 15 February 1976 Torrelavega, Spain |
| Height | 1.71 m (5 ft 7+1⁄2 in) |
| Weight | 64 kg (141 lb; 10 st 1 lb) |
| Team information | |
| Current team | Retired |
| Discipline | Road |
| Role | Rider |
| Rider type | Sprinter, Classics specialist |
| Amateur teams | |
| 1995–1996 | Ripolin Bondex |
| 1997 | Pinturas Banaka |
| Professional teams | |
| 1998–1999 | Vitalicio Seguros |
| 2000–2002 | Mapei–Quick-Step |
| 2003–2011 | Rabobank |
| 2012 | Team Katusha |
| Major wins | |
Grand Tours
| |
Óscar Freire Gómez (born 15 February 1976) is a Spanish former professional road bicycle racer. He was one of the top sprinters in road bicycle racing, having won the world championship three times, equalling Alfredo Binda, Rik Van Steenbergen, Eddy Merckx and Peter Sagan. In the later years of his career, he became more of a classics rider. He won the cycling monument Milan–San Remo three times, the green jersey and four stages in the Tour de France and seven stages of the Vuelta a España, throughout a successful career.
Despite his diminutive stature, Freire was a world class sprinter. He had a training philosophy where he rode shorter distances than most professional cyclists, sometimes covering only about half the distance his colleagues would. When growing up he contracted tuberculosis and narrowly avoided having a leg amputated.