Johan Bruyneel

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Johan Bruyneel (born August 23, 1964, Izegem, Belgium) is a directeur sportif and former road bicycle racer in professional cycling. Retiring from racing in 1998, he is now best known as the director of Team Discovery (formerly U.S. Postal Service Pro Cycling Team), a US-based UCI ProTour cycling team.

Bruyneel is known to speak five languages to communicate with the cyclists of diverse nationalities on the team. He has directed the team through Lance Armstrong's seven victories of the Tour de France. Cycling lore has it that he called Lance Armstrong in late 1998 with the message that "you can win it next year".

His greatest successes as a cyclist came at 1995 Tour de France when the native Belgian won stage 7, which began in Charleroi and ended Liège, Belgium, against the Spaniard and eventual winner Miguel Indurain. That same year, he finished on the podium in 3rd place at the 1995 Vuelta a España and won the Aalst Criterium, part of the post-Tour-de-France criterium circuit.

Earlier wins include capturing the 1990 Tour de l'Avenir, the 1991 Rund um den Henninger Turm, the 1992 Grand Prix des Nations and Coppa Placci, and winning stage 6 (Evreux > Amiens) and finishing 7th overall at the 1993 Tour de France.

In the 1996 Tour de France, millions of television spectators held their breath as he missed a curve when downhilling in stage 7 (Chambéry > Les Arcs), and disappeared into a ravine. He miraculously survived, climbed out of the ravine and got back on his bike.