In every generation, it seems, there is someone in the peloton that all the other riders point to when asked: Who’s the fastest descender? Who’s the man who can race down mountain roads seemingly effortlessly and leave the rest behind?

When I first started reporting the sport in the late 1960s, the fastest was Eddy Merckx, who went down mountain roads as if on rails. He set up his infamous 130km-long solo break through the Pyrenees at the 1969 Tour de France by gaining so much time on the descent of the Tourmalet that he decided to continue alone to win the stage by seven minutes. Another fearsome descender was Frenchman Raymond Poulidor. After being dropped by Poulidor going down the slick Col d’Ornon in a rainstorm at the 1966 Tour to a stage finish in Bourg d’Oisans, rival Jacques Anquetil asked his team director, “How much time did I lose on that descent?” When he heard it was a minute, the five-time Tour winner said, “A minute? My life is worth more than that.”

Through the ’70s and early ’80s, the kamikaze descender was one of Sean Kelly’s faithful teammates, Frenchman Frédéric Vichot. He passed the baton to a brawny Englishman, Sean Yates, who spent most of his career with American teams 7-Eleven and Motorola. The current king is the quiet Italian Paolo Savoldelli, now with Team LPR, who needed all of his downhill skills to win the 2005 Giro d’Italia — under Yates’s direction when the tall Brit was with Discovery Channel.

I first met “Yatesey” — as his teammates called him — when he was still an amateur racer in England. He started off in British-style time trials and always loved going fast in the shorter distances of 10 and 25 miles, winning national championships. He rode for Britain at the 1980 Olympic Games in the 4km track pursuit; but after joining the French amateur team ACBB, Yates began to show his true strength in road racing.

He turned pro with the Peugeot team in 1982 when salaries were tiny. In the winter Yates supplemented his income with laboring jobs, usually working for landscape gardeners. The hard, outdoor work proved great preparation for the European racing circuit. He always raced as a domestique, where his natural strength, speed and fearless descending made him one of the most valued teammates in the business.

Yates also enjoyed considerable personal success, and I was thrilled to report some of his most memorable successes — winning a time trial stage of the 1988 Tour de France at Wasquehal, taking the 1994 USPRO Championship in Philadelphia, and donning the Tour yellow jersey at Rennes the same year. It was also a thrill to see him going down alpine descents, such as when he helped Lance Armstrong come down the Galibier in the American’s Tour debut in 1993.

Yates recently told me: “It’s the best job in the world being a professional cyclist.” No wonder he did it for 15 years — the last eight with 7-Eleven and Motorola — though he almost stopped after the 1992 season when he was “only” 32.

“I always said that I was gonna stop when I was tired of it,” he said. “I thought it was hard I guess, but now I would have been mad if I’d stopped in ’92. In hindsight if the Motorola team had kept going I’d have liked to keep going for another two years [after the team disbanded at the end of 1996]. But I’d made my decision and that was it.”

When I asked him what made him better going downhill than the other guys, he replied, “I don’t know what was better … I just had more balls I guess. You’ve got to have confidence. I never ever felt I went over my limit. Everyone has their limits. It’s the same now when I go on my motorbike … and I go on the track and scream around Brands Hatch [motor racing circuit in England]. Everyone has their limits.”

Yates said he rides a Honda Fireblade 1000 motorcycle. "It has 160 horsepower. It’s fast … about 175 mph. It’s like sitting on a missile,” he commented. “I’ve been going to Brands Hatch on track days, because you can’t [race] on open roads. It’s too dangerous. But you go there and you just go as fast as you want. You do 20-minute sessions. You have safety cars, marshals, and a bit of crashing. It’s fun. Guys get tired, make mistakes and start crashing … but when you’re fit you don’t get tired. It’s good fun.”

Yates continued, “I go there when it’s pouring rain, and there’s guys going ’round there, and I’m going ’round the corners twice as fast. But I don’t feel I’m on my limit. I am on my limit but I feel safe, and they’re on their limit and they feel safe but they’re going half my speed. It’s your confidence in your ability [that makes the difference].”

Turning to bicycle racing, and talking of the qualities that made him so fast on alpine descents, he explained, “On a sharp hairpin you can only go certain speeds; it’s not like you can go twice the speed. It’s on the fast bends where you can gain, when other guys start using their brakes. … I’d look at the [police or press] motorbike in front of me or see how guys in front of you are going … or look at the cars, and their brake lights … just a combination of things.”

Yates did reveal that he has crashed on a descent. “Once … because of a stupid mistake.” He then added, “None of the good descenders crash. I mean, Savoldelli, he’s the best I’ve ever known; I don’t think he’s ever crashed on a descent. It’s having confidence in your ability. But some guys just can’t descend, they’re just bottled. You’ve just got to relax … like when you go skiing. Self focus. That’s what I try to tell people. Just relax.”

Savoldelli first came to prominence in 1996, the year that Yates retired. Despite being a rookie, the fresh-faced 23-year-old Italian rode with great maturity to finish his debut Tour de France in 33rd place, riding for the low-budget Roslotto-ZG team. Motorola team manager Jim Ochowicz was so impressed with Savoldelli, remarking on his speed in the time trials and on the downhills at the ’96 Tour, that he would have offered the young Italian a contract if Motorola hadn’t pulled its sponsorship.

Now age 35, Savoldelli is still confirming his early promise. At last year’s Giro, besides winning the final time trial at Verona, the man the tifosi call Il Falco almost sprang his Astana teammate Eddy Mazzoleni into the maglia rosa. On the stage to the Tre Cime di Lavaredo summit, Mazzoleni had lost a minute to race leader Danilo D Luca on the preceding Passo di Giau, but after he got on Savoldelli’s wheel on the descent Mazzoleni caught back the minute in 9km before the town of Cortina d’Ampezzo, then dropped the pink jersey group as the descent continued for another 5km.

Not having realized what was happening, Versus commentator Phil Liggett said that Savoldelli and Mazzoleni seemed to be in trouble and were off the back of the Di Luca group. Instead, Savoldelli was pulling his teammate as hard as he could in a bid for the pink jersey. Mazzoleni eventually went on ahead, and midway up the climb to the finish he was three minutes ahead of Di Luca and in the virtual lead. Mazzoleni finally took fifth on the stage (1:34 ahead of Di Luca) and eventually finished the Giro in third place — mainly thanks to Savoldelli’s incredible descending skills.

This year, Savoldelli is working for Di Luca at Team LPR, and we should get a first look at his downhill riding skills this coming Wednesday on stage 11, which has a dozen significant steep climbs and descents in the Apennines. But it’s in the high mountains of the final week that Il Falco will really come into his own.

As for the next great descender, he is already here — well, not at this Giro, but he will be at the Tour de France in July. His name is Samuel Sánchez. He’s Spanish, he rides for Euskaltel, and he has already displayed his fearless style, especially on descents in the rain, when, in Yates’s words, most people just “bottle out.”

Sánchez, Savoldelli, Yates, Vichot, Merckx, Poulidor. Those great descenders all have speed in their blood.