Julian Alaphilippe is one of the superstars of cycling, has already been a street world champion twice, won stages on the very big tours, six at the Tour de France alone and the mountain jersey on the big loop by France. On Sunday, the Frenchman cheered his seventh prank on the tour – but unfortunately it was completely wrong.
Julian Alaphilippe stepped into the pedals like crazy, took the top of a 22-member field, crossed the finish line in front of the Belgian Wout van Aert, straightened up on the bike and smashed the competition for joy around his ears. It’s just stupid that Alaphilippe did not interpret the racing process properly.
Belgian Tim Wellens had already crowned his test on the 15th stage of the Tour de France with his first section on the “Tour of the Leiden” a whopping 1:36 minutes before the 33-year-old. Even more: Eight seconds before Alaphilippe, Victor Campenaerts also rolled another Belgian over the finish line in front of the all -rounder.
Alaphilippe thus “only” secured third place with his sprint masterpiece. A rank that is undoubtedly worthy of all honors, but is hardly more than a small grin to a driver of the Alaphilipes class.
“This is bitter, but it happens”
“Unfortunately, our radio did not work,” said Raphael Meyer, team boss of Alaphilipe’s Tudor racing team, then quite crunched why his protégé simply didn’t know that a duo was going in front of his group: “This is bitter, but it happens.”
For Alaphilippe, who had worn the yellow jersey in his tour career for a total of 18 days, it was not a happy day overall – in the event of an early fall, the veteran even had his own shoulder, but managed to rein up. At the finish line, the unlucky bird was still calm about his faux pas.
“You have to take it in a humorous way. After the finish line, Wout van Aert told me: ‘No, no, there were still some before us.’ After the crash, the microphone no longer worked, “said the veteran at” ITV Sport “. The “Belga” news agency quotes the top star somewhat more drastically: “Unfortunately, my radio no longer worked after the fall, so I tried to put on the best possible sprint and think about the stage victory. I put my hands on like an idiot, but it was a few boys in front of me.”
By the way: At the classic Liège-Bastogne-Liège, Alaphilippe once thought it was the winner before Primoz Roglic still conceded him on the last few meters: “You have to see it fun. It happened to me in Liège, now on the tour. That’s part of the game.”