Tourist
Florian Lipowitz ends the Tour de France in Paris in third place and wins the white jersey of the best young driver. It is the preliminary climax of an unusual and steep ascent.
So he was now on this overwhelming splendid boulevard, on this yellow podium with the Arc de Triomphe As a backdrop in the background. Florian Lipowitz looked ahead, the photographers, the TV cameras and VIP guests who were allowed to stay before the podium.
Only now and then he carefully slows to the right, as if he wanted to make sure that it really really Tadej Pogačar And Jonas Vingegaard were – the two best drivers in the world. They were and Lipowitz had actually done it.
A good hour earlier he was rolled over the finish line on the Champs Élysées and had finally ended the Tour de France as third in the white jersey of the best young professional. “Of course it was a dream that I thought he may never come true”said Lipowitz in Paris late in the evening.
Smalltalk with Tadej Pogačar
Lipowitz, 24, has finally arrived in the world leadership of cycling, even if he couldn’t really believe it on the way. He came out these days as “Little Pogačar-Fan”who still seemed surprised that he even even with the now four -time tour winner from Slovenia Small talk was allowed to hold.
“A few years ago you only watched on the TV, see him racing. And now I’m part of it myself, of course I’m happy”said Lipowitz on the second day of rest of the tour. Now he watched the superstar of his sport to answer the questions of the international journalists and was immediately on it himself.
An unusual story
The story of the steep climb of Florian Lipowitz to the cycling elite is unusual, and he himself spoke of one during the tour “Fairy tale”: A boy from the Swabian Alb, who, like his brother, has a heart and above all a great talent for biathlon, so that the family moved to Stams in Tyrol so that the children can go to the ski high school there.
The further path in German favorite winter sports seemed to be prescribed. Florian became a national junior champion, the brother Philipp even junior world champion one and a half years older. However, inflammation of the growth joint in the knee and a cruciate ligament tear suffered while surfing stopped the biathlon career of the then 16 -year -old Florian Lipowitz. Cross -country skiing and shooting no longer went, but cycling. At 18, Lipowitz won two cycling marathons in the Alps.
A call and lunch
A little later, early 2020, the phone rang in the Ralph Denk office, the team manager of the German one, which was then still under the name Bora Hansgrohe World Tour teams. On the phone there is a young man who wants to know what to do to become a cycling professional, the secretary explained and put the caller through. Think listened to what Florian Lipowitz had to say and invited him to Raubling for lunch, the team’s seat.
Lipowitz came to the appointment from Stams – by bike, almost 150 kilometers. “It was a ride for lunch, so he was already impressed”says Denk, in which applicants often audition: “They then send a travel cost bill, and he just gets 150 kilometers by bike. “ He was flabbergasted for the second time when Lipowitz asked after lunch where he could change. He had to go back to the bike to drive back.
“Lunch has definitely paid off”says Denk today. Although he and his team had long discussed what they should do with Lipowitz. They then convinced the performance data of the young man and so they accommodated him for training for three seasons at the third-class team Tirol-Ktm before bringing him into their own World Tour team for the 2023 season, where he continued to be unstoppable.
Another step every year
Seventh place on the tour of the Spain last year was something like Lipowitz ‘journeyman’s piece, but he also did important helper services for his captain in the mountains Primož Rogličthe Vuelta won. At the beginning of this season, the promotion continued: Lipowitz took second place at Paris-Nizza, fourth place on the heavy Basque Country trip and third place before the tour at the Dauphiné-Tour behind Tadej Pogacar and Jonas Vingegaard, next to whom he was on the podium in Paris.
The question now is whether and how this steep climb can continue. “When I look at the past three years, I took a big step forward every year”says Lipowitz: “But I also think that it cannot always go on in such a way that there will certainly be one or two setbacks. So I try to take as much as possible as possible and then simply look from year to year.”
After this performance on the big Tour de France stage, the expectations will now increase, and its development can no longer be secretly, quietly and quietly. Lipowitz, who – as Team boss Denk in Paris confirmed – has been bound to Red Bull -Bora -Hansgrohe in the long term, is now in the spotlight – not only, but especially in Germany, where there was no longer a large broadcaster for a long time.
“I am not even aware of that yet”he said in Paris, he spent the three weeks in a bubble. Outside the bladder, he will probably be confronted with the question at some point whether he can also challenge Pogačar and Vingegaard at some point.
Steep learning curve during the tour
The idea of giving Lipowitz carefully, the team manager think publicly before the tour, has become invalid after his appearances in France. “A milestone”be this first podium on the tour for the Team Red Bull-Bora Hansgrohe, said Denk, and said that he would like to target the tour with Lipowitz.
Lipowitz, whose development thinks one “Heart project” called, the tour of the tour had a steep learning curve. After he and his team were safely navigated by the tricky first ten days, Lipowitz was already in the first difficult mountain arrival in Hautacam The first pursuer of the big two, more than two minutes behind Pogačar, but only 13 seconds behind Vingegaard.
Also in Superbagnères he was not far away. Only a tactical mistake on the first day in the Alps almost brought Lipowitz to third place in the overall ranking. But the following day he was able to correct this faux pas created from youthful high spirits and consolidate his podium, which was no longer in danger on the last two days of the tour. “I’ve only been driving a professional race for five and a half years. It would be strange if I did everything right”said Lipowitz in Paris.
First German on the podium for 19 years
Lipowitz has been the first German cyclist in 19 years to make it onto the podium in Paris. The last one before him was Andreas Klöden at the Tour de France 2006 – a tour of France overshadowed by scandals. Before the start, Jan Ullrich and the other were the big tours, the Italian Ivan Bassobecause of their involvement in the doping affair around the Spanish doctor Eufemiano Fuentes. The winner Floyd Landis the tour success was revoked after a positive doping test.
Smoding has also been heavily burdened in the final report of an investigation commission on the systematic doping of the Telekom/T-Mobile team at the University of Freiburg, but still denies doping. Most recently in an interview with the “Welt am Sonntag” this weekend.
The eternal doping question
Lipowitz was six years old at the time. But because, despite all efforts in anti-doping fight, cycling has been suspected and the protagonists of today seem to break all records from the weddings of the doping, which for some experts not only explained by the unquestionably rapid material development, better nutrition and progress in training science, he also has to ask the relevant questions.
This is also one of the challenges for world -class drivers in cycling. “In the end everyone has to look at themselves”Lipowitz replies to the first questions about the topic: “I can only say for myself that I do everything in compliance. I also want to be able to go to bed calmly.”
Lipowitz also has to submit to the strict regime of modern cycling: long training camps in height, weighed food and numerous other deprivations. Lipowitz reported that he has decreased one and a half to two kilos since the beginning of the year. But now, after the last rounds through Paris, there is some time to breathe.
“A croissant and a coffee” He wanted to treat himself to Paris on Monday, where he wanted to stay with his girlfriend for another day. Lipowitz will first have to let what he actually experienced in the past three weeks in France. “I will surely need a day or two to realize that”he said. And then he will find that a new time has started. For him and for German cycling.