Special envoy to La Roche-sur-Foron
Click-clack.
July 21, 1986, at the top of L'Alpe d'Huez (18th stage), Bernard Hinault and Greg LeMond, 2nd in the Tour and the Yellow Jersey, team members in the La Vie Claire team, cross the line of arrived hand in hand under the delighted gaze of Bernard Tapie, the boss of the team.
The stage for the Breton (the first for a Frenchman at the top of the mythical ascent with 21 laces), the victory on the Champs-Elysées for the American (a first for the United States, he who remains the only American in the winners of the Grande Boucle).
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Michal Kwiatkowski-Richard Carapaz, inseparable in the same celebration.
This Thursday, with 1'51 '' ahead of the peloton of favorites set by Wout Van Aert (ahead of Primoz Roglic and Tadej Pogacar), Michal Kwiatkowski and Richard Carapaz marched, took advantage of the cheers, crossed the line in slow motion.
Arm in arm, arm in arm.
An extremely rare sequence on the Tour de France.
“It was a spectacular victory.
We both left, we wanted to win the stage and take points for the polka dot jersey classification.
It was a collective effort, ”Carapaz summarized.
The polka dot jersey for one (Carapaz), stage victory for one (Kwiatkowski).
Michal Kwiatowski (world champion in 2014, winner in particular of Milan-San Remo in 2017, of the Amstel Gold Race in 2015 and of the Clasica San Sebastian in 2015) who accompanied many victorious campaigns on the Tour with the British team clinched his first stage victory on the Grande Boucle and said with emotion: “This victory is incomparable with any I have had, is it the magic of the Tour or the way we approached this stage?
We put on a great show, worked very hard for this success.
We knew we were going to win, we could hear the spectators screaming and our sports directors screaming.
I got chills from the last descent.
These last days have been hard, we had to change our objective (after the abandonment of Egan Bernal).
I am very happy that Richard let me win.
I will never forget him.
And I hope he will keep the polka dot jersey. ”
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A day and a victory (the first of Ineos on the Tour since Geraint Thomas at the top of L'Alpe d'Huez in 2018) that the Pole dedicated, very moved, to Nicolas Portal, sports director of the deceased British team in March: “We miss him so much.
We have to live with this situation.
Whether we are successful or not, we will always remember him.
We miss him very much.
He would have liked what we did.
He would have appreciated the state of mind.
He inspires us.
It's a victory for him. ”
Kwiatkowski will, after the Tour, turn with ambition to the Worlds of Imola (September 27) ...
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