In 2021, Julian Alaphilippe will discover his next world.
For the world champion, the change is now and everywhere.
And not just because he is not going to start, contrary to his habits, his season in South America.
This year, it will be France and the Tour de La Provence where he will line up until Sunday.
The event, co-organized by his partner Marion Rousse, suits him well.
But it is not a flower that he made to the latter to restore the shine to this race.
He wanted to use it since he had abandoned it in 2016. “He did things according to the rules, explains Pierre-Maurice Courtade, the director of the event and also his friend.
Everything went through his Deceuninck-Quick Step team and he asked absolutely nothing to line up.
My only interlocutor was the sporting director of his team, Ricardo Scheidecker.
"
"I can't wait to become a dad"
If Alaphilippe chose the Provençal event, it is in particular for his ascent, this Saturday, of a part of the mythical Mont Ventoux where he has not put a wheel since 2016. “I don't think I even remember anymore of the course, ”he smiles.
But the time and the mood are not to summon memories and speak in the past.
The future looks much more intense for him.
If after the Tour de La Provence, Alaphilippe will set sail for Italy and a Strade Bianche, Tirreno-Adriatico and Milan-San Remo triptych, the event which fascinates him the most lasts nine months.
The announcement of his next fatherhood turns his life upside down and he confesses it with words as simple as they are sincere.
“It changes a lot of things,” he says.
Not in my way of preparing myself sportingly but in that of thinking.
I am very happy and can't wait to become a dad.
I start talking to people in the team who are fathers of families and I listen to their experience.
But I also tell myself that I am lucky to have a great
girlfriend
like Marion.
Thanks to her, I can stay focused on my sports program and my work.
"
This year, Alaphilippe has changed everything in his work.
Even before the Tour of San Juan and Colombia were canceled, he had decided not to put an ocean between himself and France.
With the Covid, he didn't want an untimely quarantine to prevent him from returning.
Nor come back sick as it had been for several years because of the temperature changes due to the altitude.
No pressure
Sportingly, Alaphilippe does not put any pressure on the Tour de La Provence.
He who made a point of honor on Paris-Nice when he returned from Argentina and Colombia, knows that he is not yet at his best.
The legs are still responding but his right hand, broken during his fall during the last Tour of Flanders on October 18 when he was beginning to dream of victory, still hurts him.
“I am not yet 100% recovered from this injury,” he sighs.
Because if the two fractures to the fingers are consolidated, I also had a tear of a tendon which remains very painful.
I have to warm up a lot before cycling.
But, according to the doctors, the course of the pain is normal.
A month ago, I couldn't sprint.
There, I get there but I still need time.
But don't count on me to complain.
I am super happy.
"