From our special correspondent in Beijing
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Full results of the 2022 Winter Olympics
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Clément, we saw you very moved at the end of the race, you who don't often show your emotions…
Clément Noël:
Yes, that's true.
Everything is overdone here.
It's a race that I expected more, that I had prepared more and for which, inevitably, I felt more pressure, more stakes.
So when the race is over, whether it went well or not, we tend to let everything go.
I thought of all the work I had done.
In the World Cup, you can quickly recover from a failure because there will necessarily be another stage behind.
Be careful, I love the World Cup circuit, but the Games are necessarily stronger on an emotional level.
It seems normal to me...
Read alsoJO 2022: masterful Clément Noël, Olympic champion and exact to the rendezvous
About your second run, your coach told us that you were one with the elements. Is this also your feeling?
Yes and no.
I wasn't completely sure of the speed of my round.
I was surprised seeing the gap.
I felt it was good, but I wasn't sure it was very good.
This second round went well, without any error on my part, but I didn't expect to make such a difference.
In Pyeongchang, you came very close to the podium. Have you thought about it today?
No.
In Pyeongchang, I was disappointed at the time because 4th place is always difficult to accept.
Nevertheless, I had nothing to regret there because I had produced my best skiing.
I was young (20 years old) and I came to discover.
It went very well, I had a very good race.
For me, it remains a good memory and I had no revenge to take in my opinion.
Can you say that Pyeongchang served you?
Yes, of course.
Maybe if Beijing were my first Games, I would have been more impressed by all the scenery, more intimidated too.
There, I knew the operation and that necessarily helped me, at least a little.
I tend to disregard what people say about me, good or bad.
Clement Noel
How did you manage to keep the confidence to approach these games, after a complicated last month in terms of results?
I knew it was all in my head, and I was convinced that I still had the level to put in good runs and produce good skiing.
I think I did well to take a break before these Games, to rest and think about something else.
Then, when I got back on the skis, I tried to be calm, relaxed, to find solutions.
And then the solutions, I found them little by little.
Coming here to training, I skied well and it boosted my confidence level.
The fact that for four years you have been presented as the phenomenon of discipline, has that boosted you or, on the contrary, slowed you down?
Anyway, I don't pay too much attention to that.
I focus on what I have to do.
There are others who go very fast in slalom.
Personally, I stayed on three good seasons, which gave me another status, made me someone expected.
But an Olympic season, everyone was expected.
And I knew that if I could get my ski in place, I had a chance to do something good.
Now, to come back to your question, I tend to disregard what people say about me, good or bad.
LiveJO 2022: Noël wins gold in the slalom, the Bleues du biathlon misses the podium in the relay
Did you imagine yourself an Olympic champion one day?
Never.
I am not someone who likes to project myself into the future.
I was skiing, I liked it and as I was good, I continued.
I went through the ranks one by one, without telling myself that one day I would be an Olympic champion or that I would win World Cup stages.
I set myself milestones each time.
At the end of high school, I wanted to be in the France team to be sure of having taken the right train, for example.
If that hadn't been the case, then I would have prioritized my studies.
As I was lucky that it worked well in the right timing, I embarked on a career in skiing and it suits me well.
And then once we're really into it, that we've shown that we could win, of course, I wanted to succeed at least once in a big event.
You are the first Olympic champion in alpine skiing since 2006 and Antoine Dénériaz. You go down in the history of your discipline in France…
Of course, but it's not the kind of stuff I've thought about or done yet.
It is certain that in alpine skiing, in France, we are not accustomed to a gold medal or several at each Olympiad.
It's very dense.
Even arriving as a favorite, it's complicated.
During the last Olympics, we have seen in slalom that it was not always the favorite that won.