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Tour de France: une sieste, puis l'explosion... et Philipsen

• le 04/07/2023 à 19:03
• Modifié le 04/07/2023 à 21:11

Lecture en 3 min.

Tour de France: une sieste, puis l'explosion... et Philipsen

Le cycliste belge Jasper Philipsen (à gauche) lors de l'arrivée de la 4e étape du Tour de France à Nogaro, le 4 juillet 2023

Des cyclistes lors d'une chute à l'arrivée de la 4e étape du Tour de France à Nogaro, le 4 juillet 2023

Le cycliste néerlandais Fabio Jakobsen reçoit une assistance médicale après sa chute lors de l'arrivée de la 4e étape du Tour de France à Nogaro le 4 juillet 2023

Le cycliste belge Jasper Philipsen après sa victoire lors de la 4e étape du Tour de France à Nogaro, le 4 juillet 2023

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Une sieste, puis l'explosion: Jasper Philipsen a remporté sa deuxième victoire en deux jours mardi dans le Tour de France après une étape particulièrement paresseuse et un final émaillé de chutes sur le circuit automobile de Nogaro.

Dans un hommage peut-être aux cavaliers seuls de Max Verstappen en Formule 1, le peloton a ronronné pendant cinq heures sur les routes gersoises, s'accordant une pause moyennement excitante à la veille de la première étape de montagne dans les Pyrénées.

"Sans doute l'étape du Tour de France la plus ennuyeuse depuis un long moment", a convenu Philipsen, de nouveau vainqueur après son succès la veille à Bayonne.

C'est simple: pendant les 181 premiers kilomètres d'une étape qui en comptait 181,8, il ne s'est strictement rien passé, hormis une échappée sans espoir de deux coureurs normands, Benoît Cosnefroy et Anthony Delaplace.

Eux-mêmes ne croyaient pas un seconde en leurs chances d'aller au bout, sur un parcours plat comme une limande. A 60 km du but, Cosnefroy s'est approché de la moto caméra pour proposer de "faire l'interview d'après-course maintenant, ça m'évitera la zone presse à la fin."

"Pourquoi on a fait ça ? Je ne sais pas", a-t-il ajouté, hilare, avant d'être repris 35 bornes plus loin.

- Jakobsen au tapis -

Quelques minutes plus tôt, un autre coureur, Adrien Petit, avait déjà ouvert la boîte à vannes, suggérant à la télévision de mettre juste "un fond d'hélicoptère" et comme ça "les gens sont peinards pour la sieste".

Le réveil cependant fut brutal.

Des cyclistes lors d'une chute à l'arrivée de la 4e étape du Tour de France à Nogaro, le 4 juillet 2023 / POOL/AFP

Car dès que le peloton s'est aventuré sur le circuit de Nogaro, les bolides du peloton ont enclenché la cinquième, peut-être piqués par le souvenir du légendaire André Darrigade qui était venu, à 94 ans, leur rendre visite sur la ligne de départ à Dax.

Et les chutes se sont multipliées, envoyant au tapis plusieurs cadors du sprint, à commencer par Fabio Jakobsen, miraculé après une chute cauchemardesque sur le Tour de Pologne en 2020. Déjà malheureux la veille, au point de qualifier de "stupide" et "dangereux" le comportement de Philipsen à Bayonne, le Néerlandais souffre de brûlures à l'épaule et au dos, selon le patron de son équipe Soudal-Quick Step Patrick Lefevere.

Mais il devrait être au départ mercredi, contrairement au vétéran espagnol Luis Leon Sanchez, équipier de Marc Cavendish chez Astana, et Jacopo Guarnieri, poisson pilote de Caleb Ewan chez Lotto, qui souffrent tous deux d'une fracture de la clavicule et ont annoncé leur abandon dans la soirée.

Le cycliste néerlandais Fabio Jakobsen reçoit une assistance médicale après sa chute lors de l'arrivée de la 4e étape du Tour de France à Nogaro le 4 juillet 2023 / POOL/AFP

Privés de repères dans ce final inhabituel, fait de longues courbes rapides débouchant sur une interminable ligne droite finale de 800 mètres, plusieurs coureurs se sont également pris les pédales dans les barrières.

"Je ne me souviens pas d'une arrivée comme ça, a commenté Philipsen. C'était très rapide, on avait l'impression d'être des bolides. Je suis très content de ne pas être tombé, j'ai vu qu'il y a eu beaucoup de chutes, j'espère que les copains vont bien."

- Maillot vert -

D'autres comme son leader chez Alpecin, Mathieu van der Poel, ont vivement critiqué la dangerosité du circuit, avant d'être... lui-même déclassé à la dernière place de son groupe pour un coup de coude.

Philipsen, qui a devancé l'Australien Caleb Ewan, l'Allemand Phil Bauhaus et le Français Bryan Coquard, a confirmé qu'il était sans doute le meilleur sprinteur du moment.

Le cycliste belge Jasper Philipsen après sa victoire lors de la 4e étape du Tour de France à Nogaro, le 4 juillet 2023 / AFP

Il reste sur quatre succès lors des quatre derniers sprints massifs dans le Tour de France en comptant celles l'an dernier à Carcassonne et sur les Champs-Elysées.

Le Belge endosse aussi le maillot vert qui, a-t-il dit, "devient un objectif sur ce Tour". D'autant que Jakobsen, son principal rival, est toujours fanny et que Wout Van Aert, écrasant vainqueur du classement aux points en 2022, a assuré qu'il ne se mêlerait pas à la lutte cette année, préférant viser des étapes qui lui échappent pour l'instant.

La star belge a même indiqué avant le Tour qu'il pourrait ne pas aller jusqu'à Paris si son épouse, qui attend leur deuxième enfant, accouche avant la fin.

"Je suis très fier de gagner deux fois de suite", a souligné Philipsen. Il est l'un des sprinteurs qui passent le mieux la montagne. Mais il sait qu'il va souffrir lors des deux prochaines journées dans les Pyrénées qu'on espère moins soporifiques.

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Greg LeMond and the legendary Tour de France winner’s fight with leukemia: ‘I feel so much better’

• Oops! Something went wrong. Please try again later. More content below

This article originally appeared on Velo News

It's summer, he's on the road again, and Greg LeMond is talking about fly fishing and golfing.

The three-time Tour de France winner is making plans for the months ahead, but just over one year ago, his thoughts were a long, long away from casting lines and sinking putts.

"In the first four or five months of last year I told Kathy, 'I think I am dying,'" LeMond tells Velo on a call from his home in Tennessee. "For two or three years, I'd really been impacted by fatigue, but it got to the point where I couldn't get out of bed for about two months."

Kathy, his wife, had been away when things escalated. LeMond hadn't wanted to concern her about that exhaustion, but ultimately went for tests. The news wasn't good.

"I did a blood test the week before I told Kathy how bad I was feeling. We got the results back May 10th or 11th. Then I did a bone biopsy the end of May or June, but I was really diagnosed already by then."

New movie chronicles LeMond’s 1989 Tour comeback

US, Canadian riders on best Tour de France since 1980s

LeMond diagnosed with leukemia

LeMond made that information public on June 5 last year, announcing that he had Chronic Myelogenous Leukemia.

The cancer diagnosis was a shock to the world of cycling and to U.S. sport. LeMond is a triple Tour de France winner, a double world champion, and one of the America’s most respected athletes known as both a ground-breaker and outspoken supporter of clean sport.

At just 60 years of age, he was facing an unexpected health crisis.

Flash forward one year, in his first long interview since his illness, LeMond tells Velo that things had been complicated for way longer than that.

LeMond on his cancer: 'Honestly, I kind of expected this'

Back in early 1987, the world of cycling looked set to be dominated by LeMond. He'd beaten five-time champion Bernard Hinault the previous summer to became the first American winner of the Tour de France, cycling's biggest prize. He was just 25 years of age and gaining strength, making repeat Tour wins seem all but ordained.

LeMond crashed that spring in Tirreno-Adriatico, fracturing his wrist. He returned to the U.S. to recover and was turkey shooting with his uncle and brother in law that April when the latter accidentally shot him, peppering him with pellets.

LeMond was hit by approximately 60 of those, suffering a collapsed lung and extensive bleeding. He was airlifted to hospital and given emergency treatment, and was later told that had a police helicopter not happened to be nearby, he would have bled to death.

Doctors operated to remove the pellets, but an estimated 30 of those had to be left inside due to their precarious location, including several in the lining of his heart. And while he recovered to win the 1989 and 1990 Tours, he believes he hasn't been fully healthy since.

"Since I got shot and got all this lead in me, I've never felt truly healthy for all those years," he said. "The only time I felt really good and normal was prior to getting shot. It's kind of crazy but, really, it's been that long. I haven't felt on top of it for so long.

"I've always been like, 'you've got [chronic] inflammation.' I have a toxic substance which causes that. I did some heart scans and everything, and luckily I'm healthy in relation to that. But I kept saying, 'one day I'm going to get cancer.' Lead is very toxic and I have high levels of lead.

"The thing is that this type of leukemia is not genetic. It's usually a chemical which causes it. Nobody can link it completely, but I think it's the lead poisoning that could be behind the damage to the DNA. That's my hunch.

"Honestly, I kind of expected this,” LeMond stated flatly.

La vraie histoire de resurrection du cyclisme americain, c’est celle de Greg Lemond : grievement blesse dans un accident de chasse en avril 1987, il parvenait a remporter le Tour de France deux ans plus tard. pic.twitter.com/BBsu5bQj7Z -- David Guenel (@davidguenel) February 7, 2022

Talking through his diagnosis, LeMond said that he had a curious first reaction to the news. Finding a silver lining in a very big, dark cloud.

"It's kind of funny, but I was going to do an event in France, a bike ride. And I kept trying to get on my bike beforehand, but I was so tired that I couldn't do it. I'd committed to this ride, so even if I went there and I got dropped after a mile, I felt like I had to do it.

"When my wife said, 'your blood indicates leukemia,' the first thing I thought was, 'oh God, I can get out of that bike ride, I don't have to do it now.' When I think back on it, why did I even think I had to ride it when I was barely able to get out of bed?

"It was kind of a relief," he laughs.

"Maybe I was already preparing for it. I've struggled with energy, fatigue, and that for quite a while."

Turning things around again: ‘We're doing really good’

When LeMond made the announcement of his diagnosis in June 2022, the statement said that the form of leukemia he has is typically non-life threatening.

"My doctors and I have decided on a treatment which will begin this week," he said then. "I should be feeling better in a few weeks and for the near future, my daily schedule will be altered only a little and I have been told that in a few months, I should be in remission. The long-term prognosis is very favorable."

Since then things went quiet. A long period of time without any updates made those in the sport wonder how he was, but fortunately things appear to be heading in the right direction.

"I feel so much better," LeMond told Velo . "The new drug that I'm on, Tasigna, is very effective. If I'm on it, my longevity should be close to normal. Today with cancer, the success rate is 80 to 90 percent. So I'm in that 90 percent range. I'm reacting really well to it.

"Within about three, four months of the treatment I started feeling much better. Really, so much better."

LeMond's course of treatment is very expensive. There was a very high initial outlay for the drug, and also considerable ongoing costs for the twice-daily dose he takes. Fortunately he has health insurance which is covering the bulk of that cost.

"It's a very expensive drug. But thank goodness it is there, because typically you don't survive these things. The good thing about cancer there's really ongoing progress, so I'm not too worried about it."

The Last Rider, un film realise par le producteur/cineaste Alex Holmes sur Greg LeMond 🎞️ il sortira le 23 juin 2023 aux Etats-Unis #cycling #cyclisme #ciclismo pic.twitter.com/niyKaVgryZ -- 🚴 Les Rois du Peloton 🚲 (@LRoisDuPeloton) June 1, 2023

Looking back at the past two years, LeMond says not knowing what was wrong was the most difficult thing about his situation. Finding out what was going on was, in some ways, a relief. Even if the news was bad.

"Once I found out, it was, 'OK, that makes sense. That makes sense.' At least it gives you clarity," he explains. "A lot of times where you don't feel good, or things aren't making sense, you kind of get [confused] ... It reminds me of the last couple of years of racing, where I kept saying, 'I'm really tired.'

"People would go, 'how are you feeling?' I'd reply, 'if I want to be honest, not good, I'm tired.' And you get tired of saying that because it sounds like I was always making excuses.

"It got to a point where I really couldn't talk to people. I would get so tired that I would have to go two or three weeks where I wasn't really communicating a lot. For me, the diagnosis helped explain a lot of stuff."

Between lockdowns and his health problems, LeMond has spent much of the past three years at home in Tennessee with Kathy. It's been a considerable change for someone who always traveled so much, putting his nomadic schedule on hold.

"It's been fun, because until COVID happened I've never been home like this," he says. "The one year that I was home the most was in 2013 when I broke my back in the car accident. That was three months, and so I've broken the record by far. It's been nice."

LeMond has faced a lot over the past three and a half decades.

He had his hunting accident, his recovery, a career which brought successes but ultimately ended in lingering fatigue, business challenges, a war of words with Lance Armstrong over the latter's association with banned sports doctor Michele Ferrari, a public and professional backlash for that criticism, legal cases and eventual vindication when Armstrong admitted to doping. He also revealed in 2007 that he had been abused as a child.

Factor in his illness, and it is clear that he needed some recovery time.

"We're planting shrubs, flowers. We're doing great. We're doing really good," he says, smiling. "We're kind of having a little bit of a less stressful life right now, which is good."

LeMond on overcoming cancer: ‘I'm pretty optimistic. You just kind of move on’

It's now June, his energy levels are on the up and he's making plans.

A return to the Tour this summer is unlikely but he does have a trip planned for France while the race is on, and so he's toying with the idea of visiting the event and seeing a stage. He's enjoying watching cycling again and also looking forward to fishing and golfing, two longtime hobbies of his.

Things should be getting busier on the business front, too. He's got various plans in that area, as well as new products in the pipeline with LeMond Bicycles. Supply change shortages caused by the pandemic have eased, and new road, gravel and ebikes are on the horizon.

A new full-length movie -- called “The Last Rider” -- is set to be released in late June, and chronicles his legendary comeback against Laurent Fignon in 1989.

Meanwhile LeMond's treatments are continuing. Side effects are fortunately minimal and he's hoping for some good news in the coming months.

"There are some people called super responders who, with three or four years of taking the drug, they're cancer free. There's a chance I'm that type of person," he says. "They are tracking it through a very sophisticated test that can show how things are going. I'll find out in two months if I am one of those super responders. If I am, that would be great."

Greg Lemond (Usa) won the Criterium Du Dauphine in 1983. Showing what was to come at the Tour in later years. pic.twitter.com/LrZWn5sAYo -- The World of Cycling (@twocGAME) June 2, 2023

In the meantime he's planning to dust off his bike and get back out there on the trails and roads.

"For two, three years, I couldn't do much exercise. I really got de-conditioned and was incapable of it," he said. "But I'm a little more active now. It's taken a while. In the last couple of months I'm starting to feel better, and I am going to start riding a bike soon. I should have been doing it for about a month. But I really feel significantly better. I'm good."

When he was racing, LeMond was known for his resilience, his endurance, and his mental toughness. He's drawn on that before, during and after his career, and it's an asset now. His back has been against the wall before and he's a survivor.

"A setback is a setback, and I've had a lot of setbacks, including this cancer," he says. "I'm pretty optimistic. You just kind of move on from it. It is what it is. I'm fortunate it's not more severe. There's a lot of people who have much worse outcomes than me. I need no empathy.

"I feel so much better. I have energy. I can do stuff. I can think. So that's good."

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'Since being shot he'd never ridden a great race, so he was terrified' - Kathy LeMond on the 1989 Tour de France

Extract from The Road Book (1989) reveals how Kathy and Greg LeMond experienced the most dramatic Tour victory ever

The 1989 Tour de France is widely rated as the best ever modern-day edition of the race, featuring the narrowest of victories for Greg LeMond on the Champs Elysées ahead of Laurent Fignon in the final time trial. LeMond's victory, his second in the Tour, also represented an incredible turnaround for the American after his near-fatal hunting accident in 1987 and two rollercoaster seasons that followed. In this moving memoir of her and Greg's experiences, from The Road Book Blue Series , and history both on and off the bike in that period, Kathy LeMond provides an acute and warmhearted insight into how LeMond first found his way to Europe and conquered the biggest bike race in the world in a tumultuous year and when it looked like it was far from possible to achieve.

How it all began

The first time I ever saw Greg, he was sitting with his parents in a coffee shop. I was visiting a friend who was also a cyclist, and I saw him and his family happily talking together. I think it was because he had such a great relationship with his mom and dad that he wanted me to travel with him to races. There was something about how close they were. They could talk about anything and they always respected his opinion. It wasn't like they were just parents telling him what to do; that never was the case. They were just supportive, extraordinary people. His mom is gone now, but his dad is still alive.

You see, when we got married he was 19 and I was just 20. We were so crazily in love. We really didn't have anybody else. I don't even know how to describe it. It was just, you know, how it is when you first fall in love. We had been together a year and a half when we got married, and I just couldn't even imagine living without him.

Cyrille Guimard got him a ride when Renault offered him a contract. He, Bernard Hinault and Jean-Marie LeBlanc came to visit Greg at his parents' house in Reno. I mean, at 19, Greg was very young to turn pro. They were concerned about how it would work out because Americans often struggled in France; they could be lonely, unable to speak the language, although we both spoke a high-school level standard of French. And Greg was already making $35,000 a year in America, but only $12,000 in Europe.

Cyrille arranged a place for us to live only 15 miles from his house. It was meant in a supportive way, and not in any way negative. He made sure that I could also come to France with Greg because he felt he had signed a real diamond. He put his arms around us and said, 'OK, I'lI make this as easy as I can for you.' Greg took Berlitz classes and got a French tutor, whereas Cyrille tried to learn English so that he and Greg could communicate better.

Greg had the ability. I think he always thought he had the ability. He was sustained by the dream of winning the Tour de France . That kept him going through some very difficult periods.

I should fast-forward.

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The fightback begins

1987 was the hunting accident. Then, in 1988, he'd crashed in one of the Classics, gouging his chin and damaging his tendon. Every time he tried to ride again, it would seize up and he wouldn't even be able to pedal. Every day for a week he tried, until he couldn't even walk any more. We should have probably got a surgeon to do it right away, but it took until July for him to be operated on. So the beginning of 1989 felt like he was almost starting over.

Everyone had a lot of sympathy for him, and there was a lot of goodwill, but it must have been very hard for him.

He finished sixth at Tirreno-Adriatico , and fourth at the Critérium International, but then he picked up the Epstein -Barr virus, which was the next blow. He went to California, where he was going to try and train. My dad was an immunologist and had been working with a viral vaccine that he gave to Greg - basically a diluted flu shot designed to have his immune system respond. And just before his next race, the Tour de Trump, Greg started to feel better. But it was still one thing after another and he was totally out of shape.

At this time, I was about four months pregnant with our daughter Simone. I was seeing an obstetrician in the States because the plan was to have the baby back in America in October, after the end of Greg's season. I had given a routine blood test, and the next week Greg had to fly to Italy for the Giro . I took him to the airport in the morning, and I was due to fly with our two sons to Belgium in the afternoon. But when I got back home from seeing Greg off, the phone rang. It was the doctor.

I'm afraid you've got some bad results here. I'm so glad you haven't left.'

I told him that my plane was at two o'clock.

'I'm sorry, but you can't go. We need to talk.'

It seemed there were indications of possible Down's syndrome and further complications.

They wanted me to undergo an amniocentesis test. At the same time, my cousin Geoff (who we named our son Geoff after) was working as a stuntman in a Chuck Norris film in the Philippines and he ended up being killed in a helicopter crash. It was just a family nightmare.

In the meantime, Greg was starting the Giro having just found out that there was something potentially wrong with his daughter. On stage 2 to Mount Etna he lost eight minutes, and that night he called home and told me he was thinking he should just quit the sport altogether.

If you think you're going to lose a child, a cycling career suddenly doesn't seem very important. It gave him some perspective, just as it had done after his hunting accident: the most important thing was that he survived - that was a freaking miracle in itself; everything else was gravy. Now we still had another 14 days to wait for news on our daughter.

I wish people understood what it's like to be a professional athlete. When you see a cyclist not doing well, you have no idea what is actually going on in their lives. Their profession takes up 85 per cent of the energy they have for a day of living. They only have 15 per cent spare energy left for anything else. How best to use it? Greg was a father, a husband, a son.

When Greg joined Renault, the first thing they did was tell me what they expected from me: 'You do the laundry and cook for him. He needs three great meals a day.' But I made my views known too. I was just really lucky that Cyrille Guimard was open to my coming to the races because he thought it would be better for Greg. If I'd gone to the races and become an energy drain, they'd have kicked me out in a split second. Or if another rider had complained about me, I wouldn't have been able to stick around. There's no way they'd have put up with a wife who made a drama and wasn't fully supportive.

For those two weeks while I waited for the test results, I was having labour pains from the amniocentesis, and I couldn't get off the couch. I was worried I was going to lose the baby.

Then, one afternoon, I got a call that everything was fine. I'm not kidding, I got on a plane that afternoon with the two boys and we flew straight to Italy to be with Greg. Suddenly everything was OK! If you've had kids, you'll know how precious they are to you and that you'd die for them. We followed the race in the team bus for four or five days and it was just great: Greg could just ride again, rather than worrying about everything else.

On the last day of the Giro, it all came together, and Greg finished second in the time trial. He beat Fignon, putting over a minute into him. That gave him so much confidence going into the final 1989 Tour de France time trial. He was thinking: I've already beaten him by this much, and I wasn't feeling as good then as I'm feeling now. So he figured he could beat him. I mean, he always used to beat Fignon in time trials. The only question was: Can I beat him by enough?

I was there in Luxembourg at the beginning of the Tour. Greg couldn't believe what happened to Delgado [missing his prologue start time and effectively losing the Tour - Ed.]. I just remember him saying, ‘That's insane. How could his team have allowed that to happen?'

Greg's parents followed the entire Tour. I was on the race with the kids until it came close to our house in Kortrijk, and then we went home for a while. The riders flew from Belgium to Dinard. On the plane, Greg sat next to race director Jean-Marie Leblanc.

Remember that Leblanc had visited Greg with Hinault and Guimard in Nevada when they were signing him. Back then, he'd been the main cycling journalist for L'Equipe, and it had been a big story for him. After that, when Greg had been shot in 1987, I was eight months pregnant with our second boy. I had gone into labour while Greg was being operated on for his shotgun wounds. It had been a nightmare. I got to see Greg in the recovery room, and I kissed him before I got sent to another hospital for the birth. A day or so later, they let me leave my hospital to go and see Greg for a few minutes because he'd regained consciousness.

Just as I was going into the hospital, at around midnight, there was Jean-Marie Leblanc, sitting outside.

'Kathy!" he'd said. 'What's going on? They won't let us in the hospital. Can you tell us anything?'

I told him that I didn't know anything and that I hadn't even seen Greg.

'I'm here for as long as it takes,' he told me. I have to see Greg before I go back to France.

Please can you get me to him?'

Now, there were a lot of journalists there. It was a big national news story at the time. But Jean-Marie never left. Every time I came or went from the hospital over the next days, Jean-Marie was always there. On the fourth day, I said, 'OK, I'll see what I can do.' And he was the only person outside of family who saw him. When he saw Greg, he couldn't stop crying.

Greg was in terrible, terrible shape. So Jean-Marie really knew what Greg had been through.

And sitting next to him on that plane at the Tour, two years later, he asked Greg if there was anything he could do for him.

'You know what? said Greg. I need a car pass for my wife. I need her to be able to come and see me. If I go on to win this race, I will not get on the podium unless my wife is there.'

Immediately, I had a car pass and accreditation organised. It was the first time any rider's wife had been given them. The next day, after the time trial on stage 5, Greg took the yellow jersey. We were absolutely euphoric. It had been so long coming. He probably called me five times, and that was before cell phones! The hotel operator had to put the call through, or he had to go down to the lobby. We must have talked on the phone until four o'clock in the morning.

On the rest day before the Alps, I drove down, and then I followed the rest of the race the whole way to Paris. I was following the race, but in many ways I was no different to any other spectator. I could only go as far as the hotel lobby. I was never at the dinner table. I always stayed at another hotel. No one on the team took the slightest responsibility for anything to do with me. If I was there, I always made sure I was standing off to the side. I was really just there so that Greg had someone he could talk to at the end of a stage, someone he could trust 100 per cent. He needed to be able to play with the kids, switch off, talk about other things - fly-fishing, for example. Or he'd read a book about something else. Greg used to travel with textbooks he'd bought from the University of Brussels. He travelled with my organic chemistry books from college so that he could find out about the Krebs cycle. He only wanted facts. Cycling was a land of superstition and weird practices. He just wasn't interested in that.

Greg didn't know if he could race in the high mountains to come. He didn't know if he would crack. He rode super-defensively because he wasn't 100 per cent himself. Since being shot he'd never ridden a great race, so he was terrified. I mean, he literally had shotgun pellets in his heart. We didn't know what he might or might not be capable of. We didn't know what we didn't know.

He had a bad day on Alpe d'Huez. And the next day, I thought it was the end of the Tour for Greg after the stage to Villard de Lans. He thought so too. I remember Greg's mum and dad were with us that night, just sitting around, having a Coke and just talking. His parents were amazing: no expectations, no pressure; just let him vent, he'll figure it out. He won to Aix-les-Bains the next day.

Greg had been OK with Fignon taking the yellow jersey from him. Leading the race had been a lot of extra pressure. And Fignon had been saying that Greg wasn't riding aggressively enough, which made him absolutely furious because he'd seen Fignon hanging on to a motorbike. Greg said, 'Don't even go there. You should be out of this race.'

One day I was staying in the same hotel as Fignon's wife. She was working as a journalist on the race and asked me if she could join me for breakfast. We were having a nice, polite conversation when she suddenly said to me, 'Is Greg being just the biggest asshole right now?"

"No,' I said.

"Oh my God,' she said. 'I cannot stand Laurent right now.'Then she told me she didn't want to see him any more.

Greg couldn't believe it when I told him what she'd said. 'You gotta be kidding me! She told you that?'

The thing is, when Fignon wasn't winning, he was fine. We had so many mutual friends, so I knew he wasn't all bad. And after they both retired, Greg and Laurent had some really great conversations. But when Fignon was on top, he was just the worst.

The whole family was on the Champs-Elysées. Our babysitter in Belgium brought the two boys down to Paris. I drove there the day before, pregnant with Simone, and met with my parents, who'd come for the whole of the final week of the Tour. Greg's parents were there too. We had a hotel right by the Eiffel Tower.

On the morning of the final time trial, I left Greg alone. On time trial days, I let him reach out to me; I never reached out to him because he was focused in a different way to on other days

My dad said, 'I think he's going to win it.'

'C'mon, Dad,' I said. 'Let's just be happy with second. I don't think he'll win. I think it's too much. I don't want that pressure on him, and I don't want to be disappointed.'

From where we had been not that long before, second place in the Tour de France would have been a miracle. But I guess that's why I never won anything big! When the race started, within the first kilometre, I thought: Oh my God, he's good today. Maybe. Maybe. But it is going to be close. What I didn't know at the time was that my dad later took a cab to Greg's hotel with our five-year-old, Geoff. He'd just wanted to go there and tell Greg that he thought he could win. But they never made it back to join us in the VIP area and so they had to watch the race like any other spectators, from behind the fence when Greg came in. But when Greg got onto the podium, he spotted my dad and Geoff, who he hadn't seen for three weeks.

That's how Geoff ended up in all the photos with Greg on the podium.

The new 1989 Blue Book edition, from the publishers of The Road Book, captures one of the most remarkable years in professional cycling history. Order your first edition copy from a strictly limited print run for £40 from  www.theroadbook.co.uk

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Tour de France : c'est arrivé un 23 juillet... Greg LeMond remporte le Tour de France pour 8 secondes aux dépens de Laurent Fignon

Chaque jour durant le Tour de France 2022, franceinfo: sport vous replonge dans l'histoire de la course.

Champs-Elysées, le dimanche  23 juillet 1989.   Le jour où la plus belle avenue du monde est devenue le chemin de croix de Laurent Fignon. Maillot jaune avec une confortable avance sur l'Américain Greg LeMond avant cette ultime étape, un contre-la-montre entre Versailles et Paris, le Français va s'effondrer et perdre le Tour de France pour huit secondes. Retour sur le plus mythique des chronos de la Grande Boucle. 

Huit secondes. C'est ce qui a séparé LeMond de Fignon après près de 3500 kilomètres de course. C'est évidemment l'écart le plus minime à l'arrivée de l'histoire du Tour et sa dramaturgie n'a fait que rajouter à la légende. Au départ de Versailles, le Roi Fignon possède 50 secondes d'avance sur l'Américain. Les deux hommes se sont livrés une bataille acharnée au cours des trois semaines de course mais le leader de la formation Systeme U est bien le plus fort. Rien ne semble pouvoir l'empêcher de décrocher un troisième sacre sur la Grande Boucle. Sauf que... 

Le pari gagnant de LeMond

Laurent Fignon a contracté une blessure à la selle juste avant cet ultime contre-la-montre de 24 kilomètres. La distance, assez courte, devrait pourtant empêcher un retour de LeMond. Mais ce dernier va tenter le tout pour le tout en s'élançant avec un vélo, révolutionnaire à l'époque, équipé d'un guidon de triathlète. Ainsi profilé, celui qui a déjà remporté le Tour en 1986 aux dépens de Bernard Hinault, grappille seconde après seconde son retard sur le Français, qui souffre le martyre. 

Incapable de trouver le rythme, Laurent Fignon se bat avec l'énergie du désespoir mais, quand il arrive sur les Champs-Elysées, le compte à rebours est déjà enclenché. Il ne pourra pas changer le cours de l'histoire. Pour huit secondes, un Greg LeMond incrédule remporte le Tour de France 1989. Laurent Fignon, lui, est en larmes. Il vient pourtant d'entrer encore un peu plus dans la légende de l'épreuve avec ce final dont l'intensité n'a plus jamais été égalée. 

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« Un lieu pour s’entraider » : sur TikTok, les « influchômeurs » dépeignent leurs déconvenues sur le marché du travail

Entre moments de doute et critique du monde de l’entreprise, ces jeunes diplômés qui racontent leur quotidien au chômage sur TikTok cumulent des milliers de vues.

Un grand verre de thé matcha ou de café latté, un, deux, trois ou quatre entretiens d’embauche, une sieste et un tour sur TikTok. Bienvenue dans la vie d’un « influchômeur ». Depuis plusieurs mois, cette nouvelle génération d’influenceurs est née sur l’application chinoise . Fraîchement débarqués sur le marché du travail, ces jeunes racontent à leurs centaines d’abonnés leur galère pour trouver un emploi.

Avec ironie ou sur le ton de la confidence, ces chômeurs issus de la génération Z ( celle née après 1995 ) filment leurs journées, partagent avec leurs « followers » leurs moments de doute, leurs désillusions vis-à-vis du monde du travail, ou leurs conseils pour réussir leurs entretiens. Et le phénomène prend de l’ampleur : au total, près de 25 000 posts figurent sous le hashtag chômage.

@gigioncamera Meme mon cerveau ne sait pas ce qu’il se passe 👀😂 #chomage #lechomage #journalintime #nouvelleere #galere #realite ♬ son original - Gigi

La plupart de ces « influchomeurs » sont diplômés, souvent d’un bac + 5, et parfois même de grandes écoles . « Je suis assez émue aujourd’hui parce que j’ai terminé mes études et après deux masters dans deux écoles parisiennes très réputées dans mon domaine, un an de stage suivi d’un an d’alternance dans une entreprise du CAC 40 , (…) je suis… au chômage », résume Léa Lofmann à ses abonnés.

@lea.lofmann Believe, croire en ses rêves #fyp #paris #master #travail #chomagevie ♬ Work It Out - NickPommeFritz🌴🍟

Comme Léa, Lauryn est diplômée d’un master et a suivi une alternance avant d’être au chômage à 23 ans en septembre dernier. « On ne s’attend pas à galérer autant quand on a fait des études pendant cinq ans et qu’on a de l’expérience professionnelle », se désole-t-elle auprès du Parisien.

« Se sentir moins seul »

« Quand je me suis retrouvée au chômage, j’étais déjà sur TikTok mais je n’avais que 500 abonnés. Pour toucher les gens, je me suis dit qu’il fallait que je sois authentique et que je parle de ce que je vivais vraiment. Alors, je me suis mise à raconter ma vie au chômage, mes entretiens ratés. Les gens me faisaient des retours pour me dire qu’ils vivaient la même chose », retrace celle qui compte désormais plus de 6 000 abonnés sur sa page « Laurynboo_ » et dont certaines des vidéos sur le chômage ont été vues des centaines de milliers de fois.

« C’est comme si on avait créé un lieu où on pouvait s’entraider, se réjouit la jeune femme originaire de Valenciennes. Au chômage on peut vite s’isoler, ce type de contenu permet de se sentir moins seul ». « Ces vidéos permettent aussi de déculpabiliser, de rompre avec le sentiment de honte qui peut exister quand on est au chômage », revendique l’influenceuse.

Durant les six mois passés à France Travail , ex-Pôle emploi, Lauryn dit avoir passé « une centaine d’entretiens » infructueux. Hors de question pour elle d’accepter n’importe quel poste. « Pourquoi quitter le chômage où je me sens bien, pour une entreprise où je ne serai pas heureuse », assume-t-elle.

« Le travail n’est plus une fin en soi »

Lauryn est loin d’être un cas un isolé. Pour certains de ces « influchômeurs », le chômage est en partie choisi. Sur TikTok, la communauté de « Gigioncamera » suit depuis des mois ses hésitations quant à son projet de création d’entreprise. Les abonnés de Lea Lofmann, eux, débattent avec elle de son dilemme : partir en Programme Vacances-Travail (PVT) ou chercher un CDI. Le chômage devient ainsi une façon de « prendre du temps pour soi et de réfléchir à ses projets », explique Lauryn.

« Depuis la crise du Covid, la santé mentale des jeunes a été ébranlée, et ils ont conscience qu’il faut y faire attention. Pour eux, le travail n’est plus une fin en soi mais un moyen de s’épanouir », analyse Élodie Gentina, docteure en sciences de gestion et autrice de l’ouvrage Manager la génération Z, mieux appréhender les nouveaux comportements (Dunod) .

« La génération Z a un rapport au temps différent. Ils sont davantage dans l’instantanéité, et réfléchissent moins à des plans de carrière. Ils ont aussi moins d’anxiété financière que la génération Y », poursuit Élodie Gentina au sujet de cette approche du chômage, qui, précise-t-elle, « est réservée à une jeunesse aisée ».

Les entreprises sont-elles prêtes à travailler avec cette nouvelle génération ? Certaines s’y préparent, assure la chercheuse et professeure à l’Institut d’Économie Scientifique et de Gestion (IÉSEG). « Orange a par exemple mis en place le « congé respiration », qui permet, après cinq ans dans l’entreprise, de prendre une pause pour vivre autre chose », cite-t-elle.

Fraîchement embauchée, Lauryn espère que sa nouvelle entreprise s’adaptera, elle aussi à sa mentalité et à son projet de vie.

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The closest winning margins in Tour de France history

We take a look at the tightest battles and biggest thrashings since the Tour de France began in 1903.

Words: Joe Timms

The Tour de France now has well over 100 editions under its belt, in a lifespan that's just shy of 120 years. Over this period, the race has changed dramatically. In the good old days, riders often raced over 400km per day and had to make any mechanical repairs themselves (though many argue that the illicit use of trains, planes and automobiles often played its part).

So, through the years of the ever-evolving race, between dozens of riders racing hours apart, to tightly-tuned team strategies targeting bonus seconds here and there, what are the closest finishes in Tour de France history?

The smallest winning margin at the Tour de France

Laurent Fignon in 1989 (Image credit: AFP via Getty Images)

• Greg LeMond - 8 seconds, 1989
• Alberto Contador - 23 seconds, 2007
• Oscar Pereiro - 32 seconds, 2006
• Jan Janssen - 38 seconds, 1968
• Stephen Roche - 40 seconds, 1987
• Bernard Thevenet - 48 seconds, 1977
• Chris Froome - 54 seconds, 2017
• Jacques Anquetil - 55 seconds, 1964
• Carlos Sastre - 58 seconds, 2008
• Tadej Pogacar - 59 seconds, 2020

The closest ever Tour de France took place in 1989, where Greg LeMond defeated Laurent Fignon by just eight seconds in one of the most pulsating finishes to a Tour you are ever likely to see. In contrasting fashion to modern-day racing, that race featured five time trials, including the opening prologue in Luxembourg and a mammoth 73-kilometre individual time trial between Dinard and Rennes, where LeMond and Fignon were first and third respectively. 

The duo seesawed between the top two positions throughout the race, regularly taking turns in the yellow jersey before handing it back to their rival. LeMond regained the lead after the stage 15 time trial to Orcières-Merlette, but Fignon grappled the yellow jersey back on Alpe d’Huez and entered the final stage with a 50 second lead.

Nowadays, this would mean that Fignon was the winner of the Tour de France as no time can realistically be won and lost  —  the final stage is used as a celebration before a sprint finish. However, in 1989, Paris hosted a 24.5-kilometre time trial which concluded on the Champs-Élysées. 

LeMond and Fignon finished the stage first and third respectively again, but LeMond had averaged 54.5 kilometres per hour and defeated Fignon by 58 seconds. The margin was enough for LeMond to win the Tour de France by just eight seconds. Fignon, who had won the Giro d’Italia earlier that year, never returned to a Grand Tour podium again, though he did win stage 11 of the ‘92 Tour.

The Tour de France has never concluded with a time trial since, but will do so in 2024. The riders face a 35km hilly time trial in the south of France as the traditional finish in Paris is moved to accommodate the Olympic Games.

The largest winning margin at the Tour de France

In contrast, the largest margin between the winner of the Tour de France and the runner up occurred at the 1903 Tour de France, the first edition of the race. Maurice Garin finished two hours, 59 minutes and 21 seconds ahead of Lucien Pothier. For context, the same time gap separated Tadej Pogačar  and Greg Van Avermaet at the 2020 Tour de France, who finished first and 50th respectively.

In general, the margin of victory at the Tour de France has decreased as time has passed. Prior to the Second World War, the Tour de France was  regularly  decided in hours rather than minutes. The first Tour de France post-World War II took place in 1947 and was the first Tour not organised by L’Auto . Since, the time gap between the winner and runner-up has never been more than 30 minutes.

• Fausto Coppi, 28 minutes and 17 seconds, 1952
• Gino Bartali, 26 minutes and 16 seconds, 1948
• Hugo Koblet, 22 minutes, 1951
• Eddy Merckx, 17 minutes and 54 seconds, 1969

Luis Ocaña, 15 minutes and 51 seconds, 1973

(Largest Tour de France winning margins since 1947)

Fausto Coppi won the 1952 Tour de France by just over 28 minutes, which is the largest margin since the Tour de France restarted after the Second World War. Coppi also won five stages that year in a dominant performance.

Cover image: Jean-Yves Ruszniewski/Corbis/VCG via Getty Images

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Princess Madoki, la liberté de waacker

La danseuse et chorégraphe Josépha Madoki est une des grandes figures du « waacking », qu’elle a découvert en 2005. Cette danse, née dans les années 1970 dans la communauté gay américaine, lui a insufflé une énergie festive et communicative. Elle se produit avec sa compagnie au Musée d’Orsay, à Paris, du 26 au 28 avril.

Par  Rosita Boisseau

Temps de Lecture 3 min.

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« Le waacking, c’est une manière de se créer un personnage, de se raconter des histoires, de se réinventer. Le temps de la danse, on est une princesse. » Et voilà comment la danseuse et chorégraphe Josépha Madoki s’est intronisée « Princess » Madoki. Un titre de noblesse qu’elle arbore tout sourire et avec grâce pour vanter cette danse de libération dont elle ne cesse d’additionner les mérites. « Je me suis trouvée en tant que femme et artiste grâce au waacking, précise-t-elle. Il met en lumière la féminité, quel que soit le genre de la personne. »

Cette version amplifiée d’elle-même, Josépha Madoki, 42 ans, qui présente son spectacle D.I.S.C.O. ( Don’t Initiate Social Contact with Others ), ainsi qu’une battle de waacking du 26 au 28 avril au Musée d’Orsay, à Paris, la doit à un choc. En 2005, celle qui a déjà accumulé des apprentissages variés depuis l’âge de 10 ans dont celui du jazz, du hip-hop et du classique, participe à la battle réputée « Juste Debout », à Paris. Une des juges de la compétition, la championne japonaise Yoshie Koda, fait une démo dans laquelle elle introduit des mouvements de waacking . « J’ai été époustouflée par son travail des bras, se souvient-elle. Je me demandais vraiment comment elle faisait. Ça a été le début de mon amour pour ce style. »

Mais d’où vient donc ce waacking  ? Il surgit dans les années 1970, au cœur des boîtes de nuit de Los Angeles où se réfugie la communauté gay afro-latino. « Ils avaient trouvé un espace safe pour s’exprimer, raconte Josépha Madoki . Ils ont créé cette danse glamour inspirée par le cinéma hollywoodien et ses stars comme Greta Garbo et Marilyn Monroe, mais aussi les dessins animés et les arts martiaux que ces hommes, très jeunes pour la plupart, appréciaient. »

« J’ai dansé ma vie, ce soir-là »

Sur des tubes disco, le mouvement s’envole au gré d’une formidable vélocité des bras. « C’est, entre autres, l’utilisation du nunchaku qui a inspiré ces gestes, poursuit-elle . Rien ne sort de nulle part. » Quant au mot wack, il recouvre deux choses : une onomatopée venue des comics représentant un coup porté, et un terme argotique signifiant « tu crains ». Ces deux influences, et notamment la seconde, ont donné son nom au mouvement. « C’était une insulte contre la communauté gay, qui a retourné le terme en le positivant. »

Si le sida décime les waackers américains dans les années 1980, la danse revient néanmoins deux décennies plus tard. « Les survivants n’avaient plus d’endroit où aller, ni le goût de danser », ajoute-t-elle. Heureusement, certains, comme Tyrone Proctor (1953-2020), figure historique, continuent de le transmettre. En 2014, Josépha Madoki file le rencontrer à Los Angeles et suit ses cours. « J’ai beaucoup échangé avec lui car cette culture se préserve oralement. »

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Greg lemond reveals the backstory to his 1989 tour de france win.

By Kate Agathon

American cycling legend Greg LeMond talks about trauma, victory, and resilience leading to his 1989 Tour de France win in his new film, The Last Rider.

The last rider will be released in select theaters on june 23..

“Very strange things happen in cycling.You can’t count a race as won until the last minute,”  Spanish cyclist Pedro Delgado says dryly to the camera in The Last Rider (2022). 

The 1988 Tour de France (TDF) champion’s remarks could not more aptly describe the historic 1989 TDF in which one of the greatest moments in cycling ( nay, sports ) history took place. 

That year, American Greg LeMond nabbed the maillot jaune from France’s Laurent Fignon in the final time trial, ultimately winning cycling’s most prestigious event in what remains as one of the biggest sports upsets of all time.

For three weeks and over 2,000 miles, LeMond and Fignon had duked it out on the world’s biggest cycling stage. 

Across the flats from Poitiers to Bordeaux, and in the mountain stages over the Pyrenees and the Alps, the duo battled. 

With neither rider giving in, the final days were dramatic. Although LeMond won Stage 19 Villard-de-Lans to Aix-les-Bains, Fignon was in the lead for GC. Then the final time trial happened.

With a 50-second lead over LeMond going into the final time trial, the egotistical Fignon was confident in winning his third TDF title (he had previously won in 1983 and 1984), and had already begun to celebrate on the train to Paris the night before. 

According to Fignon’s directeur sportif Cyrille Guimard, the premature pouring of champagne was partly Fignon’s way of continuing to aggravate his rivals, but also to hide an embarrassing secret- Fignon was suffering from saddle sores.

Despite Fignon’s physical pain, in their arrogance, neither Guimard or Fignon ever dreamed that LeMond would overtake his lead in the individual time trial (Fignon himself was an adept time trialist). To overcome such a deficit was simply not done and unheard of- until LeMond.

Clad in a specially designed aero helmet and riding a time trial bike tricked out with aero bars and a rear disc wheel, and unaware of his opponent’s affliction, LeMond rode the final day with a nothing-to-lose audacious intensity. 

The effort LeMond put in was incredible, and he emerged victorious.

In the end, a mere eight seconds separated first place (LeMond) from second place (Fignon), while defending TDF champion Delgado took third. To this day, eight seconds remains the smallest winning margin in the race’s history. LeMond’s focus resulted in the fastest ever time trial in TDF history and cemented his TDF legacy.

That year, Fignon was not the only one keeping a secret.

What no one realized was that leading up to his amazing comeback, LeMond himself was also concealing a secret; an assortment of psychological and physical traumas that had tortured him for years.

America’s only TDF champion

What makes The Last Rider unique is that it juxtaposes the public facade of LeMond the G.O.A.T. with the relatively unknown private side of LeMond the Survivor.

“In The Last Rider we get to see what was going on in the background. Trauma changes a person, and unknown to most, I had suffered a lot,” said LeMond from his home in eastern Tennessee over a recent Zoom interview.

 “All people saw was success. But there’s a moment you hit a breaking point,” he continued. 

That breaking point happened in the 1986 TDF when former teammate and five time TDF winner Bernard Hinault famously betrayed LeMond after publicly declaring the previous year that he would support LeMond to victory.

The agony of the psychological stress dealing with Hinault opened up a wound for LeMond that for the first time as an adult, he was forced to address: he was a victim of sexual assault.

For years, he had kept the trauma resulting from the sexual assault a closely guarded, terrible secret that he did not even reveal to his wife, Kathy. 

In addition to the psychological trauma, he also had to contend with physiological trauma from a devastating incident in which he had been accidentally shot with a shotgun.

Compounded with depression, shame, and other dysfunctional family dynamics taking place at the time, he silently tried to manage his layers of trauma alone as he fought to regain top place among the world’s most elite cyclists. 

Being alone while trying to win the GC title at the TDF was not an enviable position to be in. 

After Hinault’s duplicity became apparent in 1986, a determined LeMond had ridden to victory without the help of his former teammate. Additionally, he rode defiantly in the face of dark rumors among the peloton of others sabotaging his (LeMond’s) performance throughout the remainder of the race.

In 1989, he found himself largely riding alone again as no one had considered him a serious contender for the GC throne and his team was relatively weak.

Without a reliable domestique, LeMond not only had to rely on his own grit to get through the grueling stages of the 1989 TDF, but he also had to contend with the trauma he had bottled up deep inside. Those factors combined may have made him the most successful, yet loneliest rider in the TDF peloton that year.

Due to the lack of support and the resources he needed to win, LeMond’s resilience and ensuing victory in the 1989 TDF made his feat even more remarkable. 

LeMond’s backstory during that time is as much a part of his victory as the final time trial.

“The film is more about the backside story than me winning. I think it is better to understand that side of my career other than just my race victories,” LeMond said emphatically.

Working with Holmes

The world is familiar with LeMond’s persona as America’s greatest cyclist, but what about LeMond the survivor and victim’s advocate? The personal struggles he faced outside of cycling? 

This is where The Last Rider reveals the complexity of LeMond. Here, we explore the B Side of his champion story- all of which came to a head in 1989.

The Last Rider is written and directed by BAFTA award winner Alex Holmes. No stranger to writing/directing documentaries (Holmes wrote and produced 2014’s riveting Stop at Nothing: The Lance Armstrong Story ), Holmes takes the audience on a deep dive into the stories you already knew (LeMond getting shot during a hunting trip, Hinault’s deception in the 1986 TDF, etc.). 

According to LeMond, Holmes approached him with the idea of doing the film four or five years ago.

“I was reluctant. I’m kind of going, I’ve heard this story over and over,” he said. “But Holmes explained that he wanted to show a more personal side, the other side of my story. For example, when I got shot, I had to pretend I wasn’t really that injured just so I could stay on the team. And I think he wanted to tell that story about me going from winning the TDF to almost quitting the sport and then winning. ”

“And then I said that’s what I’d like. I wouldn’t like a puff piece that was like, you know, I won the TDF in 1989. That was really a great victory, but it was overcoming a lot of stuff that led up to it that I’m more proud of than even that victory,” LeMond explained.

Production took place during the pandemic, and all the interviews were done remotely.

“It was great working with him. He wants to tell emotional stories and make movies that might touch other audiences. There’s a lot of people who are not cyclists who will like the story and I think that’s what his goal was with The Last Rider . He really put this together, he really did,” he praised.

Everyone is vulnerable

Holmes also presents a closer look into personal revelations that LeMond had kept undercover for decades and that had marred his first TDF win in 1986.

Shortly after his win, LeMond’s trauma resurfaced and he was afraid his abuser would speak out now that he had become world famous. Depression later ensued.

“I had no joy from that victory,” he said. “To win the TDF was my dream. But no one knew what I was going through physically and psychologically.”

Cycling was LeMond’s physical and mental outlet, and he was exhausted from the emotional trauma. “It (trauma) was always there. It comes back to hit you,” he said. 

LeMond’s public disclosure about the sexual abuse only happened several years later, during an arbitration hearing for disgraced American cyclist Floyd Landis in 2007.

Audiences, however, are more familiar with another devastating event that created even more trauma for LeMond and, by extension, his family. In 1987, at the peak of his fitness, he was accidentally shot by his brother-in-law, Patrick Blades, during a family trip to hunt turkeys. 

As a result, LeMond lost 25 pounds of muscle mass, three quarters of blood, and suffered a collapsed right lung. 

Deep depression, sudden financial worries (he was unceremoniously dropped from his team), and strained family relations (Blades felt so remorseful for shooting LeMond that he threatened to take his own life and was temporarily put into a psych unit at another hospital), presented LeMond with the darkest two years of his life.

“The stress was incredible. There were a lot of down days and I cried during many of them,” LeMond said.

Eventually, he realized that he needed to ride, and resolved to ride in the TDF once more. 

Going into the 1989 TDF, he competed with 45 lead pellets remaining in his body- including three in the lining of his heart and five more embedded in his liver.  

“I don’t think people have really appreciated the serious injury that I had. And it has kind of been discounted and it set me up because I had to pretend I wasn’t that injured,” said LeMond.

“So it set me up so that when I wasn’t performing, they’d look at me and say I wasn’t being professional, I wasn’t training right, I wasn’t eating right. Which was the opposite- you don’t win the tour without knowing how to do it.”

“And it set up, even to this day, the idea that I’m the one who set the example of focusing solely on the TDF as my only goal. That was out of survival , not intention. I loved The Classics, I wanted to do every race!” he exclaimed.

LeMond continued, “I would have loved to have seen what my career would have been like without the accident. I think I would have been a better palmares and my resume would have been a lot stronger. I guess I’m fortunate that I even got to race again.” 

While the struggles LeMond had to overcome to win the 1989 TDF were substantial, so was his rivalry with Fignon.

Rivalry for the ages

“Anybody who threatens me or bullies me, I’m done. I will go for the throat!” LeMond exclaimed. 

And LeMond did. With voracious tenacity.

Like a favorite book to be re-read (even if you know the ending by heart), cycling fans can’t get enough of revisiting the dramatic 1986 and 1989 Tour de Frances.

As an aficionado of cycling films ( Slaying the Badger , Band of Brothers , and All for One remain favorites), I’ve seen numerous films telling the incredible story of LeMond. However, The Last Rider differentiates itself because it is so masterfully done you can’t help yourself but get caught up in the moment.

Imagine a TDF where one team’s support vehicle sideswipes the other like a bumper car to prevent them from speeding ahead to share crucial information about their opponent (LeMond’s team support car managed to hold off Fignon’s for 1 or 2 kilometers on the Alpe d’Huez).

Or one where the GC is criticized by other GC contenders (Delgado and Fignon) for the perceived unsporting behavior of “not riding like a GC.”

During the last 20 minutes of the film, I found myself literally sitting on the edge of my seat, booing at the arrogant Fignon (cycling’s equivalent to Draco Malfoy) and cheering loudly when it became apparent to LeMond that, against all odds, he had won his second TDF. 

Even though I already knew the outcome, I was so invested in LeMond’s journey that by the time the showdown in the final time trial arrived, I had teared up in emotion. I felt myself living in the moment of a victory that happened 35 years ago this July. LeMond wins!! Yes!!!

For LeMond, winning the TDF was a relief.

It not only healed his inner pain and uncertainty in his return to racing, but healed the uncomfortable rift in the LeMond family that had been omnipresent following the shooting incident in 1987. 

The 1989 TDF is one of the most memorable cycling events of all time. 

LeMond had been absent from professional cycling for two years. He entered the race with a new team, a damaged body, a new mindset, and a formidable foe in Fignon. Many of the obstacles he had to overcome were unknown to the public and makes LeMond’s comeback story even more incredible.

While he continued to struggle silently with trauma, LeMond’s legend as a cyclist grew. After his 1989 TDF win, he donned the rainbow stripes when he won the World Championship that August, and won his third and final TDF in 1990.

In the aftermath of Armstrong’s stunning confession of doping in 2013, LeMond’s comeback story from the brink of death is even more compelling and his staunch anti-doping

 stance even more respected. 

A man of firsts

LeMond is a man of firsts. 

First and foremost, the first and only American cyclist to win the Tour de France multiple times.

Before Tadej Pogačar’s stunning time trial win over Primož Roglič in the 2020 TDF (thus winning the stage and GC), LeMond did it first. Before Jens Voigt made his moral anti-doping stance public, LeMond spoke out first.

Finally, several years after LeMond revealed that he was a victim of sexual abuse, 2012 TDF winner Sir Bradley Wiggins also opened up about being a victim of sexual abuse (he was abused at the same age Greg was) and its impact on his life. Like LeMond, he used cycling as a coping mechanism.

It seems fitting that The Last Rider was made during a time in which elite athletes are becoming more vocal about abuse they have suffered at the hands of others (i.e. Larry Nassar and members of the U.S. Olympic women’s gymnastics team), and have no qualm publicly discussing the stress from unseen grief or trauma they endure under immense pressure while competing (i.e. Simone Biles, Mikaela Shiffrin). 

After seeing The Last Rider, I won’t quite view cycling’s elite in the same way again. Is LeMond sympathetic to 2019 TDF winner Egan Bernal, who suffered a horrendous training crash in 2022? What unseen struggles are cycling’s current stars dealing with?

For LeMond to reveal his vulnerabilities in a feature-length film and share a behind-the-scenes-look where things were not so rosy, takes immense courage. 

His unwavering anti-doping stance during his entire career and afterwards (i.e. Armstrong’s vicious attacks) took courage. His personal truth only adds to his cycling legend, making his stories one of the greatest in sports history. Sharing his struggles doesn’t damage the luster to his legacy at all, it only enhances it.

I hope The Last Rider eventually becomes available to stream or rent, because this is the type of film you watch multiple times. Masterfully done, it is a must-see for cycling aficionados and sports enthusiasts. Engaging like no other, The Last Rider is a film that you will not want to miss.

One week shy of 62, LeMond no longer keeps secrets tucked away.

“I’m an open book! I’ve been to therapy, my wife has been incredibly supportive. I’m not ashamed of what’s happened to me in the past and I’m pretty proud of what I’ve done,” he proclaimed.

As for his thoughts on The Last Rider? 

“I think people will like it. Stories are timeless. Cycling is an incredibly exciting sport and there’s a human side that they get to see,” finished LeMond.

See the film

Just in time for the 2023 TDF, The Last Rider (2022) drops in theaters across the country on June 23. 

More information can be found here . Along the Front Range, The Last Rider will screen at Century 16 in Boulder, Cinemark 16 in Fort Collins, Westminster Promenade 24, and Tinseltown 20 in Colorado Springs.  

Watch the trailer here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9kWF4FmllqM

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France's Godon wins opening Tour de Romandie stage

Fribourg (Switzerland) (AFP) – French cyclist Dorian Godon won a sprint finish ahead of his Decathlon AG2R La Mondial team-mate Andrea Vendrame on the first stage of the Tour de Romandie in Switzerland on Wednesday.

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Godon, who came fourth in Tuesday's prologue, slipped through a gap to burst clear of the bunch in the closing metres of the hilly 165.7km stage from Chateau d'Oex to Fribourg and was followed closely by Vendrame.

Belgian rider Gianni Vermeersch of Alpecin-Deceuninck claimed third after an early six-man breakaway was swallowed up by the peloton on the last climb of the Arconciel.

Godon took over the race leader's jersey after picking up a time bonus that leaves him six seconds in front of Vermeersch. Julian Alaphilippe is nine seconds off the pace in third.

"We did a one-two with Andrea, and on top of the jersey, it's my first World Tour victory. I just had to be patient and I was rewarded," said Godon.

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"Tour de France Cycle City" label: soon 150 towns and 10 countries in the loop?

As part of its "Riding into the Future" programme to promote sustainable mobility, the Tour de France launched the "Tour de France Cycle City" label in 2021, encouraging all the initiatives taken by towns and cities that have already hosted the Grande Boucle to promote everyday cycling.

For this fourth edition, the Tour de France and the Tour de France Femmes avec Zwift have received bids from 24 cities, including six outside France. This year, 16 towns on the 2024 Tour de France route have applied, and two are on the 2024 Tour de France Femmes avec Zwift map, which should take the number of approved cities to 150... in 10 different countries!

The results will be announced on 15 May as part of the “Mai à vélo” (Bike in May) campaign.

150! That's the symbolic milestone the "Tour de France Cycle City" label could reach in its fourth edition. This initiative, created in 2021, enables towns that have already hosted the Grande Boucle to have their commitment to developing cycling in all its forms assessed and rewarded. Whether they are French or foreign, rural or urban, towns applying for the label must highlight all the existing measures to encourage cycling in their application and present local short- and medium-term development plans (infrastructure deployment, improving rider safety, learning to cycle with the "How to ride a bike" campaign, parking and combating theft, maintenance and repair, etc.). All these measures contribute to the growth of cycling as a means of daily transport, a source of leisure, and exercise.  

Since 2021, 133 cities in eight countries have already received at least one level of accreditation. With 24 applications, the 2024 campaign could see the number of towns and cities recognised for promoting cycling rise to 150. In addition to the new French and Belgian cities that could appear on the map, two new territories are about to join the club, representing ten countries with towns awarded the label! Italy, where the Tour de France will set off on 29 June for the first time in its history, has three candidates: Rimini, Piacenza and Pinerolo. More exotic still, Japan, which for over ten years has welcomed the champions of the Grande Boucle to Saitama in the middle of autumn as part of a festive criterium reminiscent of the Asian craze for the event, could also be in the running!  

Sixteen French towns on the route of the 2024 Tour and two others on the Tour de France Femmes avec Zwift submitted bids, from Evaux-les-Bains, the least populous of the candidate towns, to Nice, the host town of a new and spectacular finish of the Tour de France on 21 July, reflecting the diversity of bids once again this year for a label that allows towns to showcase their assets on their scale. Four French cities that have hosted the event in the past have also applied, while two municipalities that have already received the label have requested a reassessment of their rating. The jury is now studying all the applications. The results will be announced to the candidate cities on 15 May 2024 as part of the "Bike in May" campaign.  

Composition of the jury for the "Tour de France Cycle City" label: Christian Prudhomme, Director of the Tour de France; Émilie Defay, deputy editor-in-chief at France Bleu Paris; Jean Ghedira, director of communications, sponsorship and general secretariat at LCL; David Lazarus, mayor of Chambly and chairman of the "Sports" working group of the Association des Maires de France; Olivier Schneider, president of the FUB (French Federation of Bicycle Users); Karine Bozzacchi, CSR manager for the Tour de France.  

Candidate cities for the 2024 label:  

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