History will remember that a bright sun bathed the Champs-Élysées on July 24, making the smile of Lorena Wiebes, the first winner of this Tour du Renouveau, even wider. The Dutchwoman had prepared her case well, as evidenced by her nails painted in yellow on the left hand, and in green on the right hand. At 23, the DSM sprinter savors her happiness on the most beautiful avenue in the world, this Sunday afternoon.
Her sixteenth success of the season, clinched in the sprint ahead of women’s cycling legend Marianne Vos (Jumbo-Visma), propels her as a favorite in the first harvest, before the road rises and ends up rearing up at the weekend. next in the Vosges, with a finish on July 31 at the top of the Super-Planche-des-Belles-Filles. “The team did an amazing job! “, she launches to who wants to hear it. A few steps away, Audrey Cordon-Ragot, the double champion of France (on-line race and against the clock) has a less playful mood. “It was a cut-throat stage, plague the Trek-Segafredo runner. The Champs-Élysées isn’t smooth and flat, it’s worse than Paris-Roubaix. My hands are bleeding. We got our brushes and Elisa mixed up a bit (Balm) did not find herself in a good position (7th). »
“They don’t know my name so they call me the champion of France”
Disappointment did not prevent her from enjoying this circuit at times in the midst of an already large audience long before the parade of Jonas Vingegaard and his troupe, final winner of the men’s version. “It’s funny, we don’t know my name so they call me the champion of France”, smiles Audrey Cordon-Ragot. Colin and Lucas, who didn’t miss a thing from the show, couldn’t name a single name from the women’s peloton. But the two students, who follow the Tour des hommes to the point of going to see it pass over several stages, seem delighted. “We don’t know women’s cycling at all,” says Colin. We saw the ads on TV and that made us want to come earlier. We will learn and we will watch the steps. We did well to come early. »
They were not alone on the Warsaw square, under the Trocadéro, around 11 a.m., during the presentation of the teams. Juggling with surprised tourists and joggers blocked by the closure of the avenues irrigating the esplanade overlooked by the Eiffel Tower, enthroned on the other side of the Seine, the curious had plenty of time to discover new faces. “They are so young”, slips Laurette to her husband Bernard. The fifties who came from Auvergne to babysit their grandchildren were also alerted by television. “Our daughter wanted to do athletics,” adds Laurette. We never rode a bike in the family but when I see these young women and all the equipment, the bikes, the coaches, I tell myself that it’s exactly the same as with the men. I’m sure they will succeed and there will be more and more people. »
Kristian and his little troop do not ask themselves these questions. The Norwegians took their vacation to follow their champions. “We will stay to see the men but we came to support the Uno-X team (the only Norwegian formation) and our compatriots Mie Bjorndal (Ottestad) an Anne Dorthe (Iceland), says Kristian. Women’s cycling is very popular with us. It’s so good that the Tour de France is reborn here, under the Eiffel Tower. This Monday, the peloton will have headed east, with an arrival in Provins (Seine-et-Marne), at the foot of another monument, medieval this one. Another story.