It is perhaps the tricolor cyclist of the last 20 years who has come closest to winning the Tour de France. Some would even say that Thibaut Pinot deserved at least one. But at 32, the Groupama-FDJ rider will never taste a triumph on the Grande Boucle. This Thursday, the climber announced that he would end his professional career at the end of next season. “2023 will be my last season and I will do everything to finish in style”, announced the runner on his Twitter account.
Year in which he must line up with the Giro next May – “the main objective of his season” as he announced – and on a last Tour de France. “This is not a farewell tour. He will run without apprehension of the future. He will have fun and he will win us races, ”promises Marc Madiot, sports director of Groupama-FDJ.
If he did not register his name on the list of winners on the Champs-Élysées, the Frenchman wrote some of the most beautiful pages of the Tour. Whether it’s thanks to his results like his podium in 2014 with a white jersey for best young rider or his victory at Alpe d’Huez in 2015 ahead of Nairo Quintana, Alejandro Valverde or even Christopher Froome. “A victory that we remember in his career” according to the words on the arrival of the main interested party.
Not winning the Tour? “It was his destiny”
The most beautiful but also the saddest pages like this July 26, 2019. Favorite of the Tour de France after flying over the Pyrenees (winner at the Tourmalet), Pinot is forced to dismount, in tears, during the 19th stage, in the Alps. A left thigh injury put an end to his yellow jersey dreams. “It was the longest hours of my career,” said the tricolor runner at the time. The symbol of a cursed story with the Grande Boucle. In nine editions, Thibaut Pinot has let go four times. “That’s life, and that was his destiny. Today, his track record is what it is. You have to keep good memories. Alpe d’Huez was a great moment,” recalls Marc Madiot.
On the other Grand Tours, the historic Groupama-FDJ rider also experienced bad luck. During the Giro 2018, then 3rd overall, the climber suffered from severe dehydration and was forced to stop at the end of the 20th stage. In 16 Grand Tours, Pinot will have gleaned only one final podium, a single distinctive jersey, but six stage victories. Winning stages on the three Grand Tours remains a rare performance. Pinot knew how to do it.
“We must remember that he is a valiant runner who knew how to hurt himself. That’s what touched me the most about him, his ability to go far in pain and to bounce back from difficult times. He was a fantastic runner in terms of his potential. He’s a romantic runner who got lost in the 21st century. Perhaps he would have gotten lost in the 20th century as well…”, whispers his sports director. As a romantic, he will also end his career on the Tour of Lombardy, a symbolic race, the most beautiful line of his record with his victory in 2018.
A regular at the Parc des Princes
If the tricolor climber is retiring this season, it is also the result of the last three uneven years marked by long-term absences. “The triggering point was my injury in 2021 (following his crash in Nice on the 2020 Tour). There, I realized that it was difficult, that I was getting old and several times I thought about stopping, ”explained the future retiree in the columns of L’Équipe.
After 1,007 days without a victory, Thibaut Pinot had however found the joys of success during the last stage of the Tour of the Alps 2022. A return which will not prevent the French rider from making the decision to stop. “We learned that at the end of last season. We felt it coming, I didn’t fall from the tree, ”confides his sports director of Groupama-FDJ. “If I go back a bit, I started thinking during confinement too. It was the first time that I felt like I was myself, ”also analyzes Thibaut Pinot, still at L’Équipe.
Finally, Thibaut Pinot is a love story with cycling but also with the Parc des Princes. “Except for PSG and football matches, it was difficult to move him. He goes to games regularly. When he can, he goes. Thibaut didn’t go to the boxes, that’s for sure. He was going in the kop, ”says Marc Madiot. Accustomed to the Virage Auteuil, the climber already has his future mapped out “If I had lived in Paris, I would have been Ultra”, he told us in 2019. Like what Thibaut Pinot would swap the yellow jersey for a tunic with Parisian colors.