Geoffrey Bouchard, you come back to the Tour of Italy for the first time since 2021, when you had won the blue climber blue jersey. Could it be your goal for this Giro 2025 again?
It is a bit complicated to ambition to revise this boute climber jersey. Because you have to manage to escape the good days, when there are a lot of points at stake. I think the priority is still the stage victory. I had missed a few hundred meters on a stage in the Tour of Italy 2021 (the 9th in Campo Felice, editor’s note), I was caught up by a group and it was Bernal who had won. So I will try to take my revenge. I am very happy to be able to come back to the Giro, I had missed it. I had tried on the Tour de France, I had a few small problems with a big fall two years ago. I almost resumed last year on the Vuelta, but I grabbed the covid just before.
How do you feel after this first part of the season?
The condition rises really well crescendo, I am in good shape. At the start of the year, I had a role as a mountain teammate, I ran a lot with Felix Gall. There, it will be a different role, I come back a little to my first love, to project myself at the front to aim for the steps.
What do you think of this big departure in Albania from a sporting point of view, with three rather full-bodied stages? Could that suit you?
These are ultra open steps. It is not a time with only 6 or 7 runners who can target the pink jersey, or a flat arrival and an easy -to -control race for the peloton and sprinters. There, maybe there will be a breakaway, or a sprint with many people, or a sprint in a small committee … It is sure that there is always a lot of tension during the great departures. I had the opportunity to do that of the Tour de France in Copenhagen, there was a huge fervor, even more than on the traditional roads of the Tour.
Precisely, from a more cultural point of view, what is your opinion on this departure from Albania, a country little known in the world of cycling?
To be honest, we only arrived yesterday (Tuesday), so we just made a little trip from the airport to reach the hotel. We didn’t have time to see the country too much. We just could see that the euPort was under construction, and that the country is expanding. I think that for them, it is an opportunity to energize and attract more and more tourists in the years to come. It is a beautiful showcase for them to be able to see the departure of the Giro.
What are the team’s ambitions for this Giro?
The common thread of this Giro will be to target the sprint steps with Sam Bennett. We have a great opportunity to shine on this plan. In parallel, Dorian Godon and Andrea Vendrame are fairly fast runners when the race was a little harder, they will be present on the difficult sprints, it can be very prolific for them on the hilly stages. And last playground, Nicolas Prodhomme and I will try to express themselves to take the escapes and win stages on the more mountainous routes. It will be like a day’s race for each stage, and we have four runners who have already won since the start of the year, so we will take advantage to win.
Related news :