The Super combative Tour de France 2021 ended up saying stop and accepting his fate… Suspected of doping and provisionally suspended at the beginning of February by theInternational Cycling Union (UCI) for anomalies in his biological passport, then dismissed with immediate effect by his team Decathlon AG2R La Mondiale at the end of March, we left Franck Bonnamour ready to fight to prove his innocence and regain the right to return to the professional peloton. “With the help of my lawyers and scientists, we are working on my defense. I have always been an honest, upright and clean runner and therefore cannot be accused of cheating.”he then wrote in a long message. But a few months later, the harsh legal and financial reality finally caught up with the Breton, finally forced to draw a definitive line on his professional career, at only 29 years old…
Video – Franck Bonnamour didn’t think he would stop so early in 2023
“It’s too costly in financial terms, I’m stopping… I can’t afford to lose everything”
The reason which pushed the native of Lannion to throw in the towel and accept the sanction ofUCI is simple: aalmost long months of procedure, he no longer had the means to continue to defend himself, as he explained to West France in an article published this Thursday evening. “It’s too costly in financial terms, I’m stopping“, he made the bitter observation, he who has already lost an apartment in history. “I can’t afford to lose everything and it’s financially blocking. It’s been difficult for six months, I didn’t want it to last two years, three years like that. My priority is to maintain a family balance. Morally, there are difficult times, I am supported by my family and I am also followed psychologically. I’m afraid of the future. I know what I did, what I didn’t do“, he concluded.
So we won’t see again Franck Bonnamour in the peloton, and it is therefore in Australia, on a 54th place in Santos Tour Down Under in January 2024, that his great career ended prematurely. L’former team rider B&B Hôtels-KTM of Jerome Pineau had notably sought the title of “super-combative” on the Tour de France 2021. Winner of the Polynormande in 2022, Franck Bonnamour had then managed to relaunch itself after the fiasco B&B Hôtels-KTM by joining the team AG2R – Citroen in January 2023, which has since become Decathlon AG2R La Mondiale Team. But the ending was not as expected…
=
