“After the European Championships, I realized that it had been a year since I had won”, the relief of Christophe Laporte after his victory at Paris-Tours

Winner for the only time this season during the Paris-Tours classic, Christophe Laporte had not raised his arms since the European Championships in 2023. He concludes a season of ups and downs despite his bronze medal at the Olympic Games. He expressed his relief after the race, as verbose as he rarely is.

You’ve been looking for it all season long, it’s really special I imagine?

Yes, it’s special, I didn’t really believe it anymore. I repeat myself, but it has been a complicated year. I missed all the classics, I went to the Giro and I crashed. I had to leave the Giro. I then prepared for the tour, fortunately I have this Olympic medal which saved my season a little bit, and I can now also say this victory at Paris-Tours saved my season. It was difficult since the Olympic Games, the legs were there, but the motivation was not necessarily there. I still remained a little focused and motivated, today were conditions that I like, I wanted to go on vacation without having too many regrets. I wasn’t really hoping for this victory anymore, but I did well to persevere because it’s a great achievement that I’m adding to my list of achievements.

Have you had moments of doubt?

Yes there were moments of doubt. After the European Championships, I realized that it had been a year since I had won, which has not happened to me often in my career. We always wonder if we will succeed in winning again, Sillon, I did not manage to grasp them like for example last week. So I couldn’t wait for the season to end. Today was difficult conditions, at the start of the course you are always a little grumpy but when the race starts and you get excited, the instinct comes back straight away and you want to race.

Where do you rank this victory in your record?

It’s important to me, this year I missed a lot of races that were close to my heart. I had lots of problems. I won Ghent-Wevelgem last year and through Flanders, and I couldn’t even take part in it, so it’s always nice to take part in a race when you won it last year. before, we have bib number one there plus I had the European champion jersey I wanted to have a very good year with the European champion jersey, but in the end I didn’t win any races with it, so not everything went as planned. So winning here, Paris-Tours, I’m very happy, it’s a classic that I watched when I was little, given the context of my season, it adds importance.