We couldn’t let him go like that, without a word, after so many years of secretly sighing when the month of July came, the month of all dreams and all disappointments. What if we finally had Bernard Hinault’s successor? We thought it, from 2012, and if we understood, then the hope has always remained to see it up there on the Champs-Elysées. Thibaut Pinot has never worn the Yellow Jersey, and yet, we will have accompanied each pedal stroke with the fervor of a first communion. The Groupama rider well deserved a tribute in four acts.
What could have become the pinnacle of his career will ultimately remain a summary of his destiny. The 2019 Tour de France ended on the 19th stage for Thibaut Pinot, whom everyone saw winning, victim of a rupture of the vastus medialis, a thigh muscle. An extremely rare injury for the cyclist, which almost alone sums up the galleys of the champion on the big tours, and in particular the Tour de France, which he will therefore never have had the chance to win before his last big loop. 20 minutes found four witnesses of this moment which will remain forever engraved in the history of Thibaut Pinot, and that of the Tour de France.
William Bonnet, his teammate at Groupama – FDJ: “Stop, don’t worry, we’re proud of you”
“I saw Thibaut in distress, and what I thought at the time – even if we knew well what state he was in at the start of the stage, we had no illusions – it was at the Giro de the previous year, he had already had a failure, a health problem [pneumopathie] two days before arrival. And there he hadn’t wanted to give up, he had gone beyond the limit, he had really put himself in danger. So at the time I think directly of that, I see him in pain, head down, I know what he’s thinking at the moment, he sees a dream fly away, and I think he says to himself again that he will disappoint everyone, his team, the public, and I just told him “stop it, it’s useless, don’t worry, we’re proud of you”. Even if we hadn’t reached our goal, this abandonment was not going to change what we thought of him and was not going to erase everything he had done so far. I really wanted him to stop hurting himself. With the noise around, I must have spoken a little loudly and I remember that there is a spectator right next to us who hears me and says to him “Yes, yes, Thibaut, he right, we’re all proud of you!” It was hard for him. I tried to make a little joke to play it down, I don’t know if he remembers. The year before, on the Giro, I had abandoned a stage before him, and I said to him “Damn you didn’t have to do it like last year for me to experience this by your side!”. »
Samuel Rocès, Thibaut Pinot’s physio: “Oh damn, it doesn’t hold up”
“It’s a human story, a destiny that is being played out, which takes Thibaut from maybe winning the Tour, because I think he was capable of it, to going home. Retirement is one thing, but there were all the vagaries of the Tour de France. The edging which makes us lose 1’40 overall, then the Tourmalet where he becomes potentially capable of winning by making Bernal jump.
The day before, I am on arrival. He comes out of the doping control and comes towards me to say: “Sam, I pedaled on one leg from the refueling station, it hurts”. And there I answer him: “But what are you talking to me about? Apart from Bernal you end up with all the others, how is it possible to do that on one leg?”. We sit down, I listen, it lasts twenty seconds and I tell him to hurry up to recover, to see the doctor and then we’ll find out. We moved into the recovery phase because every minute counts.
And then the doctor talks about hematoma, but we don’t understand where it comes from, the injury is quite surprising. The cyclists have aches, muscle pains but no hematomas. It bled while there was no impact, we wondered if he had not had a hit in the handlebars. But we only have a few hours to work in the evening and in the morning and we do everything in our power to make it work. We don’t think, we focus on performance and care to restore the man.
The night is short, the next day we work again and things are better. We tell ourselves that it will. I was in the car with the doctor to do the transfer. We hear on Radio Tour that Thibaut is in trouble and immediately we say to ourselves “oh damn, that doesn’t hold up”. Anyway the body had said stop, it was useless. For him and for all those who worked to win the Tour de France, everything stops.
As much as Thibaut was able to say that he didn’t want to win the Tour, he wanted to win it. He wins the Tourmalet, it’s a significant event, and behind that happens. All this construction to win the Tour de France, which would have been the peak of his career, the consecration of a record, to end up like that. It sucks. »
Brice Baubit, director of the documentary “With Thibaut” for France TV: “A lot of colleagues call me saying ‘but did you know?'”
“It’s one of the strongest documentaries I’ve been able to do. In 2019 the FDJ and Thibaut decide to open the doors to do inside. We had known each other with Thibaut since 2015 and there was mutual trust between us, and with the team. Thibaut gives me lots of things so that people can experience this rather exceptional moment, he never closed a door, in good and bad times. He was in the form of his life and wanted to testify to that because he sweats the bike.
His injury, I learn it before everyone else. Finally, at the same time as his physiotherapist, Samuel Rocès. Thibaut crosses the line and tells him right away that his leg hurts. It’s a massive blow. The hotel is 1 km away, uphill, Samuel begins to push him then waits for the others, and I accompany Thibaut. Except that he could no longer pedal, I had to push him to reach the hotel. We are all expectant, no one knows and no one believes it, not even the doctor. He is neat and everyone thinks it can pass. And the next day, I’m on the bus and with the driver Didier, we both thought it was going to hold, and we see on TV that he’s dropped. Lots of colleagues from France Télévisions call me saying “but did you know?”. Yes I knew, but I wasn’t going to say it or anything.
He was on his way to winning the Tour, it was an exceptional moment, he trusted me to go through all that. In victory, it is simple to work. And when I pick up Thibaut on the finish line of the stage where he abandons, I expect him to close the door for me when he goes back to his room. But no, he gives this testimony, he never closed the door on me, even after the curb, when he speaks harshly to his teammates. When he won the Tourmalet, he chilled a beer for me. He’s a team guy, a talented, hardworking guy, capable of going very far in pain, I have great respect for him. And when I sent the sequence after its abandonment to the management, I know that some people cried. »
Guy-Laurent, founding member of the Ultras Pinot collective: “We were all possessed”
“Before the 26th, I had already cried once in this Tour. I was at work the day of the roundabout stage [lors de la 10e étape, Pinot se fait piéger avec son équipe en prenant un rond-point du mauvais côté et perd 1’40 sur les autres favoris]. Seeing that, I was in a daze, and my colleagues said to me “but what’s wrong with you?”, and I answered them “forget it, a roundabout story”. I was crying for a roundabout, they didn’t understand anything obviously [rires]. And on the 26th, in fact I felt there was a problem the day before. While he was well above the others in the Tourmalet and Prat d’Albi, when I see him let Bernal go and not follow Gaudu when he goes, I tell myself that there is a problem. And he kept rubbing his knee on the plain. So on the 26th I was devastated, but I had already slept very badly the day before because of what I had seen. This step, I followed it on TV, live. As I had also seen live when he had pneumonia at the Giro while the day before he was back on the podium. Thibaut what… I was ready to do anything to see him win the Tour. I told everyone that I would quit my addictions if he won it. We were all possessed. The planets were aligned… But in this sport, when a moment like that passes, it doesn’t come back. And then we know that Thibaut is clean, not the type to take things to recover faster or not to feel his injury. His knee, maybe there was a way to take painkillers. The worst is that we will never really know what happened to him. It’s a footballer’s injury, totally improbable, which does not normally exist on the bike. »