Rarely has there been a scene like that of Benoît Cosnefroy on the queen stage of the Alps at a Tour de France. The spectators had also turned the Col de Joux Plane into a celebration mountain, tens of thousands left and right on the side of the road. But Cosnefroy didn’t just let the crowd cheer him on. Instead, the 27-year-old from the Ag2r team rolled into a group of celebrating fans, got off his bike and partied with them for a while.
You can see it on a video, how he dances and takes another sip of beer before driving on – after all, it wasn’t so much alcohol that he continued driving in the wrong direction from then on, as happened to the Moroccan Abdel-Kader Zaaf in a legendary tour scene in 1950 . Cosnefroy, the new celebration king of the peloton, reports on the action shortly before the start of the stage in Les Gets les Portes du Soleil in a short conversation in the mixed zone:
SZ: Monsieur Cosnefroy, how did this moment come about?
Benoît Cosnefroy: It was a fan club for Aurélien (Paret-Peintre) and me, but it’s not just a fan club, they’re really good friends. I knew they would be waiting somewhere up the climb, but not exactly where. We meet more often during the off-season, but unfortunately we see each other less often during the season.
Was this moment planned?
No, I didn’t know beforehand where I would be in the final ascent. But I had a bit of an advantage over the gruppetto (Group of drivers left behind who are struggling to stay within the grace period; ed.)so I said to myself that I can stop there for a moment.
Benoît Cosnefroy from the AG2R team.
(Photo: Thomas Samson/AFP)
How long did you stop?
I didn’t check my computer, I think about 30 seconds, but you can see it in the video. (It was therefore significantly longer than 30 seconds; ed.)
And you even had time for a sip of beer.
They had definitely bought a lot of beer, 900 liters in total. Then I just took a sip. It was definitely a beautiful moment. But let’s stick to the essentials: Of course, we’re not here to celebrate. The goal of our team is a stage win on this tour. But at that moment it was out of reach, so I stopped for a moment. The rest of the ascent was definitely easier in the gruppetto. And lets me go into the last week with a smile.
What’s it like when you, as a driver arriving in the gruppetto, witness such incredible performances from Tadej Pogacar and Jonas Vingegaard?
That’s very impressive. It really is a race of two riders against the rest of the world. But it’s also not like it hasn’t happened before. It’s always been the case that there are a few riders on a different level in the mountains.